That’s a false analogy. Lots of things are part of our “culture” as you term it. Britney Spears, Janet Jackson’s “wardrobe malfunction”, the innumerable and tiresome “Survivor” clones. Nothing says any of them are worth knowing anything about.
Plus, there’s a world of difference between the hyper-mediafied organized sports populated with barely literate multi-millionaires which people pay outrageous sums of money to see, and legitimate amateur sports where there’s not so much of the media “SELL SELL SELL!” content. Or personal sports, such as competing in your office softball team, or Corporate Challenge events.
I actively hate nearly all mediafied popular sports. And in my extremely male-dominated office, my co-workers yammer for hours each week about some college player this and some team that…and the problem is, they’re focused on that and that alone. They’re not balancing a love of organized sports with other things - it’s basically their life. They haven’t read a book or magazine in 10 years that didn’t have “…sports…” in the title, or wasn’t written by a player of organized sports. Nearly every client I meet is the same way - 110% sports crazed, their offices littered with massively overpriced paraphenalia and souveniers.
I can’t talk to my co-workers. I can’t talk to them about art, music, science (pretty fucking bad in an office full of engineers and scientists!), news, politics, history…nothing matters but sports. If I open with “So, did you see that the Supreme Court is considering whether allowing interstate wine shipments…” or “Hey, did you all see that there’s going to be a new pre-raphaelite exhibit at the gallery” or even “Hey, Crystal Method is in town”, you can actually see their eyes glaze over at they much their doughnuts. Then they go back to discussing how some high school basketball player is looking good to be recruited. Nothing matters except their precious baseball, basketball, and of course, football. I mean, it’s so bad they were not even interested in the freaking Olympics! The Olympics were something I actually actively watched, and they were talking baseball! And they aren’t interested in personal sports that they themselves might participate in, oh no, nor amateur. At least those I respect.
So getting around to my point at last, I do develop a bias against sport as an oppositional-defiant thing when the topic of sports comes up. And I do tell them that I’m glad I don’t know what they’re talking about. Because I am so fucking sick to shit of being surrounded by people IRL who are dead to the rest of the world, and I am proud each and every day that I have not been reduced to a one-trick cultural pony as they have.