Archived Letters 2014
2 Jan 14
Subject: It's a Brave new World!
Three out of four playoff games are not sold out! I don't know what playoff games are but it sounds like good news to me!
There is so little interest in football that the NFL has started airing TV spots where players beg watchers to buy tickets to football games!
The tide is turning, comrades. No longer is football idolized as what all of us should aspire to but is now seen as what it actually is: a bunch of guys playing a game on a muddy field.
Don
12 Jan 14
Subject: Time wasted at playoff games
Do you believe all of the hype surrounding these ridiculous pro football playoff games? There is not a single thing on this earth that is less important than the outcomes of these games. Consider for a moment how much time is wasted during just one of these fiascos. Say 100,000 people attend a particular game, and each one of the 100,000 spends about 5 hours of his day associated with that. That's 500,000 hours of totally wasted time. Well, a human life of 80 years only contains about 500,000 hour of awake time. So at each nonsensical game, (and this doesn't account for the TV game watchers) the equivalent time in one entire human life is blown down the drain. Gone, kaput, kabloo-eey.
Steve Z
15 Jan 14
Subject: Boycott the World Cup.
I do not plan to watch one minute of the World Cup, even if England does something unlikely and reach the quarter finals. I told one fan today and he looked at me as if I said I'd been having an affair with his grandmother. Nothing scares a football fan more than a non fan and especially someone who will not be watching a bunch of overpaid, not very good team kicking a ball about for 90 minutes. Also as this World Cup has nearly bankrupted a third world country and led to widespread protests, what's good about it, except maybe a revolution in Brazil causes the World Bore to be cancelled.
AN ENGLISHMAN.
18 Jan 14
Subject: No Subject
And so, my fine, discerning friends, the stuporbore comes noisily creaking around once more - not that I know much about it, and as a sensible chap whose interest in sports is zero, why should I? Is it today? Next Saturday? Who is playing? What are those little doodads on the ends of my shoelaces called?
In local supermarkets, there are gigantic, aisle-blocking stuporbore-related displays, above which float enlarged, football-shaped balloons. These displays consist of eight-foot stacks of beer, popcorn or bags of crisps (chips, if you are an American), on which are plonked brightly coloured cardboard banners displaying generic designs of a ball-clutching guy in a football costume whose pretty colours mesmerise the fans. And who is supposed to reach to the top of these displays to pull off a case of beer? Did they think of that? Nooooooo.
The fact that the shop displays are so visible tells me that sprots fans (yes, sprots) are so dimwitted that they need to be reminded in such a garish, vulgar fashion that their pointless little media circus is imminent. I think it's remarkable, though, that I can ignore such otherwise eye-catching piffle that I still don't know who's playing. I regard this as a personal achievement. Heaven forbid that I should go to the supermarket and look for food (and guitar magazines, oh yes indeedy).
So, let us be blissfully unaware of who is competing in this pre-adolescent borefest. Let us look cheerily blank when sprots fans of our acquaintance discuss it beforehand and afterwards. We have other interests. On Stuporbore Saturday, I shall be doing what I always do on a Saturday: playing guitar, spending time with my gorgeous wife, doing a bit of sketching, perhaps a small outing.
No thank you, media manipulators, you can not entice me to partake in your vulgar little circus. Lots of funny little idiots all over the country will be barking at their television sets. I and my august associates on this fine web site - and millions of other guys who don't care about sprots - will not.
Stephen
30 Jan 14
Subject: sports suck
Hi there everybody. I wouldn’t hate sports so much if I had never played football, here’s why, I played a lot of sports growing up, but never in my life have I seen people take a game as seriously as they do football. Grown men acting like a game is more important than actually accomplishing something with their life. Grown men who cry over a game like they’re still 10 years old. Give me a fucking break. Get a life. Sports were invented for recreation not religion. I’m not some nerd in fact I’m the complete opposite, you’d probably think I was some jock looking at me, but I still hate the shit out of sports, they will always piss me off because of the way people take them so seriously. They riot over these damn games like there 10 years old. People actually look up to these idiot celebrities and athletes like they’ve actually accomplished anything great by entertaining you. I mean it’s easy to discover dna and invent the internal combustion engine, but being entertaining is so hard. I could never entertain someone even if I had 15 beers. I still actually like sports if they were treated the way they should be like games and were just done for fun, but as long as people get paid millions of dollars to play with a ball I will always hate sports.
Brandon
31 Jan 14
Subject: I love this site!
Argh, it's that time of year in the good ol' u.s.a. where "the big game" becomes the meaning of life. ugh. I'm so glad to come to this site and read the letters and know that me and my husband are not freaks for not giving a shit about any sports crap.
We have the misfortune to live in a town with a famous college football team, and you'd think they're the center of the fucking universe.
The high school needs lots of repairs, so they want to raise our taxes. However, they had 2 million dollars to spend repairing a local sinkhole (literally) football field for the non-college football/sports freaks to use. (It's really in a sinkhole. That's why they had to repair it. Again, just like 5 years ago!!)
Now that all sorts of info is coming out about how much brain damage football causes, it's great to hear how some parents are saying they wouldn't let their kids play. It's a start!
I recently read about a woman who shot another woman because she wasn't adequately upset about the loss of the game by their team. Wow. And these people reproduce. How sad.
