Why are men who are not into sports viewed by some as "sissies"?

a reply to: openminded2011

Got me. I generally dislike sports. I was the kid in school with the rock bands, nice car, the girls and art class and music. Couldnt care less about sports.

But, because of the bands...and the cars...I did have the cheerleaders hoppin' rides to school.

I cant stand sports, I hate watching it, I hate the technical terminology, and I hate the team colors. I like stuff like paintball, BMX, boxing and UFC in small doses, but I cant spend more than 30 minutes indulging in it. What gets me, it that if so many people love sports so damn much, why not get off their asses, go to the park and play them rather than filling their guts full of chips and beer. That way, the TV and radio doesnt have to be so clogged with trivial sports politics.

You would think that a sports lover would be athletic, yet in most cases the opposite is true.

This used to piss me off no end. I have been a Taxi and private hire driver in both Aberdeen, Scotland and New York US.

No matter where you go these arseholes exist that just assume you are into sports as much as they are and proceed to babble on about it. No matter how politely you put it, the revelation that you do not care about whatever stupid game they recently watched is often taken as an insult.

More often or not the most rabid fans of pro sports tend to be the most out of shape inactive lifers that would have trouble doing anything that involved running. I was a goal keeper for my schools football (soccer) team in Scotland, also played defender. I loved playing football. I could not, and still can not stand watching it. pro or otherwise. It bores me to beyond death. If it's a team I root for, for patriotic or sentimental reasons I do care about the result and I want to see the goals scored, but I sure as hell don't want to sit through the whole game jumping up and down and yelling like a poo chucking ape.

I loved being a taxi driver, I met hundreds of interesting people, heard hundreds of interesting tales. Without exception the drunken football fan was the most annoying, posturing, confrontational opinionated poop head you could ever have a nightmare about picking up on a Saturday night. If there was a game on in Aberdeen I just wouldn't work that day. I just can't pretend to be rabidly enthused about some stupid football match just so these stingy drunken idiots might give me any kind of a significant tip, which they never did. They were idiots. Idiots invariably have no money. Funny that.

I hate football. I hate watching any team sports and the point of following teams really escapes me. It seems like a substitute for tribal warfare. I love playing though, that's the irony. I played soccer, basketball and rugby. I swam races. I ski, I spelunk, rock climb and scree run. Do I like sports? Yes, but only if it's me doing it, and at the end of the day the only real point of it is fun and cardio.

Boiled down to it's simplest. Team sports are a substitute for tribal warfare and the competition for females, hence the masculine alpha male irate gibbon response to any derision pointed at the theatrical spectacle and tribal bonding rituals. I drink a lot of beer, often. I hang out with Jack Daniels and Jim Beam when I can afford to sit at that card table. Give me a discussion about anything but sports. The world is full of amazing movies, music, art, science, history and the unexplained.

I am such a sissy. I wish I could learn to care about football so I could stop being such a fag, now if you'll excuse me I'm off to give my stunning wife a right good seeing to. If only I gave a # about all those young athletic football players it would make me so much more of a man.

Half the time these muppets make little to no sense, with the alarming trait of mental gymnastics to vindicate loss of a game through vague accusations of cheating or foul play. It's like having a religious maniac in the car, but even more annoying and a lot smellier.

a reply to: angus1745

Amen brother. That is what I call a rant.

A friend of mine hung up his footy boots a long time ago ( very good Aussie rules footballer ) He has not been to a game since ,rarely goes back to the club , when asked why he says watching just doesn't cut it after playing . Call him a sissy but make sure your medical and dental cover is up to date .

originally posted by: openminded2011
a reply to: ketsuko

I dont throw a fit at all. I just am dumbfounded as to the connection made between masculinity and watching pro sports. Its ludicrous to me. I dont have anything against anyone liking or watching sports. I just personally find sports completely boring. I would rather dive a reef with sharks patrolling (diving is a sport that requires 2 balls they say).

Every time I wanted to watch an SU basketball game (which wasn't very often), my ex would throw a fit of epic proportions because it interfered with his 80th viewing of Harry Potter or 60th Viewing of Twilight. I get it, you like the movie, but you OWN the DVD!! You can put it in after the game. It's not the like game is on DVD and I can watch it later. Not to mention there's only one TV in the house. It wasn't him being a sissy, it was him being a butt. I knew it, he knew it. He controlled everything in the house. He knew I was going deaf so he would watch movies on his computer at the loudest volume possible so I couldn't hear what I was watching on TV. Just to be a butt. Sometimes guys aren't sissy's, they're a rear in the flesh who don't like sports.

originally posted by: BELIEVERpriest
I cant stand sports, I hate watching it, I hate the technical terminology, and I hate the team colors. I like stuff like paintball, BMX, boxing and UFC in small doses, but I cant spend more than 30 minutes indulging in it. What gets me, it that if so many people love sports so damn much, why not get off their asses, go to the park and play them rather than filling their guts full of chips and beer. That way, the TV and radio doesnt have to be so clogged with trivial sports politics.

You would think that a sports lover would be athletic, yet in most cases the opposite is true.

