Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[KharBevNor]

Tommy I specifically created this thread rather than having a pro-sports/anti-sports argument in the WE LOVE SPORTS thread. Don't you think it's a little rich to come into this thread, which is for people who hate sports, and defend sports? You and several others who have posted in this thread would surely be very annoyed if we came into the WE LOVE SPORTS thread and started pissing everywhere, eh?

I don't hate physical activity. I walk, cycle and sail. I do historical re-enactment. I don't even necessarily hate the idea of sports per se. I hate when people become obsessed by it. I think professional athlete is the most absolutely useless job ever. I hate the Olympics, a nationalist wankfest that legitimises corrupt regimes and drains millions and millions of pounds/dollars/whatever of money that could have been spent on, for example, saving peoples lives. I hate that funding for the arts is always slashed to fund sport. I hate that people want to increase sports teaching in school, to teach children to be competitive, to pick on the weak, to be elitist, rather than increase art and music teaching in school, to teach children to be creative and understanding. I hate it when people compare art and sport and say both are useless. Sport is an utterly ephemeral, pointless thing. Art can reshape entire civilisations and profoundly alter peoples lives for the better. The only way sports alters peoples lives is give them an excuse to get drunk, make them happier for a little while when their team wins, and to keep draining away their money into overpriced merchandise, tickets etc.

I hate how it is socially acceptable to have an autistic level of knowledge about sports, but not about, say, literature. I hate the violence among sports fans. I think that the ideas of 'social cohesion' and 'socially galvanising forces' are a load of hot air, made up by academics wishing to intellectually justify their love of something so achingly fucking stupid. Sports killed a hell of a lot more people than art last year, and will next year, and every fucking year. Think of what we could achieve if all the energy and passion and economic capital that was wasted in the ridiculous, flashy spectacles of sports was spent on something, anything else.

Also, you guys know I don't like pretty much any mainstream stuff at all so don't lay into me with charges of hypocrisy.

[Dliessmgg]

Sports are a religion, the stadiums are the temples and the famous players are the saviours. That's why they're paid so much.

[Dliessmgg]

I don't understand why we need two separate threads for the two different sides of the debate.

Because we don't want any debate. Some like sports, some don't. There are no arguments except "I like it, therefore it's good" and "I hate it, therefore it's evil".

[jhocking]

I think that the ideas of 'social cohesion' and 'socially galvanising forces' are a load of hot air, made up by academics wishing to intellectually justify their love of something so achingly fucking stupid. Sports killed a hell of a lot more people than art last year, and will next year, and every fucking year.

I think to simply dismiss those points by sneeringly ridiculing them is a bit foolish. I mean, it's to fine to say you hate sports (that's how you feel after all) but leveling vitriol at rational arguments is a great way of avoiding having to face reality. In this case, whether or not you like sports doesn't change the simple reality that other people do like sports a great deal, that art or literature or whatever isn't very compelling to a majority of society, and there's nothing nefarious about a governing body accepting reality (just the opposite really; I really wish they would accept reality more often) in trying to build cities where people actually talk to each other.

Ultimately, if you didn't want to try to discuss sports on a societal level/in a rational way, you probably shouldn't have even brought up the point about how the ruling class uses sports to control the masses. Really though from your post it sounds like your attitudes about sports are similar to mine (I'm fine with the concept of sports, but I hate the excesses of sports mania.) I'm just not as out-and-out pissed off as you are, because those justifications do hold water in my mind.

---

Also, the point about sports killing more people than art is a bit of a red herring. There are plenty of things that kill more people than art (basically everything really, but just picking something at random, air travel.) That doesn't mean we should stop doing those things, it means we should make them safer.

[KharBevNor]

Ultimately, if you didn't want to try to discuss sports on a societal level/in a rational way, you probably shouldn't have even brought up the point about how the ruling class uses sports to control the masses. Really though from your post it sounds like your attitudes about sports are similar to mine (I'm fine with the concept of sports, but I hate the excesses of sports mania.) I'm just not as out-and-out pissed off as you are, because those justifications do hold water in my mind.

I have seen like, seven or eight fights kick off in pubs over football. I haven't ever one seen the TV fantasy of total strangers hugging and dancing and crying together. I have seen total strangers getting into heated arguments about signings though.

Essentially, the idea of sports as force for social cohesion is an idea that simply does not match reality, either in my personal experience, or in wider reading about football hooliganism and other violence and discord associated with sports. Is sports a force for social cohesion in Glasgow, or the East End? I really don't see how something that promotes tribalism and an us against them mentality, and drives people to murder each other because of the colour of their shirts, can be a good thing. This is what I meant with deaths, btw; not sporting accidents, but the violence amongst fans. When was someone last stabbed to death by a frenzied art lover? And yeah, I know this is sort of a moral panic argument, except the violence is so irrefutably linked, and it's only one component of my argument.

