Rolling Maleness and Masculinity Discussion Thread

The only problem with sport is that people follow male-only teams or male competitors to a vastly disproportionate level & thus valourise sport as above all a clash of men, which is p patriarchal

I watched some women's cricket this morning otoh so I am pure and great j/k j/k obviously I watch way, way more men's stuff and have a Charlton men's season ticket and watch men's cricket and men's snooker and men's everything more than women's equivalent and the culture might change towards equality but the change is p glacial even with the tangible progress of the last couple decades

*makes j/k off motion*

obv the ideal is mixed teams on merit. one day perhaps

would like to devise a sport that gives men and women equal chances to be successful when pitted against each other. it's the great sport-theory challenge of our day

xp Yeah Marlowe got offed in a South London poetry beef irc.

Astor Place riots probably a more apposite example of non-sports crowds put to deadly ends. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Astor_Place_Riot

ANYWAY I agree that all of these things totally suck but it doesn't make any sense to me to see mass-spectator sport based violence as anything other than a symptom of the broader problem of violence under discussion.

xp. i enjoy women's sport. i go to women's fitba sometimes, would do so more often if there were a professional team where i live. but (not to be facts don't care about your feelings) sexual dimorphism in humans is an actual thing that exists and the nature of most sports means that male sport will tend to be more interesting to watch.

integrate curling imo

would like to devise a sport that gives men and women equal chances to be successful when pitted against each other

Quidditch iirc

xps. good things about women's sport - specifically football - less bro'y crowd, families, women, queer people. less money so less sponsorship crap everywhere. less money so less cheating - i.e. PEDs which are definitely a feature of men's soccer don't seem to have trickled down.

Did you mean hurling mookie

i did not

Benefit of doubt rescinded

Hurling Mookie = underrated 90s jam band

Stevie Gerrard kicking the shit out of that DJ probably goes down as a score draw

― the intentional phallusy (Noodle Vague), Friday, November 17, 2017 7:38 PM (fifty-one minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

lol

it doesn't make any sense to me to see mass-spectator sport based violence as anything other than a symptom of the broader problem of violence under discussion.

I'm getting kind of tired of repeating myself, but this isn't what I did. I was refuting the idea that sports are a non-violent/non-aggressive outlet for that type of behavior. Which is counter-intuitive given how deeply embedded in our violent culture sports have been, historically speaking. Some people may find it adequate as a healthy outlet that prevents them from murdering people, other people will use it as outlet for murdering people. Hurray humanity.

Can't measure all the lives saved thru sport so I spose we'll have to call this.....a tie

I see what you did there

I was refuting the idea that sports are a non-violent/non-aggressive outlet for that type of behavior.

No one said it was a non-violent/non-aggressive outlet. What was said is that it is an outlet where the violence and aggression can be controlled and channeled into something positive under the correct guidance.

difference w out a distinction imo

I mean my point stands, sports often fails to control and channel violence and aggression into something positive. It's just as likely to just get channeled into actual violence and aggression.

high school jocks were some of the most psychotically violent ppl I've ever known. In contrast to the psychotic violence of the less socially adept outcasts and weirdos, jocks' violence was laughed off/approved of/explicitly condoned.

and why cause sports

because sports

bah

we didn't have organized sports at my high school and the boys that were good at soccer were still often the most violent/good at fighting

The most psychotically violent ppl I knew from high school were white potsmoking metalheads. They had little to nothing to do with organized sports of any kind; they were too busy terrorizing other students and selling drugs to be on the football team (who bought a lot of acid from them).

So, my thesis is that white men are violent dickbags that need to be controlled but won't be, because other violent white men set the rules for success.

well no argument there

Speaking as an effete outsider to the world of jocks, I want to say that my experiences with these people did not lead me to see them as “psychotically violent.”

gonna go out on a limb here and guess that we all went to different schools at different times in different parts of the country

Ahem

thought the dangerous violence of sport was a universal

Historically, sports fans haven't [murdered each other en masse] either, unless you're thinking of examples I can't call to mind.

sounds like someone should read up about the culture around chariot racing and esp https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nika_riots

I already linked to the Nika Riots! There were plenty of other less-fatal riots in ancient Rome, it's p well documented

maybe do a poll on which sport is the least full of maniacs waiting to explode. never noticed a lot of roid abuse in darts tbh.

them two triathlon brothers look pretty gimpy

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UQzj6pcHAac

Ogmor I already apologised for missing that link, have now read that page twice and still don't think it makes sense to see it as "sports fans murdering each other en masse" - the sport doesn't seem to be anything like the key factor in the riots or the murder.

