If sports are gay, then what is masculine?

[sf2k4]

Sports fans, in general, do not have integrity or character.

I know I haven't introduced myself on these forums yet... I'm Aaron that posted on the guestbook, the marching band/drum corps guy. A quick intro, just so you know: Like I said, I'm in the band. I'm a graphic design major, was an engineering major, have a math minor, and thoroughly enjoy the arts, especially the performing arts. I'm also an athlete and sports fan. As a kid I played baseball, soccer, etc. and played tennis in high school. I also got the "band nerd" stigma so I don't think I can be called a "jock" if I was, you know, made fun of by them.

That said, I disagree with the above quote. If you're looking at simply fans that never played sports I could agree, or some athletes I could agree. However, when I grew up playing sports, I was always taught and learned a lot about team work and sportsmanship. Let it be known, I learned a LOT more about team work marching drum corps, but I did still learn those things when I played sports, especially when I played youth soccer and baseball. As I got older and played tennis in high school it was less about those things and more about winning and such (I won't lie, I enjoy winning and competition, I don't think that makes me a "dumb jock") but when I was playing those sports as a kid it was more about team work and sportsmanship.

I'd also like to say: I don't think the divide between athletes and non-athletes is as bad as some of you think it is anymore; at least it wasn't at my high school. Even though I was in the band I was actually friends with a lot of athletes (and non-athletes). I had plenty of athletes from all sports in my honors and AP classes, too. I think the landscape of it all has changed and continues to change because I think there is less animosity between people in each successive generation (at least when I compare the views on issues of my peers to those of my parent's and grandparent's age it appears that way).

But what do I know, I'm only 22 years old.

P.S. This may be my first post, but I know enough to know that the fact I supported sports is going to bring a fury upon me from Fat Man. I'm got my flame suit on.

[Fat Man]

P.S. This may be my first post, but I know enough to know that the fact I supported sports is going to bring a fury upon me from Fat Man. I'm got my flame suit on.

Hey! I'm very glad that things went well for you in school.

Maybe if I had been good at sports, perhaps the schools I went to would have been more tolerant toward my wanting to study Astronomy.

But unlike you, I was lousy at sports.

As I have said, so many times before on these forums, when I was 4 years old, I was in a car accident and my left knee was crippled up as a result. So, I could not run like the other kids in my school, and I walked with a limp.

I was actually suspended from school because I failed to climb a stupid rope in the gymnasium.

It made no difference that I was passing all of my academic subjects such as science, history, math, etc. etc. No, I got suspended because I could not climb a rope.

Perhaps if you were lousy at sports as I was, then things would not have been so terrific for you when you were going to high school.

I was discarded like a broken toy.

Of course, before being discarded in the human trash bin, I was kicked around some more until I was also emotionally and mentally broken.

Here lately, when have had newcomers to the forum, one of the first things they do is to criticize me.

You don't know jack-shit about me!

And no . . . I don't use a flame thrower.



I use my Verbal Wood Chipper instead!

It works on both jocks AND sports fans!

[Earl]

Greetings, sf2k4. I'm impressed with your background and all of your varied interests and accomplishments. You seem to be fair-minded and mature; so, I expect that you will make a positive contribution to the forum.

The members of this forum who support this website (some of us with reservations, perhaps, such as myself) do not follow a rigid party line. No single member speaks for all of us. I don't agree with all of the statements that have been made by fellow supporters of this website. In other words, you could think of us as just a small group of guys (and a gal or two) from different backgrounds who share a common interest in the sports culture from a critical standpoint, but come from different backgrounds and may even have different moral standards. You could think of this website as being like someone's house where we all get together from time to time to talk about various issues on our minds. We are not a cause, as a recent visitor to the Guestbook called us; we're just a ranting board.

I'm always ready to engage in a dialogue with any critic of this website, as long as he is willing to be civil and is not just trolling. What I don't like is the lack of respect (to put it mildly) shown by most of those who have reacted negatively to this website. (I certainly understand why some people don't like this website, but the way they react shows that they are guilty of their own intolerance.) If you think Fat Man is extreme (which he certainly has shown himself capable of being) but you still want to get a balanced view, check out the hate-filled responses by sports fans who have actually left messages. Sheesh!

So, please be careful not to assume what each of us actually believes. Your initial impression of one of us may not be correct. It also helps to try to understand the other person's point of view before denouncing him. Asking individual members questions about their background and actual interests would be helpful in that regard. You might be surprised.

I do not agree with all of Fat Man's statements, which should be apparent to you if you've read any of my posts or messages on the Guestbook webpage; but I will say this about his background. As the result of a car wreck that he experienced when he was four years old, one of Fat Man's knees was permanently injured. He could not run and could walk with only a limp. The mandatory boys' P.E. of our generation (the "baby boomers") was sports-centered. When I was required to take these classes (which were useless for nonathletic boys), I never even heard the words "exercise program" or "bodybuilding" because such programs were not offered, which means that the nonathletic boys who would have taken advantage of such programs were shortchanged. Yet the claim made by the hypocritical adults who mindlessly imposed P.E. upon all students was that they were concerned about some students being physically unfit.