Sign me,
Could not possibly care less about sports,
would rather go to the dentist...
and I mean it!
3 Feb 14
Subject: I Never Got It, and Still Don't
I've never fathomed what gets people so wound up over sports. Sometimes I feel like I must be missing a strand of DNA that all other humans have. I'd rather watch grass grow than sit and have to watch even a minute of any sport, either live or on TV. I cringe when I have to go to the barber shop after "The Big Game." People look puzzled when I decline their invitations to watch some bowl or other. I've turned down free tickets to college football games others would kill for. If a bunch of free tickets to some box in the Super Bowl fell into my lap, along with free air tickets and room vouchers, I'd be scalping the whole lot on the street within 30 seconds.
I actually loved playing football as a kid -- until the adults stepped in to regiment us and turn us into little Manchurian candidates. Then I quit. I'm fit and work out regularly: 6'2" and athletic-looking. But the culture of sports simply escapes me.
Advice I regularly tell my children is that if you write the great American novel, invent a cure for a disease or become a terrific educator, you can be proud that you contributed something to humanity. Where, however, is the meaning in kicking a ball around a field? Decades from now, who'll give crap? Also, I tell them we don't much care about their prowess in gym class. The thing that counts is their grades in substantive school subjects.
I'll never get it with sports. And furthermore I don't care.
Jim B.
20 Feb 14
Subject: My Wise Self and My Sporty Brother
This is a story which I believe I should share with you, which is about sports, and how it has, in my view, manifested itself as a disease within my family, whether affected directly or not. I wish to keep all people within this story anonymous, including myself, but want to share this truth with the people out there on this excellent site.
I am a sixth form student from the UK, and have a younger brother, who takes interest in sports. Now, I have never liked sports, that was always so. I exercise, and do so for pleasure, but can't stand watching people kick balls to one another, nor can I stand the fact that these people appear to be above the law and are able to incite violence and get away with it, nor can I stand the fact that money, which could have provided a cure for AIDS or paid back the huge amount of debt we're in, is used to build high tech engineered but pointless stadiums and equipment, which is a total waste of time and money.
On the contrary, my brother praises this nonsense. In fact, he plays competitively with his school team, and a private team as well. It's all he ever talks about, and most of what he does in his spare time is watch YouTube videos of it, practise in the garden, and just bask in his deranged thoughts. Meanwhile, I'm working, educating myself, using my time productively and such. There are better things to teach yourself, better skills to have, better things to see and do.
My brother isn't completely stupid, though. He has a great talent in academic work at school, much like myself. He can really work hard when he puts his mind to it, and in terms of most of his grades, it pays off. A number of students in his classes go to him for the answers, and he has received a number of school prizes as a result. It's just that he wastes his time concentrating on people throwing a ball about, which makes me sad.
I was also shocked the day that he was offered a chance to train for the national team, which may or may not be his future. Ridiculous. So, assuming that both of us continue down thse paths, the bias towards him is apparent. Even if I am an academic success one day, which I aim to be, I will still be unrecognised when compared with my brother. And even if I become famous, I will have to work hard and progress slowly, and he only needs to show off his face to be shown worldwide. And if I were to become famous, which may happen in spite of me knowing that fame is not the most important thing in life, I may easily be drowned out by my brother.
And think about the effect on my family as a whole. Chances are, I will be successful in my useful career, and my parents, aunts, uncles, cousins, etc. will be happy for me. But with my brother's complete time wasting "profession", there will be more of it, more often, and considering that I am first in my family to see the futility of this idea, there will be no breaks from the avalanche of sports fanaticism. And the fanatics who would follow him would either not care about someone who's actually doing something worthwhile, or will take me for a stuck-up snob. And knowing someone who's lived with me for over a decade, I know this will happen.
I use my life productively, and hope to use it to make a difference in the world, whereas my younger brother is putting a price on his intelligence. And his mind is something that, as a family member, I want to be proud of, and not ashamed of. So if my brother does become a professional sportsman, there won't be a way out, unless I legally change my name and leave the country for good. Something elaborate that I would rather avoid, but would, I think, be a small price to pay.
I would appreciate a response to this message, any at all, to give an honest opinion. I do not exaggerate in this message, and would be interested in anything that my newfound allies would like to add to this situation.
Thank you;
Anonymous
28 Feb 14
Subject: Sports is a corporate circus 5
I think enough has been said at this place by me and others regading Sports culture and how negatively it is effects our society and why we should completly end it once and for all. It is also more than enough to awaken anyone from his sleep and make him see the truth and through all the non sense that the media manipulators throw at the public. I think anyone with an open mind will 100 % agree with us and would join us nevertheless here is my one more appeal and effort to deprogramme sports maniacs may be it will help them leaving this pathetic circus.
Hey sports maniacs have a closer look what are you obssesed with ? what is your passion ? where your mind always is ? men kickig or hitting a ball around. Try to break sports down to its very basics and see that sports is only about grown up men in fancy clothes knocking a ball around or hitting one thats it , thats it and again for the third time thats it. There is nothing more in sports and all the media over analysis , hype and excessive coverage cant hide this fact.