Οὖτις I agree with you that sport can be a space in which violent and aggressive impulses can be let loose, or can be channelled in a more positive way.

Sport and violence discussion is interesting

Off the cuff, there are people I love who are very into sport and people I hate who are very into sport and it can be, the same sport, the same team, but has totally different significance to these different people. The sport culture itself seems to offer the good and the bad from the same stall because both sell?

I've said before I like darts - I also like listening to fans of e.g. oldham athletics football team go on, the team seems to go nowhere and that's the point? In other words the amateur knockabout eccentric side of sports seems fairly classic - a game, played by people, for fun - whereas the hissing, icy, belligerently 'pro' side of sports seems like a dud.

Not that darts doesn't have all the shouty trimmings of sponsored pro sport - of course it does - but the players are all pretty relatable in their buffoonery

Maybe sports as a healthy outlet for aggression is just a bit cart before the horses? Like I understand that it can and is used that way but it doesn't work unless you make kids aware that this aggression is ultimately destructive and something to be wary of in the first place.

I don't remember ever feeling as miserable as I did during team sports in PE class - there was a clear expectation that I should pull my weight and that my failures made me less of a man, which in turn made me worthy of ridicule, derision and homophobic slurs.

ilx probably going to have a very dim view of aggression as a thing in any form, I think that this is not necessarily an argument that would go unremarked across a wider sphere

Channelling aggression is not the only argument for sport (tho it's the context in which it came up here obv)

if you define aggression beyond the parameters of self-defence or assertiveness I think it's a moderately tough sell tbh

There is a lot of chicken/egg. Do sports always provide a release valve for preexisting aggression, or do they sometimes stir it up and create it where it wouldn't otherwise be?

For starters, we'll never know, because "though shalt be a sportser" is thrust on many American boys from birth. I'm not in a sporting family (to put it mildly) but still found that it was impossible to avoid football-themed onesies, pajamas, sheet sets. Every weekend, nearly every square inch of suburban grass is covered with preschoolers milling around a soccer ball. Many fathers do not give their sons a choice; they've already picked out a fandom and a sport and sometimes even a specific position. In much of our culture, woe to the boy who says "Uh, Dad? I'd actually rather be on the chess team."

Mandatory sports culture suffuses every high school, where you're required to go to the Pep Rally before the Big Game, in which the Anyhigh Whatevers are supposed to "stomp" and "punish" the Otherhigh Fightin' Thingies. Rah, rah, school spirit.

If the aggression and/or drive to excel is innate, why do the sportsers need a cheering crowd, banners in the hallway, constant "Go Team" exhortations? (And why, for the love of god, do we need to provide them with a dozen cute girls in short skirts, clapping and cheering them on to victory? To remind them of exactly why they need to crush the opposition?) Surely they could just use their inner reserves.

still don't think it makes sense to see it as "sports fans murdering each other en masse" - the sport doesn't seem to be anything like the key factor in the riots or the murder.

the sport is why they were where they were and the rivalry was why the ones who were killed were killed, idk how much more you could want really

this is not necessarily an argument that would go unremarked across a wider sphere

so what?

darra, I know it's not the only argument for sport - I'm not suggesting sports should be interrupted before this is sorted out! But it's the case that's being made for it itt.

Wide swathes of the wider sphere see aggression as awesome by definition, which is surely part of the problem being discussed here.

Yeah no argument with either rejoinder daniel

™Mandatory sports culture suffuses every high school, where you're required to go to the Pep Rally before the Big Game, in which the Anyhigh Whatevers are supposed to "stomp" and "punish" the Otherhigh Fightin' Thingies. Rah, rah, school spirit.

Again, how to extricate, idk- but this post screams AMERICA at me, not SPORT

it's definitely a different culture to ours

it was impossible to avoid football-themed onesies, pajamas, sheet sets

made me think how the range of default cheapo birthday card designs for sons and dads in the UK comes from the limited pool of Sport, Fishing, Cars and Beer

I mean I was getting birthday cards with photos of random unrecognisable lower tier football action on them long before I really knew whether I liked football or not

fair point darraghmac - I am speaking here from a USian context.

However, I suspect that even in Europe, athletes are exhorted to do well rather than poorly. I am told that Irish sports teams have fans who encourage them to win rather than lose.

Or is it all "Just try your best, lads! Just go out there and have fun!"?