[jhocking]

ah I didn't realize what deaths you were talking about, wish you'd specified. Yeah that kind of violence is ridiculous. Does the UK have any incidents like here where parents killed each other over arguments because of their kids' little league games? wtf

I haven't ever one seen the TV fantasy of total strangers hugging and dancing and crying together.

I can't recall having seen this TV fantasy you refer to, but regardless that's not what I was getting at. I'm talking more like people from different socioeconomic classes being comfortable interacting in public. If they don't have any cultural things in common, people tend to fear and hate each other.

Also, this may be a UK specific thing you're railing against, because actually come to think of it it's pretty common for total strangers to laugh and cheer together at sports bars around here. On game days (and remember, I live right next to a major ballpark) I'm a lot more annoyed by the noise levels of people cheering than by violence they commit.

[valley_parade]

I haven't ever one seen the TV fantasy of total strangers hugging and dancing and crying together. I have seen total strangers getting into heated arguments about signings though.

I have. I've been in the middle of that giant dancing hugging pile. It was pretty great.

[Bastardous Bassist]

I have not hugged, danced and cried with strangers, but that is because I support a team that is consistently terrible.  I have, however, made a number of friends where our first point of contact was watching an (American) football game.

I hate that people want to increase sports teaching in school, to teach children to be competitive, to pick on the weak, to be elitist, rather than increase art and music teaching in school, to teach children to be creative and understanding.

I am an incredibly competitive person due to music.  With sports, I always felt like I could play them no matter how good I was and have fun.  With music, I needed to be better than everyone else, or I wouldn't be able to do the things that were fun, and later on do the things that paid.

Personally I think that intelligent people should be able to posit and defend any argument or belief they may have and the best way to be sure of yourself is to be aware of both sides of the debate.

This is my belief about life.

[jhocking]

Music is not a competition.

http://www.wikihow.com/Survive-a-Freestyle-Rap-Battle

[Alex C]

There's patently people on the fence here and have said so.

Yeah, I like sports and all but it's easy to have misgivings and dislikes. I also think you need to be living in a cave not to have a couple of moral concerns about at least the more physically dangerous sports. Take boxing, for example. On the one hand, I agree that people have the right to do what they want and boxers consent to step in the ring. On the other hand, I'm rather leery about a society that offers men millions of dollars to beat the shit out of each other, particularly since many people (including sports fans) begrudge them their pay. I mean, really, at what point are a couple of men being compensated enough that it's OK for us to encourage them to give each other concussions? Is that really even possible? And that's not even touching the whole "Isn't there something better we could be doing?" angle. Capitalism confuses the hell out of me sometimes.

[Storm Rider]

I would just like to point out that even though it's undeniable that the amount of money involved in professional sports is patently ridiculous, it's really not the fault of the players or even the leagues, but rather of advertisers. Professional sports didn't become the multi-billion dollar industry they are today until they started being broadcast on television. Selling broadcast rights, and more importantly advertising rights, is where sports franchises make the vast majority of their income, far more than ticket sales or concessions or anything like that. So while it's completely fair to say that it's absurd how much value our society places on a professional sports player in comparison to the service they perform, the angry reaction is somewhat misdirected.

[KharBevNor]

Going a bit tangential on the subject of dangerous sports, can anyone explain to me why it's okay to risk your life and health doing something like bungee jumping, but not ok to do it, say, taking ecstacy, which is way safer anyway.

I mean, I know the reason, I just want to hear it from someone else.

[onewheelwizzard]

Well, if it were legal to take ecstasy for recreation, it'd presumably be equally legal to use it as a medication in conjunction with therapy for PTSD sufferers (among other patients suffering from mental disorders of varying severity), and this would take a massive bite out of the pharmaceutical industry's profit margin by replacing a whole pharmacopeia of maintenance medications (which need to be bought in quantity and taken on a daily or twice-daily basis for an extended period of time) with a medication that only needs to be taken once or twice in order to result in successful treatment.  The economy would take quite a hit if fewer people needed antidepressants and mood stabilizers, and that's precisely what would happen if MDMA entered psychiatric practice.

[0bsessions]

I have seen like, seven or eight fights kick off in pubs over football. I haven't ever one seen the TV fantasy of total strangers hugging and dancing and crying together. I have seen total strangers getting into heated arguments about signings though.