How have sports ever benefitted mankind in anyway ? (Now dont come up with the already debunked claims that it unites people. After the 1938 Olympics War War 2 broke out where was sports unity). What on Earths changes after these sports events like World cup or Olympics ?? The only thing that changes is the record profits earned by corporations , they are the true winners making billions. Average people on the other hand have everthing to loose their time , money , energy. Sports fans are blind slaves they are too dumb to figure out their serfdom. Fools and Idiots fail to grasp that victory in every game belongs to corporations who make billions and as I have said its about more than money , sports also a method of social control to keep the public attention away from real issues that the public should be really be concerned with.
Elitist Aldous Huxley once said that roman empire fell because the elite couldnt provide enough bread and circus. Thats the truth about sports culture its a circus. well I am out of this non sense a long time ago and hope one day everyone will be and we will also uproot the elite tyrants from power.
Thanks everyone for reading.
Lance
18 Mar 14
Subject: Fuck sports for making school classes suck!
I'm a junior in high school. Naturally the vast majority of my class never shuts the fuck up about fantasy football, but I've grown to tolerate it and even try and get into sports a little bit myself. However, my history teacher has recently, I shit you not, decided to change an entire learning unit to the topic of fucking SPORTS in history. History is the one class in school that I've always been truly interested and skilled in, and now it has to be about some stupid fucking ball games and athletes that I don't give two shits about!? It blows my goddamn mind. I have no problem with the fact that a lot of people enjoy sports as their hobby, but I do have a fucking problem when I enlist in a class to learn history and instead our teacher has to shove his fucking football boner down our throats. For the last month we've been having to research sports or athletes and explain how they represented their country's struggles and shit. I haven't done any of it, and I have no intention of doing it. Not only do I not give a flying fuck about sports in the first place, but I know for FACT that this kind of school work will not help shape my future or life in any way, shape or form. It is an absolute waste of my time. If I fail this history class for hating sports, then fucking so be it. Sure our teacher may be doing it to cater to the majority of kids, but it leaves the rest of us who happen to not like sports in the fucking dirt.
Thanks for hearing me vent. I actually have no problem that a lot of people enjoy sports as a hobby, or the fact that schools have extracurricular sports programs, but THIS is the kind of shit that needs to be fucking banned.
22 Mar 14
Subject:
I totally loved this. I'm so glad that I am not alone who is so pissed off with this sports madness.
SK
30 Mar 14
Subject: SPORTS SUCK
I totally agree with you. Sports are stupid and a waste of time! Everyone knows that it can kill you or hurt you real bad. Yet they're still doing it. Who wants broken bones, concussions, chipped nails, jammed fingers, twisted ankles, broken necks, cuts, wounds, bruises, and chipped teeth. NO ONE! But why are they still doing it. Sports are stupid, worthless, a waste of time, and dangerous. So is PE. Playing sports is the dumbest thing a person can do. Well I'm not ending up like them. I HATE SPORTS!!!
Alina
10 Apr 14
Subject: Why I don't care for sports
Don't get me wrong, I don't hate sports nor feel anger for people who do (as long as they are not fanatical about it). I just simply get bored when watching a sporting event whether it's basketball, football, boxing, racing, hell even UFC! And for team sports, I'm not event talking regular season. Sure, there is always that initial excitement right before the start, but it fizzles out very quickly, especially after seeing that Chevy truck commercial for the 10th time five minutes into it. The general belief is that the more you know about a sport, the more you start to care about it. I'm afraid I just don't have that kind of commitment. I'll admit, talking about sports is a great filler for any casual conversation, so that's really the only time when I'm directly affected. What does bother me is disproportionate value we place on pro athletes when compared to, say, soldiers (especially war veterans), cops, firefighters, teachers, scientists, doctors, but sadly that's just a kind of society we are. Finally, there are stories of people getting their property vandalized or damaged, getting seriously hurt and even killed by crazy fans, seems a pretty sad way to die, really.
Aaron
23 Apr 14
Subject: No More HPE
Today, I had my final HPE lesson and what a glorious moment it was. 10 years have passed since My first P.E lesson and it has been a long, difficult road and it feels like forever. I can recall many times that I walked away from P.E feeling like shit but I also have a feeling that I got off easy and it could have been much worse. People never levelled with me, they always seems to criticise me. In today's lesson, I decided I would try hard at sport as a joke and to remind myself one last time of what I went through. Through this attempt at sport I was ridiculed by one of my class mates and told I was pathetic and hopeless, these sorts of cruel taunts are not that common for me at my school, but I guess today I got lucky. My P.E teacher this year was horrible, she was condescending, arrogant, rude and overly serious. Unfortunately, she fits the classic stereotype of a HPE teacher. Many HPE teachers do favour the Jocks over the kids who suck at sport, and sometimes even bully those who are incompetent. Not all of them are like this, some are encouraging and understanding but I haven't had many of those. Some were just plain aloof and didn't notice me not participating. I struggled through this time and cheated the system by not taking part in this time-wasting nonsense. I have now made it to the other side. There will be others, younger then me who will have to endure what I have endured but perhaps much worse and my advice is not to try hard at sport and do your best but instead avoid it, avoid it at all costs. For me, I couldn't win either way, If I tried hard at sport they'd ridicule me for doing a bad job and if I did nothing they would ridicule me for not trying, what was I supposed to do other then simply stay clear of everyone else during HPE? I had no sporting skills to impress them with. The trap that I feel into in the early years was feeling like being bad at sport made you less skilled then everyone else, if you were uncoordinated then there was something wrong with you but only recently I decided that this wasn't the case. People have all different talents and things they like and for some people, sport is not one of them.
