
Why Sports Are A Sad and Dangerous Waste of Time - joelrunyon
https://medium.com/sociology-of-sport/3530f0ee579a
======
CocaKoala
Sports are fun to watch; they can provide you with a connection to a place,
give you a chance to learn about strategy, are an easy way to strike up a
conversation with somebody else, and are a good way to feel a part of
something bigger than just yourself. Why is the article "Why Sports Are a Sad
and Dangerous Waste of Time" and not "Why Watching TV or Watching Movies or
Reading Dumb News Stories On The Internet Are Sad and Dangerous Wastes of
Time", given that by basically every metric the author provides (people get
really worked up over them, people get into big arguments over them, people
cheer wildly for the participants, billions of dollars get spent on them, and
the consumers don't accomplish anything useful by consuming) apply to them? Is
it because the author likes watching movies, doesn't like sports, and is
bothered by the fact that people like a thing he doesn't like?

~~~
noname123
Sports is cool because it's a documentary-style narrative about people trying
to overcome their limitations and most of the time coming up short. To be
honest, I enjoy the failures than the successes, the show of vanity and
insecurity than the squeeky-clean polished professional athlete.

Some cool sports-related books and doc's I've watched over the years,

Seven Seconds or Less; about Phoenix Sun's "Run & Gun" season which reads more
like a kladeiscope novel about the star players, role players, injured players
and coaching staff. The Sun ultimately falls short of their goal of winning an
NBA championship. The morale of the story is that it doesn't really matter if
you win in the end, the point is to try something different (score in 7
seconds or less of your posession clock, play unselfishly and make the extra
pass). And even a Canadian unatheletic, relatively undersized white guy can
become the NBA Back-to-Back MVP, by owning up to who he is.

[http://www.amazon.com/Seven-Seconds-Less-Season-
Phoenix/dp/0...](http://www.amazon.com/Seven-Seconds-Less-Season-
Phoenix/dp/0743298136)

The Finish Line; about Steve Nash (the former MVP)'s potential last season
with the LA Lakers which reads more like 'Old Man & The Sea,' about a man's
denial of his aging, struggle to defy against it and his slow acceptance and
somehow finding dignity and putting on a last fantastic hooray against the
elements.

[http://grantland.com/the-triangle/the-finish-line-
episode-3-...](http://grantland.com/the-triangle/the-finish-line-
episode-3-steve-nash-reacts-to-the-backlash/)

Skip Bayless, Stephen A's conversation with TO; which watches more like the
last act (on St.Helena) of Kubrick's "Napoleon" if it was made). It shows a
broken down once high flying and flameboyant professional athlete coming to
terms with his vanity and ego, after it's already too late. But that's the
beauty too, of a man accepting who he was, how the situations turned against
him and appreciating life because the circumstances forced him to grow, even
if it meant no longer in the NFL.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I6UouXlWuvo](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I6UouXlWuvo)

Other similiar doc's: Run Ricky Run
([http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1617299/](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1617299/)),
Survive & Advance ([http://vimeo.com/62966564](http://vimeo.com/62966564)),
Hoops Dream
([http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0110057/](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0110057/)).

Hope you can find enjoyment and value in sport as much as I do.

~~~
CocaKoala
Sports are awesome. My fiancee is crazy into hockey; she grew up in Detroit
and is a passionate fan of the Red Wings. After we got serious, I started
tracking the Wings so I could chat with her about how the season is going, and
now I have a lot of fun listening to their games on the radio and tracking
their season (although this current season is pretty rough). I grew up in
Seattle and this year's football season + the Superbowl was incredible for me;
I spent YEARS being salty over the 06 loss to the Steelers and the utter
curbstomping of the Broncoes almost made up for it.

I wonder how this guy feels about the Olympics. Does he bitch and moan about
"ugh I can't believe people watch this crap" when people are rooting for
Michael Phelps, etc?

------
csense
I always hated sports. I got caught in some negative feedback loop where I
never practiced so I was never any good; I was never any good so I never
practiced.

Also it didn't help that I had no siblings or neighbor kids around, kicking a
ball around by yourself gets boring quite quickly. I've never been fast or
coordinated enough to catch things reliably, it's like my brain didn't come
with some physics module that's standard feature on most models. And due to
when my birthday fell, I was always one of the youngest kids in my grade,
which didn't help either.

Sports really suck if you're at the bottom end of the curve. Usually I ended
up waiting or something to happen or running around to various places. On the
rare occasion I had a chance to make a difference in the outcome, I usually
screwed it up. Nobody wanted me on their team, and I didn't enjoy playing.

I'm not really unhappy; if I had a chance to design the "character sheet" I
was born with, I don't know that I'd do anything different. In RPG's and such,
I tend to prefer tricky builds that are unbalanced and optimized for
unconventional strategies.

~~~
twic
You're talking about _playing_ sports. The article is about _watching_ sports.
Or, since it's not just watching but talking about, identifying with, and
generally obsessing over, _fanboying_ sports.

The two are, i think, not at all related. Indeed, if we accept the analysis in
the article, they are opposites - fandom is about _subsuming_ your identity
into a herd defined by its _submission_ to some set of idols, whereas
participation is about _asserting_ your identity as an individual or member of
a team defined by your (intended) _domination_ over your rivals.

------
runaway
Wow. I've read anti-sports rants before, but never one so lengthy and
pointless. It reminds me a lot of the hate I see for pop stars on the
internet. The vitriol over the Biebers and One Directions simply because
they're popular in the mainstream. My immediate reaction is "Lots of people
like something you don't like. Get over it." But ultimately, it's a completely
elitist attitude that in this case ignores the cultural basis for sports
fandom. He looks at all the ape-like sports fans and wonders why they can't
behave like civilized men. Like him.

In summary:

\- He doesn't like watching sports.

\- He once heard about a guy who abused his girlfriend and was also a sports
fan. He concludes that jerks will be jerks despite the existence of sports and
the anecdote was essentially unrelated.

\- He's felt the same shared joy and admiration except about things other than
sports and gets why that was exciting but doesn't feel the same way about
sports.

Great. Particularly ill-conceived is this notion that we are being "tricked"
into rooting for our regional teams despite their being full of non-local
players. What he doesn't get is _the team is the fans, not the players_. We
are the constant throughout the team's history. As the customer base, we are
the reason for the existence of the team. In a sense, we pay to fund the
thing. Players may come and go, but without us there would be no team. That's
why we might simultaneously cheer for a hockey team full Canadians and a
baseball team full of Dominicans. No one is "duping" us. I also fail to see
the point of the wrestling analogy but I suppose it all goes back to the idea
that we're all rubes.

Of course he has a friend who is an Eagles fan, so it couldn't be that he
doesn't understand the cultural basis. And he likes to watch soccer sometimes
so it couldn't possibly be that he "just doesn't get it". And he's not judging
sports fans because they don't choose what is enjoyable to them-- __But why
sports?! __

I 've had so many positive sports-related experiences, memories celebrating
with family and friends, countless strangers befriended simply because we were
both fans, it's no wonder for me. Why does it have to be sports? Because we
like them. Why do you struggle to change society instead of accepting that
this aspect of the mainstream isn't for you?

------
fsk
Most of my lingering injuries are the result of an attempt to get exercise.

I broke my pinky finger playing softball, and it never healed right.

I hurt my knee learning to dance.

------
eip
It's an easy and effective way to keep tards from eating each other.

I still think we should bring back gladiator pits though.

