I used to hate sports, but now I like some of them because they’re pretty. I realized that I can’t really get into watching choreographed dance because most of it is too simple, whereas things like soccer make for good visuals, because rather than being totally planned out beforehand, they proceed semi-chaotically according to a set of rules and the conditions at the beginning of the game, kind of like a cellular automaton. I still can’t make myself feel passionate about the whole competition thing though.
There. I’m officially more pretentious than any of you fuckers who hate sports.
Show me where I called myself sophisticated in my post. You are inferring things that I never even thought, let alone said. I have lots of unsophisticated interests, they’re not popular unsophisticated interests, but unsophisticated nonetheless. Christ on a saltine, dude, lighten up.
Fair enough, if you folks will let me. Very often, however, sports-minded people won’t do this (and in no way do I single them out… people obsessed with other topics are also unwilling to let others escape unabused). It does get tiresome when, instead of letting me walk away peacefully, I am accosted with some variation of “What??? You didn’t watch the game last night?” or “You didn’t know the superseries and/or worldbowl was yesterday?? What are you, stupid? Gay? What??” (OK, I admit that this is a small exaggeration, but very small…). I’m very willing to allow you to talk sports, as long as you allow me to not care. Agreed?
The only sport I really appreciate is women’s figure skating. I apprecate the HELL out of that!
Just the other day me and the co-workers were discussing the problems with the prevent defense and some dweeb had the nerve to say he didn’t like sports. Well, we couldn’t let him get away with THAT!! We had to pester him and call him names and I was *forced * to give him a noogie.
OK.
Yeah. I like baseball. I like to talk baseball with other folks who *like * baseball. I never try to talk baseball with someone who doesn’t like baseball. I understand that there are people who will not see what I see in it. I have never seen anyone stand aghast by someone professing to not be interested in a sport. Never seen it.
There are folks 'round here who like sports that I don’t care about. I tell them that. I say “that sport doesn’t interest me”. They don’t snicker, they don’t point and laugh, they don’t question my patriotism…they just continue on with their conversation and I politely wait till a subject comes around that I care about enough to join in.
Well the thing is everyone is still just harping about general rudeness, it still has nothing to do with sports and doesn’t justify celebrating your apathy towards something. Because lets be honest if you argue about it enough or celebrate it enough the so called “apathy” is really hatred or strong dislike.
Sports is a fairly neutral matter. There’s definitely social value to sports, things to be learned, ways to use your mind in the observance of sports, and there are also negatives to sports. One of the big ones is you can get too tied up in them to a degree that isn’t productive. But again, we each have our own lives to live and ultimately sports as a hobby is pretty neutral and isn’t “bad” or “good” outside the individual context.
I mean, we can say dismembering yourself as a hobby is pretty universally bad but sports is only bad for some people, while good for others, so in general it’s a neutral. Much like stamp, art, wine, cheese et al collecting/studying.
Gee, cricetus - I’m so sorry those guys forced you to read their threads. As already pointed out, who cares if you don’t care if people don’t care about sports? I have to side with the non-sports-caring people. I get really tired of people saying, “So, Blowero - did you catch the [recent local sports contest]?” “Whaaaaaa??? You DON’T WATCH SPORTS??? How can this be?” Uh, because it’s boring?
I believe that some of this is a regional thing. I didn’t get the aghast “concern” about my lack of sports interest until I moved to a town that is far more sports-intense. (I also suspect that there will be “pockets” of these types of people in every city or town. Some more than others.)
I loathe sport (why is it sports in the US but sport in ummmmm other places yet Americans do math while the ummmm others have maths? …sorry for that random thought).
I invited my dad for dinner the other day. Apparently super important cricket was happening (Aus vs NZ…always super important). I have been sick as a dog and have just felt like seeing dearest daddy who I have ignored.
I love it when people say this: “sorry, but I just can’t get into watching OTHER people play a GAME.”
“ooooo. you can’t? Yet, you somehow are fascintated by watching people prance around on a soundstage doing make-believe?”
Like someone else said, sports is a “common denominator”. It’s not easy to talk about music or science with others because those fields are so broad that you probably have different areas of knowledge. And, your “arguments” can’t really be settled.
For me, I enjoy the competition myself. . .seeing the unscripted drama unfold live. Particularly with football and NASCAR.
