Home is a comfortable place to be. I am feeling rather lazy right now, due to a weekend full of familiar streets, bright sunshine, and good friends.
I am planning to watch the final game of the World Cup tomorrow with more friends. I haven't watched any games yet (though I watched a play-by-play live-blog once) and am rather glad. On the outside, I can remain unattached and unmoved by the game, but if I started watching and rooting for a team, I would probably feel drawn to watch them for the rest of the tournament. I can say "it's just a game" and "why should your country's team win" on the outside, but trying to watch just one game of a tournament is probably similar to trying to watch just one episode of Lost. It's not that I don't have the time this summer, but I want to continue to have the option to spend it any way at all, untied to watching one team or one show. That said, I am looking forward to tomorrow. Chips, homemade salsa, beer, friends, entertainment. What else does one need?
Fitness, Michelle Obama would say. Which brings me to a related conversation I had with friends yesterday. Does the World Cup do anything to combat obesity and general lack-of-fitness in America? How can we leverage a love for inter-group (whether it be country, state, or other) competition into better health?
Some ideas:
Have country-wide games. Here's how it would work: in every country, every person has the opportunity to sign up for a chance to play on a national team. Countries get points for what percentage of their population signs up. Then, teams are randomly chosen. Given all the entrants of a certain age and gender, a team is picked for that contest (say 20-25 year old female soccer). Then, the countries' teams play and there are points for performance in the competition. This would encourage a constant state-of-readiness to play within the country.
Have several Junior Olympics. One for up to age 9, one for 9-12, one for older than that. This would give kids more role models and a more immediate goal to work toward if they thought it would be neat to be an Olympic athlete.
Make fun destinations (theme parks, movie theaters, etc.) which are only accessible via canoe (or other form of exercise). (It might be necessary to have alternate transportation available for those with verifiable physical disabilities). Make these into The Cool Place to hang out. No parents allowed in the movie theater, cheap, etc.
Make the ability to buy tickets to watch athletic contests dependent on scoring a certain number of points in community-level sporting competitions. Points awarded based on participation as well as skill so that you can work up to the necessary level even without natural aptitude or if you don't start out being very fit.
Your ideas?
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So, I have watched two world cup games. The US vrs Algeria (in which a very dramatic goal was scored very closely to the end) and the final. I won't comment so much on the final, because my emotional reaction to that was much more typical of my normal reaction to sports. That is to say there wasn't one. I tend to not-watch spectator sports in large part because I find them fantastically boring. I usually don't find any reason for sports to exist if not to play them. Watching a bunch of strangers play has never really struck a chord. However, I have come to some kind of understanding after watching the US v Algeria game and talking to one of the people in my apartment building whom I shall refer to as "sports guy".
I was persuaded out of my normal routine of ignoring everything to do with sports in order to watch US v Algeria by a guy from work who was trying to be social by inviting a couple of interns out to lunch, during which we would catch the last half of the game. He might have been motivated by the almost-legitimate method of watching a soccer game during the work day than by actually socializing with interns, but it still got me into the sports bar. We talked, we ate, we watched. I found myself genuinely wanting the United States to win. It would mean advancing, playing another game, having our guys be closer to the best in the world. When the Algerians came close to scoring a goal, I was genuinely scared. When we made a shot, I was genuinely excited. Throughout the game, there had been so many attempts that I had gotten used to essentially every shot being blocked by the goalie that when Landon Donovan kicked the ball in the direction of the goal, and it went in that direction, and continued going in that direction, and then went into the goal, I didn't realize the implications for a split second. It did not follow the pattern of the rest of the game, in which no goals were scored. But when it hit home, that the US had essentially won the game, I was thrilled. Take that Alergia! U. S. A! U. S. A! Yes, I used the pronoun "we" in that last sentence, even though I have essentially nothing to do with the success or failure of the US national soccer team. Still, I somehow felt a part of it. When someone tells you that your national pride is riding on something, and there is an entire bar that believes it, it is kind of hard not to get caught up in the moment.