Essentially, the idea of sports as force for social cohesion is an idea that simply does not match reality, either in my personal experience, or in wider reading about football hooliganism and other violence and discord associated with sports. Is sports a force for social cohesion in Glasgow, or the East End? I really don't see how something that promotes tribalism and an us against them mentality, and drives people to murder each other because of the colour of their shirts, can be a good thing. This is what I meant with deaths, btw; not sporting accidents, but the violence amongst fans. When was someone last stabbed to death by a frenzied art lover? And yeah, I know this is sort of a moral panic argument, except the violence is so irrefutably linked, and it's only one component of my argument.

I, like Shane, have been in multiple instances of that total strangers hugging and high fiving and what not thing. Shit, I did it last night at a game that the team we were all rooting for ended up losing anyway.

In fact, I've never even seen actual violence erupting from sports in my life. Granted, I've heard about some grizzly stuff (Including an incident last year where a rival team's fan was attacked and beaten down the street from my apartment), but almost all of them have been the result of idiots with violent tendencies using sports as an excuse to exercise said tendencies. I'm reasonably sure I've debated this with you before, but I've seen many more concert and music related incidents in my life than anything even tangentially related to sports. I've seen women throttling each other at concerts, I've seen guys get their noses broken at shows and even been briefly involved in an altercation at a show myself before.

Sports don't cause people to be violent, they just tend to attract a larger amount of the already violent crowd because of the rampant testosterone involved. The same holds true to why you might see a dude get his nose broken at a metal concert as opposed to say Phish or something. Activities that breed heightened emotion and a faux-macho attitude tend to draw people who've got something to prove with their fists.

It's not the sport or the music that's the problem, it's the fanatics and this is a fallacy I see you falling into quite often. It's not that people are obsessive about sports that's the problem, it's that people are obsessive at all that's the problem. Obsession breeds fanatical loyalty, contempt toward those who do not share it and, far too often, violence in the name of said obsession. It happens with music, religion, politics and pretty much everything else under the sun, why draw a line in the sand over sports?

[KharBevNor]

Hey, let's be fair here, I am pretty damn critical of religion.

I also don't think it's at all possible to draw a correlation between sports and politics, as if politics is just a hobby people do, and nothing to get worked up about.

[a pack of wolves]

You also can't separate these things from the fan violence you're talking about. Celtic and Rangers fans go at each other but it's not just about football, it's also about Catholic and Protestant communities fighting. Or look at violence between FC St Pauli, Hansa Rostock and Hamburger SV. The conflict comes from the latter two sides having, at certain times, neo-Nazi factions in their supporters and FC St Pauli fans being well known for their left wing, anti-sexist (apparently Maxim ads are banned from the stadium) and thoroughly anti-fascist outlook. FC St Pauli bring people together in mutual hatred of the Nazis. What's wrong with that?

[Hat]

Music is not a competition.

http://www.wikihow.com/Survive-a-Freestyle-Rap-Battle

Also possibly the only competition in which cocaine is legitimately a performance enhancing drug

[Ozymandias]

Well, if it were legal to take ecstasy for recreation, it'd presumably be equally legal to use it as a medication in conjunction with therapy for PTSD sufferers (among other patients suffering from mental disorders of varying severity), and this would take a massive bite out of the pharmaceutical industry's profit margin by replacing a whole pharmacopeia of maintenance medications (which need to be bought in quantity and taken on a daily or twice-daily basis for an extended period of time) with a medication that only needs to be taken once or twice in order to result in successful treatment.  The economy would take quite a hit if fewer people needed antidepressants and mood stabilizers, and that's precisely what would happen if MDMA entered psychiatric practice.

Or not!

[onewheelwizzard]

::sigh:: I was literally just at a research conference about precisely this, last weekend.  The extrapolation that pharmaceutical industry interests play a causal role in keeping MDMA illegal is my own conjectured opinion, but the bit about MDMA being a safe and effective treatment for PTSD and other mental disorders is simple fact, and it's not a huge leap in logic to see that antidepressant prescription and use would decline if it were available as an alternative treatment.  It almost certainly would not be overprescribed to the extent current antidepressants are, so it wouldn't see widespread use, but my personal opinion is that this is because it does not hold the same potential for profit through overprescription.

[Hat]

Well, if it were legal to take ecstasy for recreation, it'd presumably be equally legal to use it as a medication in conjunction with therapy for PTSD sufferers (among other patients suffering from mental disorders of varying severity), and this would take a massive bite out of the pharmaceutical industry's profit margin by replacing a whole pharmacopeia of maintenance medications (which need to be bought in quantity and taken on a daily or twice-daily basis for an extended period of time) with a medication that only needs to be taken once or twice in order to result in successful treatment.  The economy would take quite a hit if fewer people needed antidepressants and mood stabilizers, and that's precisely what would happen if MDMA entered psychiatric practice.