Unfortunately, Sport can influence your popularity and social circle, which can make people feel isolated if they don't have any skills. Well, I will wrap it up there, thank you for the support I have received from this community in reaching this point in my life, I should not have had to endure all of this and I hope things are better for future generations, but from today forwards, most but not all of my suffering is over.
Tim=
15 May 14
Subject: World Cup
Less than a month to this pile of tedium and already it's starting to dominate conversations and the media AND the Goddamned domestic season has only just finished. As one non fan said to me earlier this week, football( soccer to our American friends) is starting to become a 24/7 thing and dominating everything and making non fans wretch with boredom.
Today at work I had to listen to two bores discuss England's prospects and they seemed to see it as some kind of life and death matter( one of these is typically overweight and I tend to switch off as soon as his endless football talk starts). I somehow fell between the football crossfire and told them, " I don't give a toss about it and won't be watching any of it". Stunned silence, same as someone in a bar started droning on to me about how many Southampton players were in the England squad and I said, " sorry, mate, I'm not interested. " Funny look from fan and then a sharp exit from the pub as he knew he'd met a non fan and didn't know what to say.
Incidentally over half the population won't be watching, but the silent majority as usual will be overruled by the boorish, loud fans who see it as their duty to root out dissent and try to make everyone love the beautiful game. I think DVDs, long walks, taking the car out, trying to get a new girlfriend and even discussing politics would be more fun.
By the way I have no objection to exercise, people working out, taking up sports for fun, or doing something like karate for fitness and self defence, just the grossness and greed that surround team sports on both sides of the Atlantic and the way they are shoved down people's throats constantly and where fans behave like a sporting Taleban, where they seem to be fighting a jihad against non believers. Come to think of it, about the only decent thing the Taleban did was ban soccer.
GLENN IN ENGLAND.
23 May 14
Subject: Some Sports Fans
I hear a lot from American contributors on here how a lot of sports fans are ignorant, homphobic and intolerant of anyone who has interests different to theirs and who shows no interest in sports. I think it is quite true over here as well, particularly among men who follow team sports. Last week a friend of mine, Raif, who is a graduate, wanted to talk to me about politics( we are in the middle of two elections here). Two sports fans, this time of the rugby league fraternity, told him to " shut up, freak" as he obviously was talking about something they didn't understand and wasn't prepared to discuss the Wigan interchange, or some other weird language these guys use to discuss a move in their sport. Also I could have added an interchange is a name for a bus and rail station in Britain, but since this type of humour is lost on these guys, or they could turn nasty as their beloved sport is being criticised( rugby league does have some very aggressive players in its ranks), it wasn't worth it.
This week even a simple game of eight ball pool nearly ended up in a fight. In Britain a lot of pubs have pool teams who play in a league similar to a football league, with a champion and a team who comes bottom and gets moved into the league below. Sounds innocent enough and I have spent countless hours playing this innocent and popular pub game for fun or a small bet. However, since those who see it as a matter of life and death have got involved in pub leagues( no suprises most of these guys follow team sports), an innocent pub game has turned ugly. Some guy who has lost his last four matches and threatened a player from a rival team was sidelined for a game under Pool Commitee rules. Rather than accepting his punishment, the whole pub was subject to a foul mouthed stream of abuse and threats before he stormed off. While I could probably understand some overpaid football star behaving like this, something as trivial as a pool league in Nowheretown caused this guy to go mad.
Again the win at all costs and displays of aggression seen in commercial team sports has infected something as innocent as eight ball pool and I'm sure I won't be signing up for any teams shortly even though I was good at this game when I was younger. It seems behaviour more commonly seen in the NFL, major soccer leagues and rugby league seems to have filtered all the way down to bar games. What next, a fight over a card game or dominos, well if it happens in pool, it wouldn't surprise me. Me, I think a polite discussion about where do liberals in England go after a bad election result today is more fun. Also over here, those of who associate with the Liberal Democrats( a bit like the US Democrats but more progressive without being socialist) tend not to like sports much, or see them as a life and death matter , these seem to be more the tendency of sheep like Tory( Conservative) and Labour voters.
GLENN AN ENGLISHMAN
1 Jun 14
Subject: I don't understand the fans
As much as I dislike sports, I dislike the fans even more. Sports turn the fans into rabid, growling, hive-minded mongrels that care about nothing but themselves, the game and their idol. Take what happened in Vancouver a few years back - when Vancouver lost the Stanley Cup, the fans decided to completely trash their city and give Canadians a bad name. Totally uncalled for. Didn't the same or similar thing happen a while ago in Los Angeles too?
What also really drives me up the wall is the hatred sports can inspire. Homophobia, particularly. It goes to show how dumb, unintelligent and narrow-minded the players and fans are when they go and put down someone or beat them up or in some extreme cases, kill people because they aren't identical replicas of themselves or because they don't fall into a certain category. This is particularity the case in high school. I am so glad to be graduating high school so I don't have to return to that hellhole ever again. Sure, the jocks are physically attractive, but other than that, they are my most hated part of high school.
