I’ve seen tables flipped, tv sets punched through, furniture thrown. And that’s just in the home.
How does one get to a place mentally where burning and destroying things, over a sportsball game seem a reasonable thing to do?
Destroying things and acting like a bully feels powerful and strong. They can’t do anything else, it’s a lack of problem-solving capabilities .
The sportsball team you cheer for is your tribe.
Your tribe meets up to go to war against other tribes regularly, you wear the same colors to recognize each other.
The goal is to beat the other tribe, show them who’s boss and acquire the shiny thing at the end.
The great thing is, you don’t even have to do anything to be part of the tribe, except wear the right colors and cheer (or boo) at the right time.It’s a pretty civilized way to channel our stone-age tribal urges into something that happens on a weekend, doesn’t interfere with your work, and can even be turned into profit. And sometimes a few things break, but that’s much better than the constant bloody feuds that were normal during most of human history.
What’s sportsball?
Perjorative term for all sports.
Mostly internet and I would imagine strongly correlated with those who are still angry they had an unpleasant high school experience.
Or those who think there’s an absurd amount of money and resources devoted to literally nothing productive. Every time the fuck cars people post about stadiums I really want to bitch about people who don’t live near or out in the country but seriously there’s WAY to much money spent on these places and events.
I really hate the “non productive” argument as you only see it with sports, not say, the video game or movie/tv industries. Just has this real whiff of “I don’t like this activity and I don’t see why anyone else should!”
Of all the non productive uses of money and time, at least sports has a bunch of ancillary benefits, especially for youth. I don’t imagine youth sports leagues, which keep kids in shape, keeps them doing something positive instead of the usual juvenile delinquent stuff we’d have been doing, teaching them to be a part of a team etc. And then those stadiums tend to get used for a bunch of cultural/musical events.
Exactly. I used to think like this when younger, but I now see how stupid this mentality is. Basically anything we care about as humans is “non-productive”. Music, art, video games, musicals, movies, sports, etc. just because I don’t care about something doesn’t mean that it’s not important to someone else.
I don’t really have a problem with youth sports. But it shouldn’t be a “profession”. We shouldn’t allocate hundreds of acres of land for parking lots that are only used for barely half the year. Games and tv and movies advance tech at least and don’t each up billions and trillions of dollars of my money for shit I and many others will never use. There are dozens of studies on the utter uselessness of these facilities.
https://www.si.com/soccer/2015/05/01/ap-soc-brazil-useless-stadiums
They bring down the local economies and depending on the fans fanaticism can utterly destroy local towns after a bad kick or pass or whatever.
How much money and research has been devoted to proving that getting smacked in the head by a 400 lb wall of meat can cause concussions. Or more accurately to prove the misinformation that it wasn’t happening to be false.
You should see what happens when political tribalism takes place in the United States.
Strong emotions and financial strain with the working class at an all-time high, disdain towards other groups, and fights break out.
Assassination attempts and murder of activists and politicians due to disagreements.
I think it goes back to dividing the working class and keeping us entertained so we don’t pay attention to the status quo.
I think you’re missing two large parts; escapism and booze.
From the sportsball moniker, I imagine you aren’t a fan. Sometime, it’s worth it to go to a bar that supporters of whatever team go to. There’s something magic about hooting, hollering and cheering with a crowd of complete strangers about this one thing. And in that brief couple of hours, it becomes larger and more magic. And some folks chasing that feeling get drunk and go too far when it goes wrong.
You’re missing the final piece, gambling losses.
The easiest, but not necessarily the most applicable answer, is that it is possible to wager money on the outcome of sports games. Very large sums of money. Ruinous, life-altering sums.
The more common answer is that this is a sense of personality for some people. They identify with a certain sports team and spend a lot of their time cheering them on and building up the belief that they are the best team, undefeatable under any fair circumstance. When that team loses, they then take it personally. After all, if their team lost, could it mean they’re not actually the best team? Did I choose wrong?
No. Impossible. It’s those damn referees, blind as they are, missing the most obvious fouls and treating my team unfairly, punishing my team’s players more harshly for the tiniest infractions. Nay, not even that; my team didn’t break the rules; it’s that other team’s fault!
&c., &c., until you get bored.
It isn’t reasoning driving these decisions. It’s emotion. And before any of us get too haughty about it, it’s also a very human reaction. Humans were not designed to reason, we were designed to feel. And yes, everyone has a set of circumstances that will cause their logical processing to shut off and allow emotion to take control. It just might not be sports.
I’m just a little sad that there are people in the world who have lived such empty, passionless lives that they can’t conceive of being so excited and invested in something that they could lose their self control for a moment
You think the only reason people could find destructive, violent behaviour to be unusual or difficult to understand is because they have no passion in their own lives?
I’m just a little sad that there are people in the world who have grown up in such violent, loveless homes that they can’t conceive of finding violent behaviour over a sports game disgusting.
