Books served me quite well before computers came along. War, sports and religion are the three most wasteful inventions of humanity in terms of time, money and human life. And they are all linked as part of the “us verses them” tribalistic mentality.
War sure, religion maybe, but sports? The mega team franchise stuff that taps into tribalistic tendencies is weird but I would say thats not intrinsic to sport, it’s a capitalist development. I think at basically any level below that theres a lot of value to be had from sports. Also I think that’s not all that present in sports that feature individual competition e.g. tennis, fencing…
One might make a similar argument for religion actually. There’s stuff that’s been really useful to humans in religion even today, it’s primarily bad at higher level of organization.
As someone who isn’t much into sports, you absolutely cannot write it off as a waste of time money and human life, any more than anything else.
As well as being a pursuit many people love and have a good time with, most local sports are about building a local community, so you socialise and make friends, which is one of the healthiest and funnest things you can do in this world.
Local and school sports events can foster socialization, cohesion, and investment (as in improvement) in communities. You can make the same argument for the church. Learn to work within a team is good for kids. I feel like sports taught me to cut people slack, coordinate with others, and generally just made it easier to get along with people different then me. All of these things are compatible with socialism. I’ll agree that war is wasteful (excluding socialist revolutionary action), religion is complex, but sports have clear positive benefits.
Books served me quite well before computers came along. War, sports and religion are the three most wasteful inventions of humanity in terms of time, money and human life. And they are all linked as part of the “us verses them” tribalistic mentality.
War sure, religion maybe, but sports? The mega team franchise stuff that taps into tribalistic tendencies is weird but I would say thats not intrinsic to sport, it’s a capitalist development. I think at basically any level below that theres a lot of value to be had from sports. Also I think that’s not all that present in sports that feature individual competition e.g. tennis, fencing…
One might make a similar argument for religion actually. There’s stuff that’s been really useful to humans in religion even today, it’s primarily bad at higher level of organization.
As someone who isn’t much into sports, you absolutely cannot write it off as a waste of time money and human life, any more than anything else.
As well as being a pursuit many people love and have a good time with, most local sports are about building a local community, so you socialise and make friends, which is one of the healthiest and funnest things you can do in this world.
And if nothing else at all, sports are typically a moderate-intensive exercise, meaning for someone otherwise sedentary, spending an hour playing football might give a return on lifetime by 2-4 hours, as well as improving mood, function, health, etc etc benefits of exercise.
Local and school sports events can foster socialization, cohesion, and investment (as in improvement) in communities. You can make the same argument for the church. Learn to work within a team is good for kids. I feel like sports taught me to cut people slack, coordinate with others, and generally just made it easier to get along with people different then me. All of these things are compatible with socialism. I’ll agree that war is wasteful (excluding socialist revolutionary action), religion is complex, but sports have clear positive benefits.