Cultivated Disinterest in Professional Sports • Hacker News Board

Re: Cultivated Disinterest in Professional Sports

#261

Post by aaron-lebo » Fri, Jan 30, 2015, 10:37 PM UTC

rational-future wrote: post #218

solson wrote: post #20

When you show overt contempt for sports you are showing contempt for most everybody and that is problem with your social skills. It's called being a snob. The disdain for working class culture among academics was part of the reason I choose not to pursue a formal higher education. I suspect this overt snootiness keeps many gifted working class kids from participating in higher education. I grew up working class and w…

Professional sports are for the dumb - a modern version of the Roman circus to keep the unwashed masses occupied and away from the important things in life - politics, finance, economics.

You say that as though modern politics isn't a bunch of people mindlessly rooting for their favorite team.

Re: Cultivated Disinterest in Professional Sports

#262

Post by kolbe » Fri, Jan 30, 2015, 10:38 PM UTC

I've found myself in a much different position WRT sports: I can't talk about it and not be a completely out-of-touch nerd. And it actually is a problem. People do like talking about sports, but you'd be surprised at how few really care about sports. When I like something I get into it: Bayesian systems, predictive analytics, disregarding common assumptions. Most people just don't want to talk about sports in that way.

Re: Cultivated Disinterest in Professional Sports

#263

Post by dap » Fri, Jan 30, 2015, 10:38 PM UTC

dragonwriter wrote: post #39

aaron-lebo wrote: post #19

I think professional sports are the closest we have to real-life dramas, tragedies, or even comedies, and they have profound life lessons. I am a lifelong Dallas Cowboys fan. I grew up when they were a dynasty in the 90s, and at the time it seemed like going to the Super Bowl is something they were supposed to do every year. I cried after some tough losses. Sometimes I get into other local teams when they are doing w…

> I think professional sports are the closest we have to real-life dramas, tragedies, or even comedies, and they have profound life lessons. I think anyone who thinks this is spending too much attention on professional sports and not enough on real life: because there is plenty of actual real-life drama, tragedy, and comedy; professional sports are not the "closest we have" to those things (though there is some of al…

I wouldn't say it's about being "closest" to real-world, but rather that it's close enough to be useful, but distant enough that the change of perspective helps us see things differently. It reminds me of the way sci-fi can be a device for talking about today's problems in a context that's sufficiently distant from our actual world that it can help people to see things they wouldn't have seen about the immediate real-world issue.

Re: Cultivated Disinterest in Professional Sports

#264

Post by im3w1l » Fri, Jan 30, 2015, 10:39 PM UTC

timr wrote: post #94

solson wrote: post #20

When you show overt contempt for sports you are showing contempt for most everybody and that is problem with your social skills. It's called being a snob. The disdain for working class culture among academics was part of the reason I choose not to pursue a formal higher education. I suspect this overt snootiness keeps many gifted working class kids from participating in higher education. I grew up working class and w…

"When you show overt contempt for sports you are showing contempt for most everybody and that is problem with your social skills." That's nice. What other corporate products must I consume in order to be a validated member of your social caste? How about this: "when you show overt contempt for fast food, you are showing contempt for most everybody, and that is a problem with your social skills." If I don't eat at McD…

>That's nice. What other corporate products must I consume in order to be a validated member of your social caste?

I guess you ask that rhetorically, but I think it is an interesting question. I'd say you have to listen through the music top charts. You also have to watch most popular movies every year. There are more TV-series than there is time to watch, so I'd guess I'll say you only have to watch one or two of your choice. Read synopses of the rest.

Furthermore you should have at least some passing familiarity with the most popular games, but there is no need to go all out. 10 hours each in final fantasy, mario, random flash games(10h total), mobile games(10h total), counterstrike, starcraft, league of legends, dota, wow,

Re: Cultivated Disinterest in Professional Sports

#265

Post by city41 » Fri, Jan 30, 2015, 10:39 PM UTC

msluyter wrote: post #52

I've felt for a while that not knowing much about sports has been a huge liability. As in, sitting at lunch with co-workers locked out of the conversation because I didn't know anything. So, a couple of years ago, I had a sports-fanatic friend of mine sit with me through a few football games and explain everything that was happening. This unlocked my ability to relate to others (well, men). It was nothing short of re…

I was disinterested in all sports up until about 4 years ago when my boss randomly game me tickets to a hockey game. I found out I really like hockey and have been a big fan since.

