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I love playing sports and always have. But I have major issues with categorizing everyone who has issues with them as elitist. Some of us dislike them because

I love playing sports and always have. But I have major issues with categorizing everyone who has issues with them as elitist. Some of us dislike them because they're destructive to society. I'm sure I'm not the only one who went to a high school where athletics were more important than academics, and not going to the football game was worth a couple nitpicked points off on your chemistry quiz or some teacher who became a teacher solely to coach had you spend their class taking notes from a text book every day while they jawed around with other coaches in the back room. I feel like sports culture deprives lots of regular public high school students of an education, and I don't think it's elitist at all to dislike professional sports for their contribution to this mess. I love sports, but every time I watch or support them I feel like I'm destroying civil society and undermining democracy and helping to destroy the last vestiges of effective public education. And I'm not elite or upper class.

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- detaro 12y ago
  Nice straw man you got there. Where do you get from that he thinks sports should be banned?
- monocasa 12y ago
  Nobody other than you said anything about banning sports.
sanderjd 12y ago
That's an interesting perspective, in a similar wheelhouse to my own, but I don't blame professional sports for the many ills caused by school sports. You picked on high schools, but the problem is far worse in colleges. I much prefer the european model, which focuses on clubs rather than schools.
- scottmcf 12y ago
  The clubs model brings a different set of problems, especially in populations already divided by religion or class. See the sectarianism and tribalism that have developed around the Old Firm derby in Glasgow, for example.
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aaron-lebo 12y ago
High school athletics is a problem in some ways, but don't throw the baby out with the bathwater. Robert Putnam is a political scientist of some renown. One of his major contributions was a study he did in Italy over 40 years. His question was why was government in in the north generally more efficient and just all around better than politics in the southern portion of the country. His conclusion was that northern Italians were much more heavily involved in civic clubs like religious groups, labor unions, and ... soccer clubs, which created social capital, and horizontal networks, unlike the hierarchical networks in the south which created clientelism and gangs. Sports fanhood and clubs may actually make democracy better. They certainly foster community. There are bigger problems in this country.
- a8da6b0c91d 12y ago
  Well there's putnam for ya, letting the obvious visual difference between southern and northern italians sail right over his head.
  - aaron-lebo 12y ago
    I must admit your point is going over my head, too. Do you mind explaining?
    - selimthegrim 12y ago
      He's probably making some crack about perceived race
Implicated 12y ago
> I feel like sports culture deprives lots of regular public high school students of an education, and I don't think it's elitist at all to dislike professional sports for their contribution to this mess. While I respect your position I feel that you really don't understand the perspective of sports from the athletes side. You're completely glossing over the positives that sports bring to the lives of people involved in them, especially those who take it serious. I've been writing code since I was 13-14 years old, but I've been testing myself physically and mentally since I was 8, thanks to a life long 'career' of playing baseball. Nothing in my life has taught me more about who I am and what I'm capable of, both mentally and physically, than my time spent in team sports. And that's saying nothing of the social growth and life long friendships and connections made. I'm just a middle class white kid who had far better options in life than to pursue professional sports...but for those less fortunate, the education they get from their sports teams/coaches/careers my very well be the best 'real life' education they'll ever get. Calling sports destructive to society seems so completely asinine to me that it's comedic. Then again, my perspective is quite different than yours.
- pstuart 12y ago
  > You're completely glossing over the positives ... > Calling sports destructive to society seems so completely asinine You're completely glossing over the negative elements of professional sports (which includes college sports).
- XorNot 12y ago
  That's not his point though. His point is that for every bit of handwringing of how ghastly some people's comments on sports are, there's the reality that the football coach is the highest (in the millions of dollars range) paid position at almost every university in the US, how the sporting department despite those figures manages to be a net budgetry drain on almost every school which has one, and the reality that college-level sports is hugely abusive and exploitative to the players which actually play it.
  - refurb 12y ago
    Sports is a huge financial drain on the school? Do you have any data? What I heard was that college football tends to pay for all of the other sports at a school. If anything sports creates a lot of opportunities for students that otherwise could be done due to budgets.
remarkEon 12y ago