I wonder how many of wives and partners who get the shit kicked out of them when their passionate “alpha” male’s favourite team loses would agree with you. Oh it’s OK, he had just lived such a full, passionate life that he sometimes loses his self control for a moment.
I dunno.
But I work in contract security. When the Super Bowl came to Minneapolis, it was one of the worst nights of My working-life.
I was walking through a bar to touch bases with their management (the bar was tenants of my client,) and a philly fan broke a bottle off and tried to shank me. That was the night before. All I did to provoke it? Walk behind him.
Another incident the night before, 3 guys were kicking the shit out of an oldish guy while two howling wives egged them on.
They were late twenties early thirties, their victim was a late-50’s black guy.
Their only “reason”? He was wearing a Vikings cap.
Over all, the only night that we had more arrests happen was when the city decided to set up a soft checkpoint for a trump rally with a day’s notice to my client next door.
When ever I start listing incidents other Philly fans are quick to say “no we’re just passionate!”
Green Bay is passionate. They dress up in their cosplay and drink all the beer then go home. (Though, probably some of the best tailgating you’ve ever seen…) they don’t beat the shit out of people.
As a philly native, I will say that the vast majority of philly fans are more reasonable levels of passionate, I’ve never personally been around anyone getting violent over a game, at worst just a lot of yelling and cursing directed at no one in particular.
But yeah, our worst fans definitely have a way of going the extra mile into the heart of crazytown.
Philly has a tough image and we’re proud of it and embrace it, but a lot of assholes don’t understand that being tough doesn’t mean being needlessly violent, offensive, and destructive.
Personally, I like the lunatics here that climb light poles and think of the city greasing them up as a challenge, that’s the kind of crazy fan I want to represent my city.
Really. A native and you’ve never personally seen it.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F7sW-0D_qhI
I only knew of one but after googling there appears to have been a few.
Yeah, astonishingly if you don’t wander into the crowded center city areas that are packed with people and bars, things are a lot more subdued.
There’s something 1½ million people in the city, a lot of whom are watching the game, either at home, in a friends house, or at one of the 1300 or so bars in the city, all spread out over about 140 square miles. If you don’t go seeking out the craziness, it’s easy to not see it in person.
Not to mention all of the eagles fans in the surrounding suburbs.
And take a good look at your video, how much actual violence or destructiveness are you seeing there? I’m seeing mostly a big crowd of people milling around outside chanting and yelling at no one in particular. Creating a nuisance or impeding traffic? Sure, hardly a riot or anything of the sort though.
You have, being generous, maybe a couple thousand people (I’m pretty sure I’ve seen more people turn out to ride in the Philly naked bike ride) gathering around city hall, a major landmark located in the very heart of the city, and doing what? yelling? Maybe 2% of a city where “go birds” passes as a greeting, wandering around outside being a bit rowdy.
Yeah this isn’t really an argument between you guys as much as one saying “the worst of the worst is bad!” and another saying “yeah, they are! But most people aren’t the worst of the worst”.
that didn’t take long.
I mean, seriously. You’re aware that after a 49er’s game that turned violent, Eagles added jail cells - oh I’m sorry, the proper term is “holding cell”- to deal with all that… “passion”. and… no. I don’t mean a holding room that locks. they had full on jail cells. and before that, Veteran’s Field didn’t just have jail cell- it had a full on court room.
There’s also those incidents with the D-cell batteries. Plural. Totally normal fan-rivalry things to do. totally.
then there’s that time that eagle’s fans beat up Cheif Zee (redskin’s super fan.)- broken legs, ribs, and other injuries.
And what the fuck did Millie ever do to get harassed by crowds of phillie fans? she was a 90+ year old grandmother for crying out loud. the only thing she did to get the attention was get recognized for being an old vikings fan. Even then you had to drag out your geriatric fan and that wasn’t enough?
sure. Not all eagle’s fans are total assholes. most fans “aren’t that bad”. But you do realize, when other teams say the same thing, they’re talking about people that are singing a little too loud, or shouting obnoxious jingles or maybe they just got a little drunk. (I’m not kidding about packer’s fans drinking all the beer.)
Should ask somewhere else, you won’t find these people in a federated open-source communist link aggregator website.
People who destroy things over computer game outcomes: Why?
I’ve seen keyboards flipped, monitors punched through, controllers thrown. And that’s just in the home.
How does one get to a place mentally where burning and destroying things, over a computer game seem a reasonable thing to do?
More relatable?
I’d say, based on most of the answers here, that the reasons behind the sports scenario (people who are spectators) and the reasons behind the video game scenario (personal failure) are very different.
Apples to oranges.
Ironically, the only game I’ve ever damaged my own stuff over was a sportsball game.
Most games you fuck up due to your own incompetence, but football games and the like make you feel like you could do nothing wrong in a game and still lose. It’s infuriating.
More relatable?
No
I’ve seen keyboards flipped, monitors punched through, controllers thrown. And that’s just in the home.