I can only do Archery and Bowling due to a rod on my spine that might paralyze me but I love to watch football and basketball. It's very hard around here to find a place to shoot arrows and I live in an apartment building, so it's not like I can set it up in my backyard. I used to be deadly with the right bow, and given enough practice I probably could be again. I also like shooting guns. There is an indoor gun place near here I've been eyeing, but you probably have to own a gun to go shooting. If a gun has sights I bite at shooting, but take the sights off and use open sights and it's like archery for me. I'm fair to middling with bowling, but after awhile my back hurts so bad I have to stop. I can probably last about 3-6 games. If I could I would go ALL day! I just love the game!

Is it just me or is there a lot of small minded trolls in this thread?
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a reply to: openminded2011

This is why you don't let another man's opinion have power over you. They can say whatever they like, be strong and don't be controled by peer-pressure.

There is nothing less attractive to me than the stereotype of the beer bellied drunk on the couch with a bag of potato chips and cheering for a team that like they are apart of something they are not. The team isn't going to win if you drink more beer and yell at your t.v. louder> The team doesn't even know you exist yet you cheer mindlessly calling them "my team." Dude, seriously, the team loses most of the time and the players aren't even the same as when you first "choose" them.

I just don't get it. I just don't get the mentality of blind loyalty to a team because of the teams name.

Sorry if I offended anyone, but i just can't grasp the logic behind it.

Well football/soccer is definitely a form of distraction and control.

I would say the biggest sissies are those who break down into uncontrollable tears when their team gets knocked out of the cup.

Utter saps.

a reply to: openminded2011

I think the idea is that men are supposed to enjoy competition because they see reality as something which they must overcome. I think they are supposed to enjoy the thrill of competition, because it culminates into victory and meaning which can be applied elsewhere (applicable meaning/understanding which works).

And as a man, I do enjoy competition, but only if the prize is worthy of competition.

-Football? no. MMA? yes.
-Politics? hell no. Debates about reality? Sometimes yes, depending on the arguments.
-etc.

In general, sports are pretty stupid and meaningless, and I like my victories to have meaning and/or something of substance. MMA, for example, is great for learning combat moves. Football, however, is just playtime, mostly - its a parody of battling for land, but its for nothing but the mere sake of competition. Although, football does at least teach you how to stiff-arm someone and run past them, so plus one there, but that's about it - there is no substance in its competition.

Oh and I assume someone might call you sissy because they think competition frightens you, or overcomes you. Then again, they're probably just daft, and use "sissy" as a way to make themselves feel justified. So, in such cases, sissy is an ad hominem argument (fallacy) for their justification of watching lame competitions.

a reply to: openminded2011
Because they themselves are the sissies and are covering it up with the liking of sports. Just my thought on the topic before my coffee.

LL

It's part of the American Macho character , that produces jocks and nerds and gung-ho soldiers with all their hoo rahing

It's a testament to the intelligence of American society that the most popular sport is not only one that has callable offenses on every play, but severely underpaid officials. You do the math.

originally posted by: openminded2011
Why is it that men who don't like sports are viewed as not manly or sissies? Just because you are unable to obsess about the athletic prowess of OTHER men and are bored to death watching a bunch of grown men kick a ball around a field, somehow your masculinity is in question. What is it what makes you more of a man if you are somehow able to memorize statistics about a bunch of jocks? I just dont get this. And yes, I am one of those people who just isnt into sports. I dont mind watching the olympics, or the occasional hockey or tennis game. but it just bores me to death. And I am 6'5" and scuba dive, have lots of masculine interests, just sports is not one of them.

I only see 2 reasons to engage in sports:

1. To take pleasure in someone else's defeat

2. To touch other men

I have no interest in either, though I don't see a problem with the 2nd. I've had gay friends that watch sports solely for that reason. I have no respect for anyone who has to put others down or make themselves feel superior through competition, however. If you need to triumph over another person to feel good about yourself then you are, by definition, a sadist. That's all I see in competition - reveling in the misery of another person.

If calling someone a sissy makes you feel better about yourself, it just proves how horrible of a person you really are.

My hubby isn't into sports. Just because he isn't doesn't make him a sissy. He's a man, 100%, through and through.

I dare anyone say to him he is a sissy. See what happens, it won't be pleasant for the messenger. Js.

Personally, I can't stand most sports. Football, Basketball, NASCAR,soccer...
They all are a waste of my time.

Fishing though,
now there is a sport!

a reply to: openminded2011

Why is it that men who don't like sports are viewed as not manly or sissies?

That is very simple to answer,

people have their own sense of perception.

If one has that view of a man simply because he perceives sport as boring or what ever other reason who has the faulty perception?

In my opinion the one that perceives the man as not manly. its just ancient thinking that men are tough an women are weak.

One might not like sport due to their own physique and abilities or one might not like sport because they have a belief that sport is another divide and conquer technique that goes back thousands of years, have men compete to separate the crowd so to speak in a form of entertainment.

I like and enjoy sport but have stopped watching many team sports due to believing there is a deeper purpose than just fulfilling our competitive spirits and on the lines of creating division to the point where ignorant people cause violence due to sporting teams clashing on a field just as politicians clash in the political arena the fans of sports fight on the streets just as the soldiers fight on the battlefield.

a reply to: finitedualities

Lol here we go again bashing on Americans I guess people never go crazy and riot in Europe over a soccer game! I'm American and I can't stand sports I think sports are just a distraction for what is really going on in this country!