Alright, we will now put that little experience in a little box and move onto another anecdote before I comment on your ideas for translating spectators into players. This anecdote is a case study in a genuine sports fanatic. He lives in the apartment next to my own and was outgoing in an effort to have a less lonely time in a new city in which he did not have any friends, a common situation for the interns living in this building. Anyway, in trying to direct conversation in a direction that would entertain us both, I found the prospect incredibly challenging. He seemed to be interested in nothing but spectator sports, notably the world cup, a topic which I have mentioned before I usually find fantastically boring. I found it next to impossible to direct him to a topic that was at all actually interesting. Instead, he tried to explain to me why anybody would ever enjoy sports. I understood the normal "camaraderie" and "national pride" arguments that have always seemed like extremely artificial arguments to me. You can find camaraderie and national pride in anything that a large group of people decide that they will find camaraderie and national pride in. But there is something about sports that seems to attract this attention, and therefore something about sports specifically that is particularly special. He revealed to me what this special attribute was: skill. He explained that he would never be as good at anything as these national soccer players are at soccer, and by watching his team play, he is a part of something excellent, something beautiful. Being a spectator is of course not as good as being a player, but then again, being "me" is not as good as being "Landon Donovan".
Now that we have these two insights, that it is in fact possible to feel a part of something that you have no right to feel a part of, and that it is particularly attractive to feel a part of something that is patently full of skill and beauty, I will comment on your plans to get spectators more active.
1) Country wide games with random selection. This will reduce the feeling of being a part of something world class. People will notice that the players are less good, and therefore be less interested.
2) Junior Olympics as an intermediate goal. I am not sure that having a Junior Olympics would really provide that much of an intermediate goal that is not already present in after-school sports. I think that a more realistic interpretation for this option would be to present role models for young people that feel alienated from the world of adults.
3) Fun Destinations only accessible through active methods. Sounds extremely awesome. Also extremely expensive. I am not really sure how to comment on this because it just seems really.... unrealistic. If they existed, I would definitely take advantage of them, though.
4) The cost of tickets including some exercise points. I think this is starting to get at the real goal. We want to include physical activity in whatever process that sports spectators participate in. I do think that it is a little formal, that for-profit sports leagues would never require this rule, and that if they did, they would lose a lot of spectators. I therefore propose the following:
A PR campaign. Are you familiar with the many many PR campaigns in which professional athletes go out and tell their fans that they are nothing without their support? That fans are an essential part of a team's success? While it might genuinely help with the psychological aspect of a player's performance, that campaign is really about making spectators feel like a part of the team that they are rooting for, and increasing revenue for the team and league. These PR campaigns consistently work, in large part because you are giving people the chance to eat good food, get drunk, have friends.... and win.... all at the same time and with very little work.
Now, they will probobly be less receptive to a course of action that involves sweat. However, if you are able to get some airtime during one of these commercial breaks during which you can somehow convey that by picking up a soccer ball and kicking it around with some friends, you are helping your team win, or increasing national pride, or SOMETHING Let them be proud of the fact that they are active. Note the requirements: it must be something that you succeed at by virtue of trying, and it must make them feel like they are actually helping their team.
What about a kickathon for soccer, in which a team asks its fans to kick as many balls-on-strings a possible in preparation for a particularly important game? It is a highly repetitive, easily quantifiable way of showing their support and increasing the mental strength of the players that will actually be in the game. Its quantifiability will also provide the statistics that sports fans seem to be so fond of. As long as the formerly couch-only spectators are able to make contact with the ball, they will be helping their team by contributing to that statistic. They will feel more like they have more in common with the world-class-ness of the people they are rooting for. AND they will be more active. If we could get programs like that to take off, if it were possible to watch a sport "well" by participating in a more easy aspect of playing it, then we might be able to motivate spectators to be more active.
So, I have watched two world cup games. The US vrs Algeria (in which a very dramatic goal was scored very closely to the end) and the final. I won't comment so much on the final, because my emotional reaction to that was much more typical of my normal reaction to sports. That is to say there wasn't one. I tend to not-watch spectator sports in large part because I find them fantastically boring. I usually don't find any reason for sports to exist if not to play them. Watching a bunch of strangers play has never really struck a chord. However, I have come to some kind of understanding after watching the US v Algeria game and talking to one of the people in my apartment building whom I shall refer to as "sports guy".