What also drives me batty is the fact that professional athletes in the NFL or NHL, for example make ridiculous amounts of money. They don't deserve it. They make millions of dollars and then blow them off on steroids, hookers, alcohol and useless parties. They don't even do a single charitable thing with the money. It bothers me when they buy a huge estate worth 12 times the money I will ever see in my entire life time, just for themselves to stay in. No one else, just themselves. Then, they fill the 15 car garage with Ferraris, Maseratis and Bentleys when they, at most only need a car like my little Buick that is only worth about $1,000.
Sports inspire too much greed, selfishness, hatred and anger. I think something needs to happen, and soon.=
R
6 Jul 14
Subject: Pathological dislikes of sports
Dear Secretary,
In principle I have nothing against sports, but I'm totally unable to enjoy team sports. My girlfriend just persuaded me to try playing ultimate frisbee. As I feared, it brought back unpleasant memories of football at school. I think part of the problem is that I am literally completely uninterested in which side wins. So the game consists in running around a field while people shout stuff. I really wanted to enjoy it, but how is it possible?
If the game was played entirely by robots and my task was solely to get hold of the frisbee and throw it into the goal area, I think I might possibly enjoy it, even a lot. But we're all assigned some player we've got to "block", and to me it seems like the game is far more boring if people can't even throw the thing freely, on top of which, spending three hours stopping people throwing frisbees feels even less productive than watching TV.
Since the other players are not, unfortunately, robotic, I'm constantly worried about running into them or doing something they will disapprove of, like standing in whatever spot I actually feel like standing in, rather than where they all think each other should be. Maybe I'm just not a team player, since I work for myself and, when I used to have to work in a team to pay the bills, I totally didn't care whether the team accomplished its goals or not, or even whether the company as a whole went totally bankrupt, except of course I don't want anyone to fall into poverty -- which anyway doesn't happen if a frisbee game goes wrong.
OK maybe I'm a bit of a geek, inasmuch as I prefer intellectual pursuits to this madness (although I do workout and run), but how is it that it's virtually impossible to get together a group of people to discuss anything intellectual and potentially useful to humanity, but very easy to find endless groups of people who want to throw things and shout?
Regards
John
6 Jul 14
Subject: Now I Have to Pay for THEIR Sports!
I just got this letter from Bright House, my cable provider. Apparently, from now on, every single cable subscriber (and there are MILLIONS) will have to PAY $1 a month to subsidize sports on whatever channels sports come on. I can only guess as to why this is necessary. Is interest in sports so low that they have to get people who don't watch sports to contribute? Has the pay for sports bums risen to such heights that commercials now fail to meet the required income level? Fuck that. This is bullshit. If the sports fans want to see this crap, let THEM pay for it!
7 Jul 14
Subject: sport sucks
Hello, Sports Suck;
I just happened onto your website. Thought I would send word. There are a number of new publications in the social sciences and political economy that increasingly show how professional sports suck public sector money into private ownership. In a world already wracked with private sector fractional reserve banking on the verge of total global economic meltdown, it might be meaningful if some of these publications were listed on the Sports Suck webpage.
For instance, the titles; Varsity Green, Larceny Games, Match Fixing in International Sport, Agents of Opportunity and numerous other titles. Maybe you could have a small bookstore attached to the website with such titles and their relatives for sale.
kind regards,
antuerius
15 Jul 14
Subject: The World Cup
At last freedom from the World Bore, a return to civilisation for a month, and freedom from soccer bores. However, in a month's time the Premiership and the European Champions League return and the fight against soccer and its corruption, overkill and obnoxious fans resumes. I did my bit in the Resistance against the World Cup, refusing to visit any bar that was showing it and steadfastly refusing to discuss it with people at work.
AN ENGLISHMAN.
22 Jul 14
Subject: Glad to know I'm not alone
I hate sports — but you know what I hate more than sports? The rabid fans. Not all are obsessed, and annoying, but the majority are.
I just turned 13 by the way. My dad is stupid enough to pay for a football program every Sunday on TV, when he doesn't even have a job (he was fired) when he could be putting that money back for emergency purposes.
As I write this, I'm on vacation. We have one TV in the house and it's in the living room. Guess what the fuck is put on it? Sports. Thanks for ruining the vacation!
Also SPORTS IS ALL MY FATHER AND BROTHER TALK ABOUT. It's so IRRITATING! I want to tell them to shut up!
I think sports is so overrated and I think the players are paid WAY too much. I'd rather pay our brave soldiers 5 million dollars than give it to someone who can throw a ball and wear pads.
I understand that sports do take talent, but in my opinion it's talent wasted.
I wouldn't be so angry about sports if the fans wouldn't shove it down my throat.
Why the heck would I want to sit in the rain, or snow, or heat for two hours to watch a guy throw a ball back and forth? And the tickets are like what? 15$ per person? 30$? 100$? Some are way more than 100$. It's ridiculous!
I know that sports is an interest to some people and that's fine AS LONG AS YOU DONT FUCKING SHOVE IT DOWN MY THROAT AND RUIN MY LIFE WITH IT.
- Reagan
24 Jul 14
Subject: Commonwealth yawns
As far as I can see, the only thing that can be said in favour of the Commonwealth Games this year is that the yawnfest lasts a mere ten days. We recently endured a month of footbore from Brazil. Wimblebore lasted for two weeks. All I can say is that the sports-loving minority must be jolly noisy, for the media to be pandering to them with so much of this drivel to watch on TV.