I think interest in sports is pretty healthy. But like all things, in moderation. But it's not so much about sports specifically, but rather having diverse interests is healthy.

Re: Cultivated Disinterest in Professional Sports

#266

Post by CocaKoala » Fri, Jan 30, 2015, 10:42 PM UTC

tjradcliffe wrote: post #224

CocaKoala wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It helps a lot if you have a friend who's really passionate about the sport; you can leech off of their passion until you develop some of your own. When I started dating the woman who would later be my wife, I would occasionally watch hockey games with her; she is from Detroit and grew up an ardent, passionate fan of the Red Wings. After a few games of her explaining the rules and strategy, telling me about the fanta…

I think you're underestimating the crashing indifference some of us feel toward all sports. It's not cultivated, and it's not that we haven't tried or been exposed to other's enthusiasms. It's not that we haven't played a bit ourselves, even, at least at beer-league level. My whole family is pretty nuts about American football, so I grew up surrounded by it and can still appreciate the beauty and complexity of the ga…

>But I watch the Superbowl and that's it. I just can't be bothered with anything else.

That's totally fine! If the extent of your emotional commitment to football is "I watch the superbowl and that's it", that's still a passing interest in the sport and the sort of thing the article is encouraging.

The attitude that the article is lamenting is the people who go out of their way to avoid being interested in football, the people who take pride in their lack of interest. The sorts of people who, next Monday, are going to be saying, "Oh, the superbowl was yesterday? I figured I'd just catch the commercials on youtube; that's the only interesting part anyways. I don't even know who was playing." That sort of disinterest is cultivated.

Re: Cultivated Disinterest in Professional Sports

#267

Post by JoshMilo » Fri, Jan 30, 2015, 10:44 PM UTC

rational-future wrote: post #218

solson wrote: post #20

When you show overt contempt for sports you are showing contempt for most everybody and that is problem with your social skills. It's called being a snob. The disdain for working class culture among academics was part of the reason I choose not to pursue a formal higher education. I suspect this overt snootiness keeps many gifted working class kids from participating in higher education. I grew up working class and w…

Professional sports are for the dumb - a modern version of the Roman circus to keep the unwashed masses occupied and away from the important things in life - politics, finance, economics.

You must have forgotten that Niels Bohr was an olympic athlete as well as a nobel prize winner in physics.

Re: Cultivated Disinterest in Professional Sports

#268

Post by Implicated » Fri, Jan 30, 2015, 10:44 PM UTC

Glyptodon wrote: post #172

solson wrote: post #20

When you show overt contempt for sports you are showing contempt for most everybody and that is problem with your social skills. It's called being a snob. The disdain for working class culture among academics was part of the reason I choose not to pursue a formal higher education. I suspect this overt snootiness keeps many gifted working class kids from participating in higher education. I grew up working class and w…

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 bec…

> 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.

Re: Cultivated Disinterest in Professional Sports

#269

Post by dap » Fri, Jan 30, 2015, 10:44 PM UTC

When people say they don't care about sports, it sounds to me as ludicrous as if they said they don't care to watch movies or read fiction. On some level, those are all reasonable choices. But they all involve summarily rejecting an important medium for the telling of interesting and valuable human stories. In the field of music, theater, films, literature, and sports, I don't think sports is really that different from the others in terms of its capacity for telling valuable stories about human experience.

Re: Cultivated Disinterest in Professional Sports

#270

Post by remarkEon » Fri, Jan 30, 2015, 10:44 PM UTC

Glyptodon wrote: post #172

solson wrote: post #20

When you show overt contempt for sports you are showing contempt for most everybody and that is problem with your social skills. It's called being a snob. The disdain for working class culture among academics was part of the reason I choose not to pursue a formal higher education. I suspect this overt snootiness keeps many gifted working class kids from participating in higher education. I grew up working class and w…

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 bec…

>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.