Non-ignorant athlete/sports fan here- please read
Posted: Mon Jun 29, 2009 6:58 am
I'd like to begin by saying I'm not going to be some of the other pro-sports people on this site and come on here questioning your manhood/sexuality/patriotism etc. and go on and on about how I am superior to all of you for whatever ignorant reason. I realize that we all have different hobbies and interests and for many people this does not include sports. However I do have issues with how a lot of the anti-sports people deny that nothing good can come from sports and believe that most, if not all athletes deserve to be placed on the same level as the murderers and rapists of society.
While I enjoy playing and watching sports, I do agree that it is often taken to far. As it says on the front page of this website "there is something wrong when people base their lives on the outcome of a game". One of the areas that I have the greatest problem with in sports is the greedy pro athletes who are paid ungodly sums of money for what they love to do. Don't get me wrong, as an athlete myself I will be the first to tell you that competitive sports are far from being fun all the time, but when you love your sport you should be grateful for being able to have a job that many dream of but few attain. Also, despite my interest in sports I don't believe in having physical education classes in schools. While it can be fun with a good teacher, one semester I also had the biggest asshole you could imagine for gym. You know the kind of teacher I'm talking about, every school has one, the guy who always has to enforce the minor rules that nobody else gives a shit about. In his class it seemed like the point wasn't to get exercise but memorize every goddamn rule of whatever sport as if that was as necessary for college as reading or math skills. My point is, gym classes take up time that is needed for more important subjects in school and it should be up to kids and their families to decide how and when if at all they want to exercise.
But what pisses me off about the people on this board is that they believe that there is some kind of link between enjoying sports and being unintelligent, arrogant, rude etc. I'm not going to lie and try to deny that there are athletes who do look down on those who aren't good at sports or just don't care (I'm not one of them). But for every jock out there who looks down on people who don't care about sports, there is the intellectual nerd who looks down on the less smart, the theater kid who looks down on people who don't appreciate musicals, the goths (and more recently emos) who bitch about how everyone else is a mindless conformist when they themselves are conforming to their own group, and so on. Why do you think cliques like these exist in high schools? It's has nothing to do with jocks bullying others, and everything to do with people choosing to associate with other people who they have things in common with. I read the article about the Columbine shootings on this website, and if everything in it was true, then yes, Columbine High School in the late 90's was a really fucked up place. But while jocks such as the "Rocky Wayne Hoffschneider" guy in the story may be assholes (by the way there are no jocks like him at my school), we can't forget that no one made the two shooters kill as many people as they did but their own fucked up selves. And even more ignorant are the people here who think that liking sports makes you dumber, as if every game watched means more brain cells killed or less IQ points. Yes every high school football team has its meatheads, but they also have plenty of members who are quite intelligent. Every sports or non-sports organization at a school is going to have its smart and dumb members. What you people are forgetting is that those people who we consider to be "smart", "average", and "dumb" in terms of intelligence come from all walks of life and has their own unique interests. Finally, quit whining about sports media coverage. We do not live in a fascist police state where you are forced to watch or read about sports against your will. Our economy is based on people choosing how to spend their time and money the way they want to. Don't like a restaurant showing sports on TV? Take your money and eat elsewhere. Just because some people enjoy 24/7/365 sports channels like ESPN doesn't mean you have to watch them.
Finally there are certain people on this website who I find to be really ignorant and annoying. "Fat Man", you say that "The only thing I want to hear coming out of an ex-jock monkey-boy's mouth is . . ."Will that be paper or plastic?" Then after that, he can just shut the fuck up!" This is just making a blanket statement about all athletes that they will all end up having jobs like bagging groceries for their whole lives. Yeah, we've all heard of the star high school athlete who put all their faith in their sports skills and never gave a fuck about their education, and ended up either getting a career-ending injury or becoming a bust in college or the pros. Well most high school athletes, or so called "monkey boy jocks", realize that their chances of going pro are slim to none and enjoy their sport for what it is, a chance to have fun, be part of a team, and represent their school and are ready to move on with their lives when their playing days are over. "Sergey", you think that people who sit on their ass playing this 'Starcraft' game deserve more money than pro athletes, well yeah we'll see about that when more people give a fuck about that game than sports. But the worst one of all is "Fitz301". There are a lot of hypocrites on this site who think all athletes are homophobic but discriminate against them and accuse them of being closet gays. But this guy is the worst. Several times you talk shit about how athletes/sports fans are all gays using terms like "homo" and "fag" etc. Do you really think your above any of the jocks you hate? More tolerant and open-mind? By the way, been on plenfyoffish.com lately?
