Good.
I am not a fan of professional sport - another brick in the wall.
Sport should be for fun IMO, not a profession.
I am not a fan of professional sport - another brick in the wall.
Sport should be for fun IMO, not a profession.
It was very popular at the beginning of the 20th century. That’s why the olympics were strictly limited to amateurs and why professionalism was banned in France during the nazi occupation.
What happens when you ban professionalism is that the rich who have time to seriously train get good at sports and the poor are excluded.
I know that. Rugby Union, amateur and posh, Rugby League professional and for the working class.
> What happens when you ban professionalism is that the rich who have time to seriously train get good at sports and the poor are excluded.
What I am against is the spectacle. I loved playing sport back in the day (I am old and bent now, so want opportunities for my children and grandchildren). Fun. Joy. The feeling of giving your all physically.
The spectacle ruins all that. Professional sports people are unhealthy in all other ways than the performance at their sport. What is the point? Selling sugary or alcoholic beverages to people sitting down watching?
I am an old man shouting at the clouds.....
I do not understand why we are such hypocrites and talk about "purity" for an activity that has nothing normal in it.
As for non-professional sports - I play mixed volleyball with friends and it is great. the level is average, there are very good players (who tone down their capacities) and less good ones (that try hard). We have fun and we get a beer afterwards.
We even play in a business league where we are systematically last and somehow a mascot of the league. Since we will lose anyway, the other teams play fair and let us play (and try risky combinations on their side for the fun).
I watch these matches with a lot of pleasure because everyone is there for the fun and get exactly nothing out of the game - except pleasure and friends.
It's nothing to do with purity. If you allow doping, that means doping becomes mandatory to participate at any high level. Amateur levels will be messed up as well, because all the people that dream of going pro will dope as well.
It's similar (but not the exact same) as helmets in hockey. When they weren't mandatory, nobody wore them because not having a helmet provided an advantage (better visibility). The downside was that it was easy to get a head injury and ruin your life. Unfortunately, since some were ready to take that risk, everyone was forced too.
Today in order to get to pro level you need a staff, special nutrition, etc. This is a commercial investment. It starts at amateur level (for those who want to go pro)
What we allow today is not far from doping - but we still pretend to look for "forbidden" substances because we arbitrarily said that they were bad.
Allowing doping would level the game: today there is so much research on how to hide the "unorthodox" substances players use and this is a cat and mouse game. Once you say "go for it" at least there will be no cheating in this area.
The only thing that bothers me is that this will quickly hit children who are not aware of the consequences. My wife was a European level champion in the junior league and when she was offered to join the national team, she refused because this would mean abandoning studies and get into a really unhealthy mode of life. She was lucky to have reasonable parents and friends - not everyone was that lucky and the ones who failed failed really really hard.
There are "touch rugby" leagues here. Some get competitive and a bit yuck, but others are done for fun. Smoking dope, drinking beer.
My favourite used to be hacky sacky. When we played it we scored as a group (a "hack" when everybody in the group got to kick the sack). Pure fun.
Really? Why?
Given the distortions it creates in the economy, the terrible effects on the player's health, the deleterious effects of sitting watching eating potato chips and drinking beer... Why?
I agree that at its best professional sport is a glorious spectacle. But throwing people to lions would be too, and less hypocritical.