The sports fandom really can be toxic and overbearing. As much as I love some sports, the way it was always expected for me to give a shit about the local football or baseball team was obnoxious.
Not to mention the excessive doting on sports, to the point that schools will slash their arts department and lay off teachers so the middling football team there can get more concessions.
One of the most sobering early experiences I had as a teacher was being notified, again, that I had to tighten my belt, again, because of a budget cut that was necessary, again, in the district’s newsletter.
The next page over, the same newsletter proudly announced the new stadium being built…
For the amount that the necessary budget cut was for.
My city is currently facing a housing and homelessness crisis and each mayoral candidate keeps promising to build a new stadium without raising taxes because of the constant braying of the sports Fandom.
That is a uniquely american thing in part because America is the only country I know of that takes high school sports seriously and also don’t seem to understand that the relevant costs for a sports team are: shoes, a ball, PE teacher salary, field someone will let you run in none of which should be breaking the bank
To be honest this is the real issue. People I know who say ‘sportsball’ are trying to mock how sports is not more important than all things, yet in some contexts seems to be treated as such. Unlike all other hobbies, sports gets ground into my face every day by Youtube ads and buses and TV and news etc. If chess got the same coverage and pushing into my face that sports did, I’d mock it just the same.
College and high school sports should just be some field out on campus, and the coach should just be the anthro professor doing it as a hobby or something.
The sports fandom really can be toxic and overbearing. As much as I love some sports, the way it was always expected for me to give a shit about the local football or baseball team was obnoxious. Not to mention the excessive doting on sports, to the point that schools will slash their arts department and lay off teachers so the middling football team there can get more concessions.
One of the most sobering early experiences I had as a teacher was being notified, again, that I had to tighten my belt, again, because of a budget cut that was necessary, again, in the district’s newsletter.
The next page over, the same newsletter proudly announced the new stadium being built…
For the amount that the necessary budget cut was for.
Love this phrasing
I’m not sure how else it’s supposed to be described except in less flattering ways.
The Sportsball Cult
My city is currently facing a housing and homelessness crisis and each mayoral candidate keeps promising to build a new stadium without raising taxes because of the constant braying of the sports Fandom.
That is a uniquely american thing in part because America is the only country I know of that takes high school sports seriously and also don’t seem to understand that the relevant costs for a sports team are: shoes, a ball, PE teacher salary, field someone will let you run in none of which should be breaking the bank
To be honest this is the real issue. People I know who say ‘sportsball’ are trying to mock how sports is not more important than all things, yet in some contexts seems to be treated as such. Unlike all other hobbies, sports gets ground into my face every day by Youtube ads and buses and TV and news etc. If chess got the same coverage and pushing into my face that sports did, I’d mock it just the same.
College and high school sports should just be some field out on campus, and the coach should just be the anthro professor doing it as a hobby or something.
Do they have to be anthro? I dunno if we can find that many furries