Similar to fashion is the current thing. In the global news we have wars of course, but what about the things closer to the private sphere? Right now the Euro football cup is happening — or soccer for the Americans — which makes me think about how little agency modern people have in their lives that they get that invested in complete strangers playing a sport game in the name of a country.
I think Darren Allen is completely right to say that the reason why sports are promoted by the system is because they are ultimately harmless to it. 4 It's like a modern version of the arena, albeit without any of the violence, but the dynamics remain the same: the spectacle and the entertainment, the people to root for and antagonize, and the excess energy and frustration of the masses being channeled into said spectacle. 5
There are certainly forms of virtue needed to partake — not on the spectating side — in sports. It is true that they require a lot of hard work, it is true that promote teamwork, and it is true that here and there we find displays of genuine sportsmanship, but ultimately those qualities are only allowed because sports are utterly meaningless, and thus has no chance whatsoever to disrupt the system.
Having people who work hard, work together and show compassion to one another, but who want nothing to do with the system, is the worst possible scenario from its point of view. Thus there are two main strategies it uses depending on the type of people: 1) make people so passive and impotent that the only thing they do is spectate others who have more agency and 2) only allow the people with ambition and work ethics to excel at utterly meaningless activities, or in other cases like business, tasks that benefit the system. Those two main strategies lead to the two sides of the spectacle of sports.
As always, the system isn't perfect, which is why we do see individuals who talk about the fundamental problems of society, and talk about the changes needed for growth in life. But by large, it is rather astounding how incredibly effective the system is at channeling attention on things that fundamentally cannot alter it, the main type being things that don't matter at all, such that people never examine their life.
There is always something suspicious about trends that get everyone to talk and react, because it means that people stop listening and examining what really matters. The main form of control of the modern system doesn't consist in hiding information, but instead in drowning the important conversations under a sea of trivial but emotionally gripping gossip, and in making people within the system so impotent and passive that they cannot even think of something better to do than sit down in front of a television and watch sports.
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2024-06-21