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Comment by insickness | Hacker News Reader

Am I the only one who finds the term 'sportspeople' weird and awkward? Why not call them athletes?

In Icelandic athletes translates to íþróttafólk which literally means sportspeople. So to me this sounds like an Icelander that doesn’t know good English. It’s probably a perfectly cromulent word though.

> So to me this sounds like an Icelander that doesn’t know good English.

Complete aside, but since we are participating in linguistic tomfoolery, this feels appropriate:

The expression should be “doesn’t have good English”, or perhaps, “doesn’t know English well”.

[Cromulent] was introduced in "Lisa the Iconoclast," an episode of the Fox animated television series The Simpsons that first aired on February 18, 1996. Coinage of the word has been attributed to the television writer David X. Cohen by Bill Oakley, one of the series' producers, in a commentary to the DVD release of the series.

https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/cromulent

In comparison to "sportsperson", "athlete" has slightly more of a connotation of proficiency or seriousness. "sportsperson" more plainly means anyone engaging in sport.

Can also include motorcyclists/cyclists, which aren't necessarily considered "athletes". Maybe "recreational use" might had been more apt.

Really wondering if this can be combined and standardized through ECE 22.06/SNELL/MIPS. ECE is probably the best bet for testing something like this, SNELL is too strict in its testing experimentation.

I think this might apply to people who do a variety of activities that might not fit into traditional genres, like motorcycling, horseback riding, ATVs, skiing, skateboarding, scooter/cycle commuting, military/police, etc

There’s a lot of sportspeople who aren’t athletes. I average close to 20 hours of sportsing per week, but I am no athlete. An athlete is someone who competes for realzies, maybe even money.

Seems like an unnecessary complication. We already have a way of distinguishing that: athlete vs paid or professional athlete.

You could pay me all you want; I'd still be a sportsman and not an athlete.

If you spend 20 hours per week playing music, you're a musician.

Yes, and, note, not an athlete.

You're right, it's awkward and takes you out of the story. They could have just said athletes.

Why do people consume articles instead of reading?

Not all of them are athletic.

But aren't they?

Pretty much every sportsperson who wears a helmet is an athlete, no?

It's not the golfers or bowlers who are wearing helmets. It's the American football and ice hockey players. Even F1 drivers need to be in top athletic condition.

As a general rule not all sportspeople are athletes, but for this article "athlete" does feel like the more natural word.

I bike for transportation sometimes but I wouldn’t consider myself a cycling athlete.

You wouldn't be a sportsperson then either :)

Athleople?

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