Thank you for listening
While I enjoy playing and watching sports, I do agree that it is often taken to far. As it says on the front page of this website "there is something wrong when people base their lives on the outcome of a game". One of the areas that I have the greatest problem with in sports is the greedy pro athletes who are paid ungodly sums of money for what they love to do. Don't get me wrong, as an athlete myself I will be the first to tell you that competitive sports are far from being fun all the time, but when you love your sport you should be grateful for being able to have a job that many dream of but few attain. Also, despite my interest in sports I don't believe in having physical education classes in schools. While it can be fun with a good teacher, one semester I also had the biggest asshole you could imagine for gym. You know the kind of teacher I'm talking about, every school has one, the guy who always has to enforce the minor rules that nobody else gives a shit about. In his class it seemed like the point wasn't to get exercise but memorize every goddamn rule of whatever sport as if that was as necessary for college as reading or math skills. My point is, gym classes take up time that is needed for more important subjects in school and it should be up to kids and their families to decide how and when if at all they want to exercise.
But what pisses me off about the people on this board is that they believe that there is some kind of link between enjoying sports and being unintelligent, arrogant, rude etc. I'm not going to lie and try to deny that there are athletes who do look down on those who aren't good at sports or just don't care (I'm not one of them). But for every jock out there who looks down on people who don't care about sports, there is the intellectual nerd who looks down on the less smart, the theater kid who looks down on people who don't appreciate musicals, the goths (and more recently emos) who bitch about how everyone else is a mindless conformist when they themselves are conforming to their own group, and so on. Why do you think cliques like these exist in high schools? It's has nothing to do with jocks bullying others, and everything to do with people choosing to associate with other people who they have things in common with. I read the article about the Columbine shootings on this website, and if everything in it was true, then yes, Columbine High School in the late 90's was a really fucked up place. But while jocks such as the "Rocky Wayne Hoffschneider" guy in the story may be assholes (by the way there are no jocks like him at my school), we can't forget that no one made the two shooters kill as many people as they did but their own fucked up selves. And even more ignorant are the people here who think that liking sports makes you dumber, as if every game watched means more brain cells killed or less IQ points. Yes every high school football team has its meatheads, but they also have plenty of members who are quite intelligent. Every sports or non-sports organization at a school is going to have its smart and dumb members. What you people are forgetting is that those people who we consider to be "smart", "average", and "dumb" in terms of intelligence come from all walks of life and has their own unique interests. Finally, quit whining about sports media coverage. We do not live in a fascist police state where you are forced to watch or read about sports against your will. Our economy is based on people choosing how to spend their time and money the way they want to. Don't like a restaurant showing sports on TV? Take your money and eat elsewhere. Just because some people enjoy 24/7/365 sports channels like ESPN doesn't mean you have to watch them.
Finally there are certain people on this website who I find to be really ignorant and annoying. "Fat Man", you say that "The only thing I want to hear coming out of an ex-jock monkey-boy's mouth is . . ."Will that be paper or plastic?" Then after that, he can just shut the fuck up!" This is just making a blanket statement about all athletes that they will all end up having jobs like bagging groceries for their whole lives. Yeah, we've all heard of the star high school athlete who put all their faith in their sports skills and never gave a fuck about their education, and ended up either getting a career-ending injury or becoming a bust in college or the pros. Well most high school athletes, or so called "monkey boy jocks", realize that their chances of going pro are slim to none and enjoy their sport for what it is, a chance to have fun, be part of a team, and represent their school and are ready to move on with their lives when their playing days are over. "Sergey", you think that people who sit on their ass playing this 'Starcraft' game deserve more money than pro athletes, well yeah we'll see about that when more people give a fuck about that game than sports. But the worst one of all is "Fitz301". There are a lot of hypocrites on this site who think all athletes are homophobic but discriminate against them and accuse them of being closet gays. But this guy is the worst. Several times you talk shit about how athletes/sports fans are all gays using terms like "homo" and "fag" etc. Do you really think your above any of the jocks you hate? More tolerant and open-mind? By the way, been on plenfyoffish.com lately?
Thank you for listening