DEAR ABBY: Would you please say something about the practice of choosing teams for group games by having team captains select individuals through the process of elimination?
As a child, I was always the person chosen last, and it happened again at a recent community function. I found it just as humiliating and hurtful as an adult.
We were asked to stand and then sit down as our names were called. I was the last person standing in a room of 60 people, and it felt like I had just been pronounced the least popular and desirable person in the room. -- THE OUTCAST IN ALLEN PARK, MICH.
DEAR "OUTCAST": I'm glad you wrote. When choosing teams for group games, most savvy educators separate students into "odds" and "evens" -- or divide them alphabetically -- rather than using the old "last man standing" method. That this would happen in a room full of adults shows extreme insensitivity, and I don't blame you for being upset.