Rants

Okay, sports fans, listen up.

I understand that if you surround almost any situation with enough hype, enough flashing lights, enough people screaming, the instinctual animal response is to join in. I get that; I’m not ignorant to the way your brain works. But I gotta ask: do you actually love this biannual jock-fest, or are you sucked in by the mob mentality?

Patriotism is nice when you don’t step on other country’s toes.

I get that the Olympics represents a sort of patriotic rallying post of the most pure variety – you can root for your country in something that doesn’t belittle other countries.

I mean, war is patriotic, but we’ve all been taught that war is bad, and killing others, no matter how evil, is bad. And despite that load of crap, I can see that it makes you feel like a better person to not revel in killing other populations, as that could be seen as separating humanity, and possibly pushing racism to new heights.

I also understand how feeling good about your country for being healthier, or richer, or safer, is also seen as uncharitable, and potentially xenophobic and/or racist. You can’t hate on another country because they’re sick and poor, apparently, and you can’t be proud of your own for having moved past that.

It’s sad that the things we’re good at are all elitist.

Out of the mouths of babes?

So, what can we be proud of?

Clearly, physical accomplishment is the shorthand workaround for actual national pride. No one feels bad if one person runs faster than they can (excluding the few who are actually running around the track with said person), and it doesn’t hold as a representation of your own abilities.

But really, isn’t this a schoolyard thought process?

“I can run faster than you!”

“Nuh-uh!”

“Ya-huh!”

“I’ll prove it!”

This shit barely flew while we were in school; why would it become acceptable now? These physical demonstrations of superiority are so unimportant to anything outside of the Olympic setting – how often would you need to be capable of both skiing and shooting in a real world setting? Cutbacks at the police force? Arctic assassin school?

Sure it’s hard; So is chewing through a tree. Doesn’t mean you should brag about it.

I have a certain level of respect for Olympic athletes, at least on the level of skill and training they must master. That being said, what does it say about a person who spends most of their life mastering skating around really fast in a circle? Or cross country skiing? Or, for Jebus’ sake, the fucking skeleton, which is just a human cannonball who forgot his cannon, so said “Fuck it! Ice will make me fast!” and then decided to go HEAD FIRST down a slide that has proven, at least this year, to be willing and able to kill?!?!

Sorry, got carried away.

But seriously, sports fans, whether or not something is difficult to do doesn’t mean that’s the reason to laud it. Sure, that’s the rationale behind Sir Edmund Hillary’s climb of Everest, supposedly, but thanks to him we have quite a few dead corpsicles on the slopes of that mountain.

Really, where is the line that separates the truly stupid from the heroic? There are rumours that an Olympic event being considered for addition is essentially full contact downhill skiing, with hip checking and no ski poles. Which is, as far as I’m considered, another step down the (pun-intended) slippery slope of organized athletics.

I mean, what’s next? Drunken crazy carpet races down the ski slopes while being chased by a mogul monster?

(I totally rock at that, by the way, even though I lost my carpet halfway down the hill, and basically luged on my ass the rest of the way.)

Darwin would have been ashamed.

And really, aren’t we attempting to evolve here? Which means that we nerds are supposed to be the next step? Physically frail, while more and more intelligent – isn’t that the ideal we’re shooting for? The whole reason we geeks are pasty and flabby is all the time spent pumping iron in the mind, not the gym. Why do we glorify the gladiatorial exploits of our common man, thereby encouraging them to keep on truckin’?

I know that some of this may seem like I’m bitter for not being in as good shape as these people, and maybe that’s part of it. But the other part is how holding people who can throw a stick farther than another up as the pinnacle of human achievement cheapens everything we do, on a daily basis. Because really, isn’t that less of an accomplishment than raising a child? Or writing a book? Or painting a work of art? Where are their medals, and poorly choreographed dance numbers? Where are their huge, American Idol-shattering television numbers?

It’s not a mistake that I waited until after the Olympics were over to post this. People get a weird, aggressive mindset going during the Olympics. And refusing to support your teams skating-and-rubber-circle-whacking abilities is somehow seen as unpatriotic, mostly because the person smacking the rubber was born in the same geographical and political region as you were.

I mean, there’s only so long you can watch someone brag about how long they can balance on one leg if you haven’t had a hand in making them.