>I love sports, but every time I watch or support them I feel like I'm destroying civil society and undermining democracy and helping to destroy the last vestiges of effective public education. Hyperbole. In a lot of ways, sports can bring a city or group together in ways that other events can't. I feel like this is where I have to make the usual acknowledgement that yes of course the NFL is run by a bunch of morons and yes of course head injuries when you're a young kid are a bad thing.
- SapphireSun 12y ago
  It's the coming together / tribalism part that unnerves me. There's no rational reason for people to get so excited about it, so it rubs me the wrong way the same way most political rallies do. Small scale sports don't have quite the same effect on me, but large heavily marketed ones do as there is a pressure to conform (i.e. care, participate, hold certain opinions that positively reflect on the enterprise).
  - pjwal 12y ago
    "tribalism part that unnerves me... it rubs me the wrong way the same way most political rallies do" Jr, ear muffs! "U! C! L! A! Fight! Fight! Fight!" Yeah...I'm not quite getting how this invokes visions of Nuremberg, may I politely suggest a bit of therapy perhaps?
    - SapphireSun 12y ago
      You said Nuremberg, not me. ;) That's an extreme case. It's more that when I see that effect, I have an uneasy feeling that a trigger could set things off the rails or shut off critical thinking or modify social standards for certain acts. I'm a bit of a contrarian at heart, so it's something of a non-specific mental immune response. In fact, at (EU) football events, soccer hooligans are widely known for being violent. In the US, commercial and government propaganda are often dispensed in a socially validated environment. An alarming trigger (or a home-run that lands in the stands) can cause a stampede at stadia. I recognize that the more extreme examples are relatively rare occurrences, but they are more common than on say the street per square foot. The irrationality of the crowd is something that unnerves me. I've been to games, so it's not like it's some paralyzing anxiety, but I feel some creepy crawlies at times. Let me give you an example of a cohesive social situation that wouldn't creep me out: A town coming together for disaster recovery, where the people signaling cohesiveness are actually directly affected or are participating in the recovery effort. On the contrary, when people that are totally unaffected come together, it feels more uneasy to me because they are responding to a story being told on the news and are in a condition where simple manipulation is possible as they are not responding to advance their own interests (so certain sanity checks are disabled) and they do not have a good way to verify the story they heard.
ansible 12y ago
I love sports, but every time I watch or support them I feel like I'm destroying civil society and undermining democracy and helping to destroy the last vestiges of effective public education. I'm not a big sports fan, but pro sports does serve a purpose. Sports in general is ritualized hunting / warfare. A civilized and less brutal version of war, but the roots are clear. The skills used are the same as our ancestors used to survive: running, throwing, tackling, hitting things with sticks. That's war. Watching sports is a celebration of those ancient survival skills, though they don't have much place in modern society. These urges exist within many of us, and need an outlet. Sports is highly preferable to the small-scale skirmishes that frequently occurred in centuries past. Many people feel the strong call of tribalism too. Us versus them. Rooting for the home team, and feeling their ups and downs as your own is also wired into us at a deep level. It would be a lot more effective for society if we were pitting city governments against each other, seeing who can deliver the best services at the lowest taxpayer cost. But I'm not holding my breath for someone to set that league. :-)
- dragonwriter 12y ago
  > Sports in general is ritualized hunting / warfare. Ritualized, sure. Hunting / warfare? Depends on the sport. Dancesport is a thing, and its assuredly not ritualized hunting / warfare. > Sports is highly preferable to the small-scale skirmishes that frequently occurred in centuries past. Sports is -- and has been for quite some time -- a frequent focus of the small-scale skirmishes much the same as those you paint it as an alternative to. I'm not sure its much of an outlet. > It would be a lot more effective for society if we were pitting city governments against each other, seeing who can deliver the best services at the lowest taxpayer cost. But I'm not holding my breath for someone to set that league. Actually, before those "small-scale skirmishes" were so frequently outbursts about sport, they were often outbursts between the backers of different political factions, ideologies, or groups striving to shape society (we still sometimes have those, too; sport may have kept the violence while removing the social purpose to a certain extent, but not entirely.)
  - ansible 12y ago
    Dancesport is a thing, and its assuredly not ritualized hunting / warfare. The main topic of conversation is the widely popular professional sports such as Football, American Football, etc. These sports have attackers, defenders, and so on. Sports is -- and has been for quite some time -- a frequent focus of the small-scale skirmishes much the same as those you paint it as an alternative to. I don't see that as the proximate cause of most conflicts throughout history. Mostly, it seems to be about resources, and sometimes ideology too.
briandear 12y ago
If sports weren't the basis for cliques, it would be something else. Eliminating sports would not make high school any better, people would just organize into different exclusionary groups.