AND, I enjoy the soap opera of it. . .bullshitting with guys in the office about “TO-Gate” or “Bonds on Steroids” or trying to predict which NFC team at 5-7 will make the playoffs, if any.
Sports just kind of gives you something to argue about every day.
I agree with Veb: I don’t dislike sports, I don’t like sports…I guess they have no effect on me at all. I guess I’ve missed out on a lot of stuff, but I just can’t get enthusiastic about this stuff, i mean, it’s great that Boston won the World Series…but it just doesn’t translate into a lot of emotion for me.
It’s worse with golf: my brothers are all golf addicts-they watch golf matches on TV constantly! To me, it is a crashing bore! Hell for me would be forced watching of the Ryder Cup, 24-7!
Quote:
Originally Posted by Elenia28
Like sports playing over some movie I want to watch. Although this is moot since I never watch TV!
Is this a joke, or are you really this insane
Ok, RickJay, so you decided to just dump on me and run, eh?
Let me 'splain, and then you can think whatever you want.
I was talking about, as in the other thread, when sports run late or whatever and carry over the shows/movies I wish to watch. I had cable up until August of this year.
Anyway, I decided I was watching too much TV, and I cancelled the cable. So I no longer watch any TV but DVDs. When I had TV, I used to hate it.
Clear enough for you? And now maybe you should calm down and stop being so rabid, considering how polite my post was.
I hate sports, too. Glad to see I’m not alone in that! Sometimes it feels that way here in Gainesville, Florida. It’s Gators, Gators, Gators, til you could fucking puke. Not to mention that the team colors are orange and blue! Could they come up with an uglier color combination if they tried? (Okay, pink and green might be worse.)
I may be a bit more prejudiced against sports than most…my ex-husband told me before we got married that he didn’t care about sports all that much. (I was concerned because a former boyfriend had exposed me to far too much football.) He should have said, I only care about sports if they are being watched or discussed anywhere on the planet, morning, noon, or night, or if they are baseball, football, hockey, basketball, golf, tennis, horse-racing, or auto racing. Jesus, don’t even start me on auto racing! :mad:
When we got divorced, I promised myself that I would never put myself through another minute of sports, even if my son grows up to be a professional player. (He can buy me a house, though.)
The only thing that bugs me more than people who believe that not liking sports confers some sort of moral superiority upon them are people who tell everyone that they “never watch tv” and they “don’t even own a tv.” Like I’m supposed to impressed at their moral distance from popular culture.
There’s a lesser version of this too which consists of the people who have to tell you that they never watch reality shows or make fun of me for watching American Idol. My asthetic tastes range all over the place from the loftiest to the lowest. I love P.G. Wodehouse as much as I like South Park. Shakespeare was full of low comedy. Aristophanes wrote fart jokes. I cand stand affected avoidance of popular entertainment (be it Monday Night Football or be it The Apprentice) just for the sake of appearing to be above that sort of thing.
I’m not saying anyone has to like sports or “Desperate Housewives,” just don’t feel that liking or disliking it has anything to do with intelligence or moral virtue or personal integrity.
(This is not directed at anybody in this thread but at people encountered IRL who definitely do adopt the kind of culturally “superior” affect that i’m talking about)
Perfect example of why people like me love sport. The Black Caps recovered from a seemingly hopeless position to get themselves into a winning position but luck continually went against them. I even half wanted them to win. At the death Chris Harris, who had earlier dislocated his shoulder while fielding, came back to the ground from the hospital to attempt to win the game for New Zealand. After the game Australia’s captain Ricky Ponting, at the press conference, first pointed out what a brave effort it had been fo Harris to return.
I read nearly all of the paper every day and basically dispair at the front half and revel in the back half. Years ago someone said that basically the front pages of the newspaper chronicle mankind’s failures and the back pages its successes. I can’t argue with that.
I find it hard to believe that there are people so numb that they can’t appreciate the drama of real life, played out in real time.
I think that one of the things I like the most about sports is that it’s the only thing on TV in which the ending is not scripted or predetermined. The networks can’t control the outcomes. I like that.
Eh? If (s)he’s a football nut, what team haven’t they seen? Put any two teams on, I’ll enjoy it. The only tough part is when it’s two teams I hate, like the Redskins and Eagles. But I still wouldn’t mind watching them.
