The ones who don't understand sports were the ones always chosen last

Chomsky included.

I didn't do well at sports at all and I was always chosen last or next to last. :-(

While I do exercise, I still stay away from anything "team" related.

and I'm certain that they grew up as capable as those chosen first...but when I see posts dissing those who love sports, I can only come to the conclusion that those dissing didn't play that much sports.

Always picked last for the sports events, which I very much wanted to be a part of.

I resent it to this day, and I hate jocks. I hate seeing the biggest, strongest, and meanest people growing up to be idolized as gods among us only because they can kick ass.

fuck team sports, some of us hate sports, and chomsky had some valid points.

uncoordinated. I'm also small (maxed out at 5'1"). I LOATHED p.e. class. I never played team sports and never will. I was always picked last or next to last. I don't like jocks.

Plenty of geeks and disabled who grow up to be idolized.

Hell the most famous scientist in the world is arguably Stephen Hawking, and the richest man in the world is Bill Gates.

Just sayin...

Oh and I was on the crew team (among others) in school and we had a paraplegic coxswain for a bit. He had to prove to the coach that he could swim if dumped in the water, so he wheeled down to the dock and basically (not sure how) he locked his wheels and dove right into the water, backstroked around, and pulled himself back out, hopped back up into his chair and wheeled back up the dock to the coach. He was awesome.

puts people off.

your logic is faulty here. you say those who were not chosen did not play much sports. well if they were not chosen by the elite snob cliquist better-than-you's who grew up to be people like george w bush they sure as heck did not play much sports.



Msongs
www.msongs.com/6for2008.htm

There is also a big difference between playing sports and understanding sports and the obsession of sports fans.

As a 5'2", 100lb female, no, I never played football. Does that mean I can't possibly understand the game? I can't be a fan? I can't understand or even participate in the obsession?

Guess only big strong men can be sports fans. (For those that don't get it: :sarcasm: )

i wouldn't be surprised if he was often picked near the end as a kid--after all, his daddy wasn't vice president yet, so people didn't have to pretend he was competent :rofl:

my family being athletic oriented lived the life of sports. i am thankful for what it gave me in confidence, competents, humility, grace, and a sense that in mid fourties to continue to stay fit.

grades were spoken as priority, but if we excelled in sport, we recieved our validation from parents.

i am sorry for those that are not athletic and how hard life is for them growing up. we all have things we excel at, our gifts. i have a son that is small framed, articulate, intellectual, glasses wearing boy that has dealt with that thru his years in elementary and now middle school. children have issue with him and will continue because he is a little adult. he speaks, thinks and acts like an adult. we deal with it regularly in his hurt feelings. but it is never trying to make another less for him to feel better about himself.

and listen to sports radio, as described in this quote:


In fact, I have the habit when I'm driving of turning on these radio call-in programs, and it's striking when you hear the ones about sports. They have these groups of sports reporters, or some kind of experts on a panel, and people call in and have discussions with them. First of all, the audience obviously is devoting an enormous amount of time to it all. But the more striking fact is, the callers have a tremendous amount of expertise, they have detailed knowledge of all kinds of things, they carry on these extremely complex discussions. And when you look at the structure of them, they seem like a kind of mathematics. It's as though people want to work out mathematical problems, and it they don't have calculus and arithmetic, they work them out with other structures...And what all these things look like is that people just want to use their intelligence somehow.

Well, in our society we have things that you might use your intelligence on, like politics, but people really can't get involved in them in a very serious way -- so what they do is put their minds to other things, such as sports. You're trained to be obedient; you don't have an interesting job; there's no work around for you that's creative; in the cultural environment you're a passive observer of usually pretty tawdry stuff. So what's left?

And I suppose that's also one of the basic functions it serves society in general: it occupies the populations, and it keeps them from trying to get involved with things that really matter. In fact, I presume that's part of the reason why spectator sports are supported to the degree they are by the dominant institutions.

Does the ex-sportscaster Keith Oberman fall into that category...or how about a guy like me who writes a sports blog and is heavily involved in politics?