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detaro 12y ago
Nice straw man you got there. Where do you get from that he thinks sports should be banned?
monocasa 12y ago
Nobody other than you said anything about banning sports.

sanderjd 12y ago

That's an interesting perspective, in a similar wheelhouse to my own, but I don't blame professional sports for the many ills caused by school sports. You picked on high schools, but the problem is far worse in colleges. I much prefer the european model, which focuses on clubs rather than schools.

scottmcf 12y ago
The clubs model brings a different set of problems, especially in populations already divided by religion or class. See the sectarianism and tribalism that have developed around the Old Firm derby in Glasgow, for example.

deleted 12y ago

[deleted]

aaron-lebo 12y ago

High school athletics is a problem in some ways, but don't throw the baby out with the bathwater. Robert Putnam is a political scientist of some renown. One of his major contributions was a study he did in Italy over 40 years. His question was why was government in in the north generally more efficient and just all around better than politics in the southern portion of the country. His conclusion was that northern Italians were much more heavily involved in civic clubs like religious groups, labor unions, and ... soccer clubs, which created social capital, and horizontal networks, unlike the hierarchical networks in the south which created clientelism and gangs. Sports fanhood and clubs may actually make democracy better. They certainly foster community. There are bigger problems in this country.

a8da6b0c91d 12y ago
Well there's putnam for ya, letting the obvious visual difference between southern and northern italians sail right over his head.
- aaron-lebo 12y ago
  I must admit your point is going over my head, too. Do you mind explaining?
  - selimthegrim 12y ago
    He's probably making some crack about perceived race

Implicated 12y ago

> I feel like sports culture deprives lots of regular public high school students of an education, and I don't think it's elitist at all to dislike professional sports for their contribution to this mess. While I respect your position I feel that you really don't understand the perspective of sports from the athletes side. You're completely glossing over the positives that sports bring to the lives of people involved in them, especially those who take it serious. I've been writing code since I was 13-14 years old, but I've been testing myself physically and mentally since I was 8, thanks to a life long 'career' of playing baseball. Nothing in my life has taught me more about who I am and what I'm capable of, both mentally and physically, than my time spent in team sports. And that's saying nothing of the social growth and life long friendships and connections made. I'm just a middle class white kid who had far better options in life than to pursue professional sports...but for those less fortunate, the education they get from their sports teams/coaches/careers my very well be the best 'real life' education they'll ever get. Calling sports destructive to society seems so completely asinine to me that it's comedic. Then again, my perspective is quite different than yours.

pstuart 12y ago
> You're completely glossing over the positives ... > Calling sports destructive to society seems so completely asinine You're completely glossing over the negative elements of professional sports (which includes college sports).
XorNot 12y ago
That's not his point though. His point is that for every bit of handwringing of how ghastly some people's comments on sports are, there's the reality that the football coach is the highest (in the millions of dollars range) paid position at almost every university in the US, how the sporting department despite those figures manages to be a net budgetry drain on almost every school which has one, and the reality that college-level sports is hugely abusive and exploitative to the players which actually play it.
- refurb 12y ago
  Sports is a huge financial drain on the school? Do you have any data? What I heard was that college football tends to pay for all of the other sports at a school. If anything sports creates a lot of opportunities for students that otherwise could be done due to budgets.

remarkEon 12y ago

>I love sports, but every time I watch or support them I feel like I'm destroying civil society and undermining democracy and helping to destroy the last vestiges of effective public education. Hyperbole. In a lot of ways, sports can bring a city or group together in ways that other events can't. I feel like this is where I have to make the usual acknowledgement that yes of course the NFL is run by a bunch of morons and yes of course head injuries when you're a young kid are a bad thing.