Or not!

cool contribution dude

[Bastardous Bassist]

Music is not a competition.

And auditions end up with everyone getting the job!  I'm so glad that I was able to make money without having to compete with other bassists.

[Bastardous Bassist]

Eh.  Making music isn't a competition, you're right, but making a living playing music is.  My case is certainly a rare one.

[nobo]

You can play music alone and be happy, but its hard to do that with a sport.

[Bastardous Bassist]

So, sports are more social then?

[Nodaisho]

You can play music alone and be happy, but its hard to do that with a sport.

Depends on the sport. I would consider rallying, target shooting, and free running sports, but you can do those by yourself and have fun.

[0bsessions]

Golf could probably be fun alone too. Not mini-golf, though. Mini-golf requires a second person so you can rub it in their face how much better than them at it I am, Rachel!

*Ahem* What were we just talking about?

[Masterbainter]

I really hate football season... Everyone always asks me my favorite team and I have to respond with I don't watch football and then I get wierd looks.   Then I explain I love playing sports, just hate watching them. 

Yes, the big names do get way overpaid.  It is however, the nature of the beast for this to happen.  It's entertainment and a business.  As with anything, if people are willing to pay the money then people somewhere are going to get the money. 

But I'm with Khar, I hate watching sport or having to sit there and waste my time among friends who are talkinga bout sports all the time.  I'd rather be out having the fun than talking about it.

[Bastardous Bassist]

So, when you're hanging out with friends talking.  What do you talk about?

edit:  I hate football season for the exact opposite reason.  The two things I have done most in my life are music and science.  I rarely find people who give a damn about football in either group.  I still haven't found anybody to discuss F1 or Moto GP with yet.

[KharBevNor]

You can talk about every other single thing in the universe apart from sports.

There isn't exactly a shortage of topics.

[doobiemonster17]

ya i lost alot of friends to skating(i guess thats a sport).
discussion topics were limited to skating and marijuana.

I could only participate in 50% of those conversations.

[evilbobthebob]

I still haven't found anybody to discuss F1 or Moto GP with yet.

Er...If I say I like F1, and that I could probably discuss it, are we going to have to make another thread

[öde]

Actually this is a common error. Spectators are the team. Everybody else involved with the team is transitory. Football teams regularly change hands, managers, coaching staff, players and sponsors. The fans are always the fans. Everybody at the club works for the fans. The players of Leeds United are playing for my team and indirectly I pay their wages.

Perhaps more directly you pay for the armed forces and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, are you as enthusiastic about that team too? I see your point though but it seems about as valid as me saying "we played some great music tonight" when seeing a band I like (and support).

Also, why does everyone have to pick a team? I know people that enjoy football whoever's playing, but they always have "their" team.

[KharBevNor]

Everyone has to pick a team because sports unite people!


Wait.

[a pack of wolves]

Perhaps more directly you pay for the armed forces and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, are you as enthusiastic about that team too? I see your point though but it seems about as valid as me saying "we played some great music tonight" when seeing a band I like (and support).

Also, why does everyone have to pick a team? I know people that enjoy football whoever's playing, but they always have "their" team.

I've heard a lot of people talk about their shame over what "our" troops are doing in the Middle East. Similarly, people aren't always happy with the decisions made by their club or the performance of their team. Most bands don't make any suggestion that the audience is part of the people making music, whereas it's very different with football. You'll rarely see a football match where the commentators won't talk about the crowd's effect on the match. Watching Ipswich lose to Newcastle on the TV recently they were talking about the level of support of the Ipswich fans, how they were urging the players to take chances but Ipswich were nevertheless unable to build on this psychological base.

People like to be part of a group, a community, and it also makes matches more exciting if you care about the outcome. Most of the time it's due to identification with family history, geographical location or national identity.

[KharBevNor]

People like to be part of a group, a community,

And to hate people from other communities.

Yay it's all so cuddly and fun!


I wish I'd just derailed the goddamn sports thread now.




Thing I don't get is how it is even enjoyable to watch sports. It's just so fucking dumb. "OH LOOK ONE MAN IS KICKING THE BALL TO ANOTHER MAN" *sexwee*

"OH LOOK AT THE CARS GO ROUND IN A PRETTY CIRCLE VROOM VROOM VROOM"

"LISTEN TO THE TENNIS LADIES GRUNT!!!"

It's just so utterly without anything to excite the thinking human mind!

