I think most people's resentment for sports, if you asked them, comes from their connection to gender norms, and how kids who aren't interested in sports are treated by society as freaks who need to be policed into liking the appropriate gender coded activities. I suppose that also extends to people who for whatever reason weren't fortunate to be good enough at sports that they were picked last.

Either way the issue isn't that they werent good at it or weren't interested - its the gendered stigmatization that comes with it.

Perhaps that's changed or isn't as extreme now as it was. But, most peoples issue that grew up when i did comes from the reaction from society at large for not liking the enforced gender coded thing and being told whatever we liked instead was stupid or wrong and that we needed/were expected to like sports instead.

[–] very_poggers_gay@hexbear.net 15 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Yes and I also hate sports because of the macho “my team (us) vs. your team (you)” culture, like toxic masculinity and pseudo-nationalism wrapped into one.

Oh and I also how these guys that run around after a ball make tens of millions of dollars (and their investors) even more

[–] BurgerPunk@hexbear.net 12 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Eh, athletes are workers whose labor is still exploited by owners despite their large salaries. And don't forget about the exploitation of free labor at the college level and even lower because kids are competing and hurting their bodies to maybe one day make that money. I think that's the part that's worth being mad about, not that the few who make it get to make large salaries for years of wrecking their bodies

[–] TawnyFroggy@hexbear.net 10 points 1 year ago

Yeah, most athletes don't make even close to enough compared to the value they bring team owners. I can't feel bad for millionaires who play a game for a living, but I feel a hell of a lot more for them than billionaire owners who don't do shit.

[–] very_poggers_gay@hexbear.net 6 points 1 year ago

After writing my comment i'll just add a foreword that I know i'm hyperfocusing on pro-level sports and on the athletes that survived varying degrees of other evil shit they were subjected before they went pro

athletes are workers whose labor is still exploited by owners despite their large salaries

that's true, maybe i'm stuck in my ways with a reactionary take, but i don't know what can convince me to empathize with the exploited NHLers who earn (on average) over 60 times the median salary in Canada to play hockey, for example. or the golfers who earn more. or the soccer players who earn more. like i don't know any other way to feel but mad.

Sure, they are exploited to some degree, but also they benefit to incredible lengths from the labour of everyone else that keeps their leagues and arenas and schedules running; and many of them pivot with ease into petit bourgeois (maybe i'm not using that right) roles with huge investment portfolios and business/brand deals. The only way their salaries from the league (and their earnings with brand deals) are so inflated are because they are being paid out from the surplus value of all those other labourers. For me, it's like feeling bad for A- and B-list Hollywood actors because their labour is exploited by movie execs, meanwhile the countless other staff that make movies possible earn literal pennies on the dollar.

And from there I arrive at a weird thing about the bodily destruction that these sports and industries demand from players. Sports like football, MMA, boxing, and hockey are disgusting (imo) for the bodily destruction that they demand from athletes of all ages. Yet, the risks (or guarantees) of physical harm are never really factored into any wages.

And don't forget about the exploitation of free labor at the college level and even lower because kids are competing and hurting their bodies to maybe one day make that money.

that's also true. I think i overlooked that because we don't have the same college athletics culture in Canada. I generally forget about it until i get an from some coach telling me a student needs exemptions for a tourney lol. It's super gross that many young people are forced into harmful sports by parents or coaches in some odd hope that they will become a millionaire. I feel like that's all the more reason to oppose sports being like this billion-dollar industry and golden ticket to amassing intergenerational wealth.