If this is true, then people in your home need some professional help. I have never seen something like that over a videogame
Rage quitting doesn’t have to involve destroying stuff. If you are so much out of control, you need help and I don’t mean that as a rhetoric figure.
Not really. It’s just as irrational. Why destroy something because you lost a video game? I’ve been frustrated before due to a game, but never anywhere near frustrated enough to destroy something that I paid a lot of money for and am very happy with. At most I’ll slap my desk or something, but that’s nowhere near hard enough to have any effect.
“Sportsball normie Lemmy user” reporting in and I have the answer! The answer being: I DON’T KNOW . Not all of us are the same. My usual response to my team having a disappointing season is just trying to enjoy the rest of the season from an entertaining perspective while dying inside over my team’s showing.
When my team has won the Superbowl (will not disclose the amount of times), I have ridden that sublime high for well, all of my life since that fateful year(s) in a sun kissed peace almost like a runners high. I never felt the need to fuck shit up is what I’m saying
So we’ve concluded you’re not a Browns fan…
Probably not a Bears fan either.
The both of you are correct.
Hmm, gonna try and narrow this down further. Did you climb any light poles as part of your celebration festivities?
Oh God no, we’ve won way more Super Bowls than the Eagles. I mean only one more, but still
Sometimes you just gotta kill a toaster…
They use sports as an outlet for all their emotions. Happiness, sadness, anger, grief.
I would say, witnessing the other side of this is beautiful. I was in Buenos Aires when Argentina won the world cup. I think it was over 3 million people that gathered on the main road by the obelisk monument. Everyone was crying of happiness, dancing, celebrating. There were no political, class, or race divides. Boca & River fans celebrated together. Everyone was just Argentinian that day.
It’s called displacement aggression The sportsball fan identifies with his team to the point that it feels like he lost the game himself. Since he can’t express his frustration and subsequent aggression towards the opposing team (since he is in front of his TV several 100km away), he expresses it towards the next best thing that is weaker and accessible, e.g. furniture, walls, wife and kids…
Since he can’t express his frustration and subsequent aggression
towards the opposing teamin a way that someone who can regulate their emotions would…It is always weird to hear fans refer to what happened in a game as “we”
Yeah… Kinda like a political party or government?
It’s also really heavily about tribalism
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tribalism
Because people like to be part of a specific group and feel like the goals of said group are their goals, regardless of the reality of the thing
I personally find it weird when fans use “us” and “we” when discussing their sports team as if they have anything to do with how the team performs or is managed. I just call my local/city sports teams by their name.
Now do politics 🐸
I mean people cry over movies and tv shows. The line between fact and fiction, real and not real, important and inconsequential is pretty blurry in our minds.
The difference is that movies and TV shows are often specifically made to elicit those reactions. Storytelling is essentially a hack that uses our emotions to implant lessons.
The same can’t be said for sports events.
Seriously!? A Cinderella team spends a full year working their way to the sweet 16 and perhaps eventually the final four? Then loses by one point. Do you not see the struggle, the passion, the determination and the heartbreak in that?
Or a champion tennis player, significantly past her prime, coming back to championship after multiple years out and winning the title.
Or two soccer superstars at the absolute peak of their field going head to head. Can you not sense the tension, and suspense as these two juggernauts battle it out to see who comes out on top?
Or a man, born without arms, overcoming adversity at all points in his life to become the fastest swimmer and winning the gold.
Do you not see how sport can be an allegory for the human condition? The struggle, the heartbreak that of failure, the celebration of success, the toll of aging.
If not, I challenge you to take up a sport for a year, just a year. Try to get as good as you can with it. Celebrate your successes. Reflect on your failures. Document your milestones as you progress . Try not to give up. Make friends along the way. Become the true definition of an amateur. Living through your own experiences, you may discover that sport is full of emotion.
Dude, the purpose of sports events isn’t to rule people up and have them damage property. The purpose is to entertain. You understand the difference, right? Or do you go apeshit and break all your belongings whenever you’re watching a movie?
Way to completely miss my point.
Way to completely miss mine!
The difference is that movies and TV shows are often specifically made to elicit those reactions. Storytelling is essentially a hack that uses our emotions to implant lessons.
The same can’t be said for sports events.
What part of this did I miss?
The part where sports events aren’t specifically made to elicit aggression?
The OP claimed that aggression caused by sports events is comparable to e.g. crying due to movies. Movies are specifically made to elicit crying. Sports events are not specifically made to elicit aggression. Which part is difficult for you to understand?
Everything around sports is made to make you loyal to the team and be emotionally attached to the results.
For team owned by some gereatric white paraaites leaching taxpayer funds to the stadium
Middle age cucks need to wake the fuck up
Wait till he hears about hollywood
hollycreeps also are able to extract huge concessions from “movie” cities because “jobs”
I personally can’t say why I would because I don’t but I can tell you why my friends do. Its because they drink a fuck ton of alcohol, bet way more money than they can afford and get caught up in the mob mentality.