I'll tell you one thing---sports keeps me sane cause if I was immersed in politics 24x7, I'd go insane.

I'm still sticking to the premise that those who don't understand sports never played and simply don't follow it.

Like I said--- That's OK...I can dig that... but don't label people as obedient knuckleheads just cause they like sports.

But what is there to understand? Teams compete, one wins, one loses.

All the participants are overpaid, over glorified, given every possible break in life and for what? They can run, throw a ball and make shaving cream commercials.

What does it contribute to society? How much is wasted on this crap every year when we could be spending it on educating kids?

I just didn't like your subject line, inferring that whose who were picked last are sore losers for no good reason.

This grade school crap bleeds into the adult world and is now our foriegn policy. The weaker nations who can't keep up get trounced.

And don't ever let it slip that you hate football lest you be called gay.

I think he's saying that americans in general are trained to be obedient (and that most accept that without questioning it) and that following sports provides an outlet for their unused creativity and intellect--an outlet that is in no way threatening to the status quo, which explains why the dominant institutions support sports to a high degree.

I'm a big sports fan, but I don't think that analysis is particularly off base.

"...basic functions it serves society in general: it occupies the populations, and it keeps them from trying to get involved with things that really matter."

He is saying that anything that occupies or entertains people is designed to keep them from getting involved with things that matter. I'm not buying it.

You could take his same argument and substitute any hobby (woodworking, painting, playing an instrument). All activities that take up a lot of time and energy. I guess they all need to stop because "...in our society we have things that you might use your intelligence on, like politics...".

If you substitute in your own favorite pastime, the whole thing sounds pretty stupid. Nobody can be serious 24/7 and there is no government plan to make you learn the piano or go to concerts so you aren't out protesting.

I expected better from someone like Chomsky.

and I too am surprised by the clumsiness of Chomsky's point.

it was a football game--the Florida-Florida State game had been rescheduled from earlier in the year due to a hurricane, and when those teams met in early december, that trumped the recount. There were people talking about how people in town for the recount would be dislocated, because their hotel rooms were needed for football fans, etc.


(http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/people/f/dexter_filkins/index.html?offset=10&s=oldest&inline=nyt-per)

Sports, on the whole, are a much bigger distraction than woodworking. :)

I'm a huge sports fan, but I don't think Chomsky is all that wrong here. I think following sports consumes an awful lot of intellectual and spiritual energy for some people. That doesn't mean sports should be abandoned or that any attention to sports is wasted or worthless. Sports, woodworking, whatever--these can all be fine things, but they can also keep people from paying attention to things, and sports, in particular, seem to alleviate or to refocus negative or critical emotions that might otherwise be focused poltiically. I think the rule of thumb from my catholic childhood is still a worthwhile one: all things in moderation.

I just can't understand the fascination with watching sports.

I played the big 3 and was never chosen last, but I wonder how many sports-nuts were.... they couldn't play, but they sure can watch a mean game.

The political part of me can't help thinking about how Rome put on the circuses to keep the plebeians entertained and quiet. Now the millionaires keep the folks busy thinking about the pro teams rather than the reaming they are taking from the ruling class.

Thanks for not bringing up issues like in/out groups, popularity, bullying, etc. Those issues are another discussion, IMO.

I was also one not chosen for sports, ever. Sporting and team activities weren't part of our family values, aside from a couple of years of Little League for my brother. My parents were teachers and thinkers and raised us to read books and play/explore independently.

I don't now think team sports are wrong or bad, but I did carry old resentments until I realized that my harbored feelings of "unpopularity" were a fiction, as it wasn't an issue of popularity, but of skill. I didn't know how to play, and other kids knew it, and PE teachers weren't interested in actually teaching the rules of a game. So, I stumbled my way through sports in phys ed, and spent most of my recesses with a book under a tree (much to my delight).

I do have concern about the professionalization of team sports, and the vast amounts of wealth that are tied up in pro sports. But I also recognize that sports and sporting are an essential and beautiful facet of our culture, and that team relationships are sacred in their own right.