[David_Dovey]

OH LOOK THOSE LONG HAIRED GENTLEMEN ARE PLAYING MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS

OH AND NOW THEY ARE MOVING THEIR HEAD/NECKS AROUND IN A CIRCULAR MOTION CAUSING THEIR HAIR TO MOVE IN AN EXAGGERATED "WINDMILLING" MOTION. SPLENDID!

.

.

.

[Bastardous Bassist]

You can talk about every other single thing in the universe apart from sports.

There isn't exactly a shortage of topics.

Why are sports so much worse than everything else?  Would you rather discuss one of those reality shows?  It comes down to what you have in common with other people, and sports happen to be that for a lot of people.  Hell, it's one of the only things I can actually talk about for any length of time with most people here.  Sad?  Maybe a bit, but humans are social creatures and I crave social interaction even with people with whom I have very little in-common.  By the way, very few people I know support my sports team, but I can still have enjoyable discussions with them.

[KharBevNor]

Sports and reality shows are seriously the only things you can think of to have conversations about?


Like, you just seemed to say that it was a 50/50 choice. I've never even seen any reality shows for more than about fifteen seconds channel surfing. I interact all the time with people I have 'little in common' with quite happily without having to talk about lycra shorted ball manipulators.

[a pack of wolves]

And to hate people from other communities.

Yay it's all so cuddly and fun!

Sometimes, yeah. Sometimes not. Sometimes it's communities meeting each other in friendly competition. There's nothing wrong with having a sense of community, just some of the ways that manifests itself.

[Bastardous Bassist]

Sports and reality shows are seriously the only things you can think of to have conversations about?


Like, you just seemed to say that it was a 50/50 choice. I've never even seen any reality shows for more than about fifteen seconds channel surfing. I interact all the time with people I have 'little in common' with quite happily without having to talk about lycra shorted ball manipulators.

No, but reality shows fall into the "every other single thing in the universe apart from sports," so I figured that was okay.  I've tried to have conversations about other things with the people I know.  They tend not to like music (they listen to it, but they don't actually enjoy it).  I can't talk about work because nobody understands what I do (including me).  I can't talk about philosophy, because nobody I can find has any intelligent opinions about it.  Nobody has really read any books, same with movies (with notable exceptions of shitty movies) and television.  Do you see what I'm getting at here?  If I don't want to have a conversation that consists of me explaining things to them, or them talking about the interaction they had at the lunch counter, it's pretty much sports.  Am I happy about that?  Hell no.  I hate it here.  I'd love to have substantial conversations, but I haven't been able to do that since I left Charleston (except with people from Charleston).  Sports is one of those non-topics, like the weather that is accessible to a number of people.

[Hat]

Being a human is about significantly more than passively observing other peoples achievements, ideas, and creative pursuits (or even your own achievements to date), and  as a result the range of things you can talk about outside of these things is practically infinite.

Not that these things aren't interesting to talk about but if they are all you can relate to another human being over then the conversations you have are never going to be as engaging as they could be.

In my experience, most of the limitations people find in their ability to converse with other human beings are entirely self-imposed by narcissistic tendencies when they realise the person they are talking to does not resemble them as much as they'd like.

[Dliessmgg]

OH LOOK THOSE LONG HAIRED GENTLEMEN ARE PLAYING MUSICAL INSTRUMENTS

Listening to music is not watching some guys kicking a ball around.

[Ozymandias]

And if you take cranberries and stew them like applesauce they taste much more like prunes than rhubarb does.

[0bsessions]

Listening to music is not watching some guys kicking a ball around.

I fail to see anything even remotely resembling a point. Music fandom and sports fandom are actually incredibly similar. You could do either if you really felt like it, but the majority of people are content to just watch other people with legitimate talent perform the activities. I've always found Khar to be a strong boarder overall, but claiming sports are pointless and serve no purpose to society as a whole while being an admitted and avid fan of music and concerts just does not add up in any logical manner. I enjoy playing guitar and watching music, just as I enjoy playing sports and watching them. It's about as close to apples to apples as you are apt to get in a discussion of this sort.

This thread is essentially an exercise in "I hate this and everyone who doesn't is a bestial jackass."

[scarred]

How is that out of character for this forum, again?

[0bsessions]

Your pink shirt offends my sensibilities and I hereby judge you harshly as a result.

[scarred]

You have shorter hair than I do! I am offended because you are different! WHARRGARBL

[0bsessions]

Your glasses mark you as a nerd and I hereby inform you that it is my regrettable duty to give you a wedgie and steal your lunch money while cheering for my local sports team.

[scarred]

I'm 6'2", 170 pounds! You are not! I will never accept you socially until you can squeeze into my tightass purple jeans!

[0bsessions]

Was that a come-on?