Stephen
24 Jul 14
Subject: The one-dollar sports subsidy
To the fellow who justifiably complained above, about the extra dollar he must pay to his cable/satellite provider, to subsidise sports, I would say the following.
- It's only a dollar, but I do agree about the principle - also, next month the chiselling bounders might hike it up to five dollars, and so on.
- You already pay for a lot of channels you never watch, including sports channels, so you could take the viewpoint that this extra dollar goes toward more of the same.
- Change providers or - even better - decline altogether to watch cable/satellite television. My wife and I have not bothered with it for several years now, and we do not miss it. We buy DVDs and watch Netflix, so our viewing pleasure is unsoiled by insulting commercials for products and programmes in which we have not the remotest interest.
Apparently, more and more people are declining to subscribe to cable TV, and the providers are running about in circles trying to lure us back with "deals" such as à la carte packages in which you tell them which channels you want - to a degree. Even this can not tempt me. The media are in the business of glorifying mediocrity. I am not interested in mediocrity, whether it be a footbore match or the current size of K*m K*rdashian's bottom, and I've no wish to pay them good money so they can shove these things in my face (now there's a thought!).
We are bombarded with sports quite enough on the internet; don't let them do it to you through your TV set.
Stephen
16 Aug 14
Subject: What a waste!
I grew up playing sports as a young child through my junior year in high school. I played for fun and the chance to hang out with friends and get girls. Call me weird, but I never really cared if we won or lost a game. (I started BTW) I was always just happy to play and have fun. It was so odd to me that other teammates would cry after losing a game. Literally CRY! I was always the type that just cleared it out of my head and wanted to do something else. Why dwell on why you lost? The other team was better so forget it!
Now that I'm older, I don't follow sports at all. It's always awkward when I'm asked about a score or what time a game is on. Because of my muscular build, people often assume I play or played football. I always try to wing it or say the dreaded "I don't follow sports". If I do that I'm looked at like a homo. What puzzles me most about sports fans is most of them have never even played the sport they're cheering for. To me that makes no sense. Why cheer for a team sport you have never played. Even worse is they cheer for a team that has no significance with their life. For example my buddy loves the Broncos but has never lived in nor visited Denver. He just started following them for some stupid reason. I can at least see rooting for your home team. That makes sense. Anyways, that's my rant. Fuck sports! Go out and get a real hobby besides cheering and watching TV. The world has so much more to offer.
B
6 Sep 14
Subject: Understanding sport
Hi
I come from Australia - this country is sport mad. I tolerate sports but dont completely reject it, although I do think its over-reported.
It has taken me a long time, but I think I have finally worked out the sport thing.
For some its a matter of being social - sport is a great leveller and allows people of all walks of life to spend time together.
Sport also allows people to expend agro they'd otherwise inflict on others in a random drive-by-shooting/knife fight/brawl manner, onto a field instead.
Sport also allows people who are uber-competetive to pump the air and carry on in a manner most of us really couldnt care 2 bits about...
But - I think the reality is this - the BULK of the population arent super smart - they are average intelligence, which is fine, but the reality is that sport allows them to spend time together, to bond and to enjoy time with like minded people. I am above average intelligence, and for along time I used to mock sports fans ( some of them are as dumb as a block of concrete, but thankfully there arent that many ...).
No, the reality is that pay tv worked this out a long time ago and targets the great majority of people and makes money off them precisely because they are average intelligence.
So sport is for the average man or woman, it suits their brains. The hype about super bowl I can't relate to, not being a yank, but probably the closest we get here is the Melbourne Cup when a whole nation ( i kid you not ) of ( previous ) convicts stops to bet on 10 or so over priced nags running around a track........yep........*shakes head*
I dont do the other national thing of gambling either, so you can imagine how I fit in......
Anyway, sport seems to be about fostering a sense of national identity as well - its a way that anyone can join in , in Australia anyway.
Yes there are meat heads everywhere, but again, I think even meatheads fear not fitting in, which is why they protect the sporting thing so ferociously, and ostracize anyone who rejects it, as it rejects them. Witness them hassling nerds.....
Hope this insight helps. In many ways, if youre above average intelligence, which a lot of anti-sports people seem to be , then the lesson is to use your intelligence for good, to be understanding of people who arent as smart, and recognise sport is their domain, its what allows them to function. Also, people who arent academics are more likely to do non-mentally demanding physical jobs, and sport also reinforces this physicality.
Sport isnt about belting people up, its about identity. Academics are seen as being in their "ivory towers" and this alone shows that the average person of average intellignce doesnt "get" academics. But sport they can get - its at their level mentally.
I'm not being elitist, rather trying to carefully put together a reason for why 80-90% of the population love sport. Yes its frustrating at times - you feel like a stranger in your own country, but it is what it is.
Cheers,
From the Land of the Long Weekend. ( Australia )
8 Sep 14
Subject:
I hate sports! There is nothing funny or entertaining about it. Watching sports, to me, is like watching paint dry, or the ground crack for lack of rainwater. I will never understand people with their loyalty to a "pro" whatever the player or team. All of them are paid ridiculous sums of money to hit a ball over a net, shoot a ball into a basket, kick an oblong thing between 2 goal post or hit a ball into a little cup in the ground. Insanity is alive and well in the United States.