I was persuaded out of my normal routine of ignoring everything to do with sports in order to watch US v Algeria by a guy from work who was trying to be social by inviting a couple of interns out to lunch, during which we would catch the last half of the game. He might have been motivated by the almost-legitimate method of watching a soccer game during the work day than by actually socializing with interns, but it still got me into the sports bar. We talked, we ate, we watched. I found myself genuinely wanting the United States to win. It would mean advancing, playing another game, having our guys be closer to the best in the world. When the Algerians came close to scoring a goal, I was genuinely scared. When we made a shot, I was genuinely excited. Throughout the game, there had been so many attempts that I had gotten used to essentially every shot being blocked by the goalie that when Landon Donovan kicked the ball in the direction of the goal, and it went in that direction, and continued going in that direction, and then went into the goal, I didn't realize the implications for a split second. It did not follow the pattern of the rest of the game, in which no goals were scored. But when it hit home, that the US had essentially won the game, I was thrilled. Take that Alergia! U. S. A! U. S. A! Yes, I used the pronoun "we" in that last sentence, even though I have essentially nothing to do with the success or failure of the US national soccer team. Still, I somehow felt a part of it. When someone tells you that your national pride is riding on something, and there is an entire bar that believes it, it is kind of hard not to get caught up in the moment.
Alright, we will now put that little experience in a little box and move onto another anecdote before I comment on your ideas for translating spectators into players. This anecdote is a case study in a genuine sports fanatic. He lives in the apartment next to my own and was outgoing in an effort to have a less lonely time in a new city in which he did not have any friends, a common situation for the interns living in this building. Anyway, in trying to direct conversation in a direction that would entertain us both, I found the prospect incredibly challenging. He seemed to be interested in nothing but spectator sports, notably the world cup, a topic which I have mentioned before I usually find fantastically boring. I found it next to impossible to direct him to a topic that was at all actually interesting. Instead, he tried to explain to me why anybody would ever enjoy sports. I understood the normal "camaraderie" and "national pride" arguments that have always seemed like extremely artificial arguments to me. You can find camaraderie and national pride in anything that a large group of people decide that they will find camaraderie and national pride in. But there is something about sports that seems to attract this attention, and therefore something about sports specifically that is particularly special. He revealed to me what this special attribute was: skill. He explained that he would never be as good at anything as these national soccer players are at soccer, and by watching his team play, he is a part of something excellent, something beautiful. Being a spectator is of course not as good as being a player, but then again, being "me" is not as good as being "Landon Donovan".
Now that we have these two insights, that it is in fact possible to feel a part of something that you have no right to feel a part of, and that it is particularly attractive to feel a part of something that is patently full of skill and beauty, I will comment on your plans to get spectators more active.
1) Country wide games with random selection. This will reduce the feeling of being a part of something world class. People will notice that the players are less good, and therefore be less interested.
2) Junior Olympics as an intermediate goal. I am not sure that having a Junior Olympics would really provide that much of an intermediate goal that is not already present in after-school sports. I think that a more realistic interpretation for this option would be to present role models for young people that feel alienated from the world of adults.
3) Fun Destinations only accessible through active methods. Sounds extremely awesome. Also extremely expensive. I am not really sure how to comment on this because it just seems really.... unrealistic. If they existed, I would definitely take advantage of them, though.
4) The cost of tickets including some exercise points. I think this is starting to get at the real goal. We want to include physical activity in whatever process that sports spectators participate in. I do think that it is a little formal, that for-profit sports leagues would never require this rule, and that if they did, they would lose a lot of spectators. I therefore propose the following:
A PR campaign. Are you familiar with the many many PR campaigns in which professional athletes go out and tell their fans that they are nothing without their support? That fans are an essential part of a team's success? While it might genuinely help with the psychological aspect of a player's performance, that campaign is really about making spectators feel like a part of the team that they are rooting for, and increasing revenue for the team and league. These PR campaigns consistently work, in large part because you are giving people the chance to eat good food, get drunk, have friends.... and win.... all at the same time and with very little work.
Now, they will probobly be less receptive to a course of action that involves sweat. However, if you are able to get some airtime during one of these commercial breaks during which you can somehow convey that by picking up a soccer ball and kicking it around with some friends, you are helping your team win, or increasing national pride, or SOMETHING Let them be proud of the fact that they are active. Note the requirements: it must be something that you succeed at by virtue of trying, and it must make them feel like they are actually helping their team.
What about a kickathon for soccer, in which a team asks its fans to kick as many balls-on-strings a possible in preparation for a particularly important game? It is a highly repetitive, easily quantifiable way of showing their support and increasing the mental strength of the players that will actually be in the game. Its quantifiability will also provide the statistics that sports fans seem to be so fond of. As long as the formerly couch-only spectators are able to make contact with the ball, they will be helping their team by contributing to that statistic. They will feel more like they have more in common with the world-class-ness of the people they are rooting for. AND they will be more active. If we could get programs like that to take off, if it were possible to watch a sport "well" by participating in a more easy aspect of playing it, then we might be able to motivate spectators to be more active.
-Lyla
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