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I won't deny that there's a cultural aspect but I've never been into team sports for the same reason I'm not into religion. When I was a kid I realized that thi

I won't deny that there's a cultural aspect but I've never been into team sports for the same reason I'm not into religion. When I was a kid I realized that thinking your home team is better than everyone else's is something that happens just because of where you are. It's the reason why people believe that Jesus is better than Buddha or Mohammed also, or any other ordering of those three. Teams sports amplify and dignify an "us versus them" dynamic. I think that part of us is one of the most problematic aspects of our nature.

aaron-lebo 12y ago
The other side of that coin is to realize that who you are, where you came from, what you believe often (but not always especially in the last case) is something you have no control over. Sports is the perfect example of this in that you can and should take great pride and joy in everything that makes you, you, but also realize that there's someone on the other side of the TV screen that has the same reasons for taking pride and loving who they are. If you can both do that and appreciate the other for that, and not hate them because of it, then you've got it right.
- dinkumthinkum 12y ago
  So does your reasoning break down when you have people that like sports teams for reasons other than locality?
  - aaron-lebo 12y ago
    Not at all. Your passion for something is obviously not tied down to locality.
dinkumthinkum 12y ago
The whole discussion here is about intellectuals not liking sports but of all these supposed intellectuals here in not seeing a lot of intellectual reasoning. Rooting for a team is not the same as believing the universe is actually based on some particular religion, I don't think we can equivocate the two at all.
- golemotron 12y ago
  They come from the same sociological root: in-group/out-group dynamics. I don't know how much more intellectual you want to get.

aaron-lebo 12y ago

The other side of that coin is to realize that who you are, where you came from, what you believe often (but not always especially in the last case) is something you have no control over. Sports is the perfect example of this in that you can and should take great pride and joy in everything that makes you, you, but also realize that there's someone on the other side of the TV screen that has the same reasons for taking pride and loving who they are. If you can both do that and appreciate the other for that, and not hate them because of it, then you've got it right.

dinkumthinkum 12y ago
So does your reasoning break down when you have people that like sports teams for reasons other than locality?
- aaron-lebo 12y ago
  Not at all. Your passion for something is obviously not tied down to locality.

dinkumthinkum 12y ago

The whole discussion here is about intellectuals not liking sports but of all these supposed intellectuals here in not seeing a lot of intellectual reasoning. Rooting for a team is not the same as believing the universe is actually based on some particular religion, I don't think we can equivocate the two at all.

golemotron 12y ago
They come from the same sociological root: in-group/out-group dynamics. I don't know how much more intellectual you want to get.