Gee
20 Sep 14
Subject: sports and personality
Ever since I was a child I was mystified by sports culture. My parents had me try T-ball around age 6, and arguably it served as my introduction to the concept of futility. My passions have surged against sports many times, but since becoming an adult and deciding how to spend my own time, I find myself more tranquil. That is, until I am confronted with sports again.
I live in a small American town with a very popular college football team, and while a game is occurring it is virtually impossible to leave the house and not come across some artifacts of the current status. If my wife and I play minigolf, the attendant turns the radio from pop music to football. If I go to the grocery store, I am surrounded by jerseyed people of all demographics buying alcohol and snacks. The roads are dead while the game is going. Thankfully, I'm quite happy to stay at home, where my wife may wear a jersey but we do not have TV service.
In the past 8 years I have learned more about the diversity of mankind by studying David Keirsey's temperament theory. With it, I finally have a useful way to talk about the necessary and sufficient context of sports fanaticism. According to Keirsey, the Artisan, a tactical improviser, is happiest when feeling excited, and likes to acquire techniques. Well, that would explain a great many fans and athletes. It would explain the victory dances, the hooting and grunting, and the sheerly audacious swagger of sports culture.
But not all sports fans are excited, exactly. The Guardian is happiest when feeling concerned; and regarding the topic of sports there is a great deal about which one can be concerned: safety, politics, disciplinary action, tradition, community, entertaining guests, arranging parties, making chit-chat. Guardians are sports fans just to be members of the community.
Keirsey estimates that 90% of the population consists of these two types; the sports phenomenon becomes a trivial manifestation of temperament.
The other 10% consists of Idealists and Rationals. Idealists are split, as is typical. Some of them are just as passionate as Artisans. Others are utterly offended by shallow or destructive behavior. All of them, however, are interested in personal growth, with the split representing disagreement about whether sports entail any personal growth. Rationals, I like to think, find sports completely incidental, since they are so focused on understanding the world in terms of consequences.
If you tell a Rational "We won!" you might as well say, "Some incident has occurred." Analysis can be carried out in sports, but the factors that govern sports outcomes are rather obscure, and certainly not of much interest to most sports fans, who don't care about abstractions. Rationals hate to feel anything but calm, and thus are offended by sports emotionalism. At least for myself, I find this a useful way to talk about why sports makes no sense to me and why I have absolutely no desire to partake in its culture.
Karl
25 Sep 14
Subject: Complaint against sports and atheletes
Look, for me it is not exactly that sports suck, but they are way overrated for the sake of mankind. First I want to talk about me, since birth; my family raised me to be good at academics. Sadly to this cause, I had numerous ailments which prevented me from developing right physically.
I have never been physically fit. I've tried to make with academics, which in a way I regret now; not because I do not like to gain knowledge but it has not gotten me far in my job in any way whatsoever and because all that people nowadays worship are beefheaded athletes.
Excercise is good for our health, but does it really have to be 100% part of our daily lives? I mean there are other things in life than that. Sadly I do have to agree that those who dedicate their lives to it, gain health and beauty for their later years as I see Japanese Female Bodybuilders in their 50s who look great. But why demerit people who don't bodybuild?
Many say that martial arts masters are the epitome of health and discipline, but most martial artist masters are nothing but a bunch of undisciplined jerks. I have met academics and intellectuals who behave better than such brutes.
I cannot say anything like this in public, or I will be attacked like one of your supporters from England who said that he gets mocked for disliking the FIFA World Cup when he is right! The thing is more rigged than WWE! It is not a real competition and people in my nation see it as if the world depended on it!
Quite honestly, to date I would have loved to be athletic as it is somewhat hard with my age. Maybe that way people would respect me more if I had big muscles and was actually a "man." Sad that one needs muscles to be a man rather than have a brain. Martial arts are not certain, yes they are a nice activity but not the "solve everything" thing they show on the media. I have a friend who took Kung Fu and now needs boxing to actually fight.
Sad how MMA brutes get money and recognition while scientists and intellectuals try to make a better world, but are shunned for being "weak."
-Annonymous.
27 Sep 14
Subject: Cheering the end of western civilization
In the entire catalogue of human achievement and endeavor, there is not one of more futility than the place sports holds in the heart of the modern man.
Doug
13 Oct 14
Subject: Is anyone else this bad?
I have a question to put to you, my dear fellow disdainers of sports, just out of curiosity. Let me lead up to it with a preamble.
We all know how rude most sports enthusiasts can be, if we admit to no interest. In many cases, this rudeness, especially when sustained for months or years, is actual verbal (or even physical) abuse. Because I suffered at the hands of such oafs at school, the only thing I learnt from sports is that sports are dull and that their fans are rude and boorish. Not all of them, of course, but most. There are two other groups of people whom you might expect to be just as off-puttingly partisan in their views: (1) members of particularly devout religious groups (and I speak as a Christian who doesn’t feel the need to get in your face) and (2) chaps mad keen on politics. Still, in my experience, these are not as belligerently rude as sports fans.
I am a musician, but though some of my associates are smug and snooty, none of them castigate non-musicians. I’m also an artist, but none of the artists I know grunt derisively at people who don’t know how to draw. We understand that their interests lie elsewhere. People I know who adore hiking might warn you about the perils of a sedentary lifestyle, but won’t call you a wanker or snigger at you, and if one of them does, it’s because he’s a hateful person, whatever his interests. I once met a chap who liked to go caving, but he didn’t call me stupid or question my heterosexuality because I had no interest in descending into the bowels of the earth most weekends; he was a friendly and decent man.