I understand sports. I knew all the strategy and what the goal was and remembered to have fun. But my body would not cooperate. I stunk. And I was always picked to be "the coach" instead of "the player".

We have a number of athletes in the family including an Olympian and my dad was a regional champion and an IOC administrator. We all played several sports.

Having said all that, anyone who really studies the sphere of sport is likely to conclude that it is diversion and what is more it is the classic case of greedy corrupt administrators and athletes doing anything to win. At its highest level sport is no different than other corporations. What makes it even worse though is the pretence that there are any real values in modern sport other than the business of making money.

Sport is not "...a realm of social life set off from the 'realities' of economic and political life - a benign sphere free from material and historical constraints." (Sage 1990)

Indeed "sport is considered to be an important site upon which the dominant ideology is constructed and maintained...in fact one of the most compelling functions of sport is to promote initiatives and activities that help shape the structure of the economic, political and cultural hegemony of the dominant class..."

One need only have followed the jingoism of the Winter Olympics or World Cup coverage to understand this. The irony of all of this is that while the athletes are expected to maintain a grand charade about values, there is unbelievable greed and corruption at the top of Sporting Bodies, not to mention broadcast rights holders, sponsors and brewers.

A study of the reforms to sport in 19th century England merely reinforces Sage's analysis of the role of sport in society. HBO produced a classic domumentary called 'Field of Fire' in the 1990s. That alone should shatter most illusions about sport.

The problem is that many of us who understand this still love the essence of the game itself. It is that plus school, community and national loyalties which masks and fuels a massive sexist, inherently racist and undemocratic corporate industry.

George Sage's Power and Ideology in American Sport is a must read.

Edit -Sp.add word.

Smallest kid, didn't see to well, kinda uncoordinated etc.

I love sports. I kept trying until I found one I could kinda do well (golf, boxing). I'm into middle age and still on a softball team. (3 for 3, 5 RBIs last night - just to brag)

I like televised sports because it is unscripted. Each game is unique in its own way. Plus outside of the documentary channels, TV sucks. And it gives you an excuse to hang out with your friends and not have to discuss anything of substance.

are not athletic.


HA, HA, just kidding.

I would take sports out of college though.

being athletic or being good at a sport isn't a prerequisite to understanding it. The kids who were picked last in my experience were the ones who either weren't any good at sports or who were generally unpopular. Some of those who weren't any good at sports understood and loved the game--they just couldn't hit, kick, whatever.

That said - and I'm no big fan of Professor Chomsky, although I read his works with interest in the early and mid 1990's - I think Chomsky's point is quite different than what may be attributed to him. As I read Chomsky on sports, he's actually praising the intellect of those who follow sports closely. I'm often amazed as well, when you hear people who other professionals tend to marginalize in terms of knowledge discussing sports with as much knowledge as any professional has in their field. Case in point: I was in San Francisco, and two guys - looking like workmen coming home from a contracting job, paint spattered and grimey - were discussing baseball. These two guys were formulating extremely complex evaluation arguments, based on extensive knowledge of trends, patterns, statistics, and history, all of which they seemed to know off the top of their heads. Their points and counterpoints were well established, well supported, extremely logical in presentation, and always to the point the other was making. In short, they were having a formally excellent debate about baseball, with a wealth of knowledge they'd acquired and formidable rhetorical savvy. I think it is this that is both admired by Chomsky and somewhat disturbing to him. It's disturbing not because he thinks sports is bad, but rather because he tries to consider this vast power of intellect and thought being applied to other spheres of life, and particularly politics. What is those two guys, in other words, had as much knowledge of American foreign policy - trends, patterns, statistics, history - as they did about baseball? Imagine the different society we would have if the multitudes of people who apply their knowledge to sports applied even part of that power of intellect to American politics. That seems to be Chomsky's point, as I remember reading it, and I think on that score he is not necessarily wrong. The question then, is this: does sports serve a social-control function in capturing intellectual power and channeling it towards non-threatening areas? One need not consider sports bad in themselves to consider this question, but it fdoes seem to be the question Chomsky is raising.

Please continue in the original thread.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=364&topic_id=1615237&mesg_id=1615237