SapphireSun 12y ago
It's the coming together / tribalism part that unnerves me. There's no rational reason for people to get so excited about it, so it rubs me the wrong way the same way most political rallies do. Small scale sports don't have quite the same effect on me, but large heavily marketed ones do as there is a pressure to conform (i.e. care, participate, hold certain opinions that positively reflect on the enterprise).
- pjwal 12y ago
  "tribalism part that unnerves me... it rubs me the wrong way the same way most political rallies do" Jr, ear muffs! "U! C! L! A! Fight! Fight! Fight!" Yeah...I'm not quite getting how this invokes visions of Nuremberg, may I politely suggest a bit of therapy perhaps?
  - SapphireSun 12y ago
    You said Nuremberg, not me. ;) That's an extreme case. It's more that when I see that effect, I have an uneasy feeling that a trigger could set things off the rails or shut off critical thinking or modify social standards for certain acts. I'm a bit of a contrarian at heart, so it's something of a non-specific mental immune response. In fact, at (EU) football events, soccer hooligans are widely known for being violent. In the US, commercial and government propaganda are often dispensed in a socially validated environment. An alarming trigger (or a home-run that lands in the stands) can cause a stampede at stadia. I recognize that the more extreme examples are relatively rare occurrences, but they are more common than on say the street per square foot. The irrationality of the crowd is something that unnerves me. I've been to games, so it's not like it's some paralyzing anxiety, but I feel some creepy crawlies at times. Let me give you an example of a cohesive social situation that wouldn't creep me out: A town coming together for disaster recovery, where the people signaling cohesiveness are actually directly affected or are participating in the recovery effort. On the contrary, when people that are totally unaffected come together, it feels more uneasy to me because they are responding to a story being told on the news and are in a condition where simple manipulation is possible as they are not responding to advance their own interests (so certain sanity checks are disabled) and they do not have a good way to verify the story they heard.

ansible 12y ago

I love sports, but every time I watch or support them I feel like I'm destroying civil society and undermining democracy and helping to destroy the last vestiges of effective public education. I'm not a big sports fan, but pro sports does serve a purpose. Sports in general is ritualized hunting / warfare. A civilized and less brutal version of war, but the roots are clear. The skills used are the same as our ancestors used to survive: running, throwing, tackling, hitting things with sticks. That's war. Watching sports is a celebration of those ancient survival skills, though they don't have much place in modern society. These urges exist within many of us, and need an outlet. Sports is highly preferable to the small-scale skirmishes that frequently occurred in centuries past. Many people feel the strong call of tribalism too. Us versus them. Rooting for the home team, and feeling their ups and downs as your own is also wired into us at a deep level. It would be a lot more effective for society if we were pitting city governments against each other, seeing who can deliver the best services at the lowest taxpayer cost. But I'm not holding my breath for someone to set that league. :-)

dragonwriter 12y ago
> Sports in general is ritualized hunting / warfare. Ritualized, sure. Hunting / warfare? Depends on the sport. Dancesport is a thing, and its assuredly not ritualized hunting / warfare. > Sports is highly preferable to the small-scale skirmishes that frequently occurred in centuries past. Sports is -- and has been for quite some time -- a frequent focus of the small-scale skirmishes much the same as those you paint it as an alternative to. I'm not sure its much of an outlet. > It would be a lot more effective for society if we were pitting city governments against each other, seeing who can deliver the best services at the lowest taxpayer cost. But I'm not holding my breath for someone to set that league. Actually, before those "small-scale skirmishes" were so frequently outbursts about sport, they were often outbursts between the backers of different political factions, ideologies, or groups striving to shape society (we still sometimes have those, too; sport may have kept the violence while removing the social purpose to a certain extent, but not entirely.)
- ansible 12y ago
  Dancesport is a thing, and its assuredly not ritualized hunting / warfare. The main topic of conversation is the widely popular professional sports such as Football, American Football, etc. These sports have attackers, defenders, and so on. Sports is -- and has been for quite some time -- a frequent focus of the small-scale skirmishes much the same as those you paint it as an alternative to. I don't see that as the proximate cause of most conflicts throughout history. Mostly, it seems to be about resources, and sometimes ideology too.

briandear 12y ago

If sports weren't the basis for cliques, it would be something else. Eliminating sports would not make high school any better, people would just organize into different exclusionary groups.