When I was at school, I encountered snobs who might look down on me because Shakespeare bored me, or classical music didn't thrill me as much as it did them, but by far, the rudest people were the sports fans. Because there were so many of them, theirs was the loudest voice. Some groups of people can be snobs, such as jazz fanatics and wine connoisseurs, but they are not everywhere you go. Their abuse is not as overt.
You’ll find loudly rude people in all walks of life, but I’m talking about areas of interest in which most of the adherents are rude, not just one or two.
So, the question is, can any of you think of any other field of endeavour whose enthusiasts are as notoriously rude as sports fans? Especially any group of people as ubiquitous as sports fans. It might be interesting for us to compare the intensity and commonness of these loutish oiks with another section of humanity.
Stephen
13 Oct 14
Subject: Telemarketers and Mormons
Telemarketers and those religious people who canvas the neighborhood knocking on doors can be just as annoying but they are unfailingly polite. Nothing approaches the constant challenge of the sports fan:
Bill
18 Oct 14
Subject: Stephen's letter
I completely agree with Stephen's letter, while religious nuts( have you been saved, brother?) are quite rare in Britain and are classed as eccentrics, political and sports( particularly football) bores are quite common and the latter a blight on polite society with their boorish, immature fans shouting at men who probably would kick them aside in the street and who make millions out of their pathetic devotion to Braindeath United. Not also forgetting the media corporations, controlled by people like Rupert Murdoch, who see it as their job to cram the newspapers these sheeple read with football stories at the expense of real news and extort a hefty subscription every month from the fans and bars that show this rubbish. Meanwhile Ebola and IS are on the march, but who cares Lobotomy FC have just signed another player for £ 50 million and did you see his free kick in the 91st minute while Fuckwit Albion's goal difference is terrible this season. Makes you weep.
However, fear not, those of us who refuse to tolerate this game and other lobotomising sports like golf( the most tedious sport on earth after football), darts and Formula 1, are spending our money elsewhere. Also bars and clubs that aren't showing sports at loud volume seem to be attracting an anti audience and I also notice that when a game finishes and the bores go home to dream of football, the atmosphere changes as the interesting people come out to discuss movies, music, books and television shows.
AN ENGLISHMAN.
3 Dec 14
Subject: BT SPENDS A BILLION ON FOOTBALL RIGHT
British Telecom is the main provider of landline telephones in Britain and for all it doesn't have a monopoly on Internet Service Providers, controls all the infrastructure. To my dismay a cable shattered inside a cabinet down the road, rendering my internet connection and phone unusable for eight days, and again the internet went off for another week due to problems with a fibreoptic cable. Extremely poor service, but really annoyed me was when the call centre operator asked me if I wanted BT Sports.
Like I have no internet and phone and rely on a mobile to communicate with people, yet this character suggested I subscribe to their sports channel for £ 45 a month, while I wanted my phone and internet back. I very nearly lost it and DID lose it when I read BT, having branched out from phones, now owns subscribtion sports channels and has spent a billion on rights to football. They can't even provide a reliable internet and phone service, have abysmal customer care and their new broadband service isn't much faster than their old one, but seemingly buying up football matches is more important than providing a basic service. It's enough to make you give up.
AN ENGLISHMAN.
22 Dec 14
Subject: The other side of the arguement
Hello There, I'm Harry a football (soccer) referee from England, and a lover of most sports, although I must empathise with your dislike for American Football & Baseball :-)
Sport is a wonderful thing in my opinion for a number of reasons:
If you want to be an actor, you have to have relatively well off parents, to go to drama school.
If you want to be a lawyer, you again need a lot a money.
However, if you want to be a football (soccer) player all you need is talent, & you can make yourself a career, which I think is brilliant, particularly football, but all sports really.
Look at Brazil for example, favelas, rife with drugs & crime, football saves thousands of lives a year, it has such a great postive influence, it gives peoples lives a purpose beyond crime. Also it gives countries a chance to have joy through dispair, like Iraq, dispite all of the trouble in Baghdad, when they won the 2007 Asian Cup Football Championship, it was a time of national celebration.
When you look at schools I fully agree with your arguement that schools can take sports too far. However, in England, it is very much not an event, just a chance to enjoy yourselfs with your friends,with a competitive edge. However, from your description of sport in High Schools (as College Sports have huge role to play, unlike on this side of the pond), it sounds very excessive & I would be against sport in schools on that scale.
When many people say they don't watch the World Cup because they claim it is 'rigged', as a fellow referee I am extremely offended as these officials work so hard to get to the pinnacle of the careers. Obviously corruption is rife at FIFA, but they would not dare fix the result of any football match, let alone the World Cup. My lifetime dream is to referee at the World Cup, & very much hope, while people are perfectly within their rights not to watch it, I would be horrified to my find intergrity questioned, as if I am sum sort of puppet to carry out orders from above.
I know how frustrating it must be having the World Cup/ NBA&NFL playoffs ruin your television plan, but at the end of the day, we must account for what everyone likes. I hate many programmes that are on the television, but I accept that lots of people like it & politely change the channel, surely you could just do the same.
I hope that I have changed your views, even slightly on sport.
I would be pleased with a reply
Kind Regards,
Harry