Fat Man's situation was even more outrageous. Even though he clearly was physically hanicapped, he was required to take sports-centered P.E., anyway. Another one of our members (greencom) was born with a congenital eye defect that left him without depth perception. He also was forced to take sports-centered P.E. Greencome and Fat Man were bullied by "jocks" who made no allowance for the fact that they were physically handicapped. Both of them should have been exempted from having to take P.E. And no one stook up for them. So, understandably, any reasonable person would be able to see how unjust this was. Not surprisingly, neither one of them is a sports fan today. And to think that some people seem incapable of understanding why guys like them don't like sports ...

I have several friends who played football in high school. One of them even played at a university. So, I'm not exactly a bigot. Unlike certain guys I have in mind, none of them look down on nonathletic guys as supposedly not being "masculine." But if they were afflicted with machismo like certain individuals who have posted abusive insults at this website, they would not even give me the time of day. Respect is a two-way street.

[HugeFanOfBadReligion]

P.S. This may be my first post, but I know enough to know that the fact I supported sports is going to bring a fury upon me from Fat Man. I'm got my flame suit on.

No offence, but I think it's a pretty big assumption to think that just because Fat Man can be a bit extreme, that he is going to be furious about you and "flame" you. Obviously he seemed pretty moderate towards you in the response he made to your comment. He may not like all athletes and sports fans, but he can make the odd distinction between a dumbass jock with no respect to "nerds" and someone who is a slight interest in sports but is also academically successful and was also part of the "nerd" culture.

Also, I wouldn't say the jock vs. nerd mentality is disappearing in schools now, I'm still in school and the conflict is in plain sight. I have several friends who are athletes, but there definitely are the hardcore "badass" anti-academic morons who only care about throwing balls around, and despise any non athletic academically successful "nerds" like me and my friends.

[sf2k4]

I'd like to apologize for my P.S. I was being being sarcastic but I know, after years of forum usage and text messaging, that the subtle art of humor is definitely lost when only read in text. I'm sorry Fat Man for offending you. I have read about your issue with your knee and I'm sorry you had to go through such a trying situation. If it gives you any hope for the future of America, at my high school at least, we did not have PE. We were required to take two classes in a four year period that counted as physical. Obviously playing a sport counted, but other things that counted were marching band (what I took), show choir, weight training, running, and a couple other classes I can't remember anymore. I promise, even though I enjoy watching sports (I'm an avid Alabama football fan, Maryland basketball fan [my dad's alma mater], and Atlanta Braves fan), I never agreed with the archaic rituals of PE class. Physical education should be FUN, not how many pull ups you can do or how many times you can climb a rope. I personally wish PE in high school could be more like intramural sports in college, where even the people that aren't any good still have a great time. I would know, you should come watch me play softball sometime lol.

[Earl]

I think Fat Man will understand. If he doesn't, I'll smack him one (just kidding).

What is so ironic about the mandatory sports-centered P.E. of my generation is that I would have been receptive to start pumping iron. Several years ago as a middle-aged man, I joined a local health club and started working with a personal trainer on a bodybuilding program. I love working out. I love the feeling of being completely exhausted at the end of a workout. For the first time in my life, I feel considerable strength in my chest and my core. But since I was ignorant about bodybuilding and my P.E. classes were "sports only," I went through my teenage years feeling bad about myself for being physically weak. (Let me add, though, that even if I become as strong as an ox, I will never look down on any guy who has a slight build because I know that that has absolutely nothing to do with true character.)

[HugeFanOfBadReligion]

This post isn't really topic related, but I got a few notifications from topics I subscribed to that there had been posts there, but when I went there, there were none, and in one topic (I believe this was the "Never Ending Sentence" topic), when I pressed on the link, there was a warning advising against going to the link as there appeared to be content from a site with malware on it that could harm my computer. Was there a brief troll attack here?

[Fat Man]

This post isn't really topic related, but I got a few notifications from topics I subscribed to that there had been posts there, but when I went there, there were none, and in one topic (I believe this was the "Never Ending Sentence" topic), when I pressed on the link, there was a warning advising against going to the link as there appeared to be content from a site with malware on it that could harm my computer. Was there a brief troll attack here?

oh oh!

If that topic has some kind of malware embedded in it, then I would urge Skul or one of the moderators to delete that topic.

In that case, I would not consider it censorship, but an intelligent move to protect us from picking up some kind if virus.

I know that after the 4chan raid earlier this year, my computer was thoroughly fucked up to were I could not upload images to my Photobucket account, or download videos.

So, I had to run my Final Uninstaller to uninstall my Mozilla Firefox browser to remove all the files still in the registry and then reinstall my Mozilla Firefox.

When you uninstall a program, there are still some "ghosts" from the program in the registry files, so I had to use Final Uninstaller to not only uninstall my Mozilla Firefox but it also cleaned up any remaining "ghosts" in the registry.

Then when I reinstalled my Mozilla Firefox again, it was like getting a fresh start, like installing a brand new program for the very first time.

Of course, since I'm using the unregistered free version, I can only uninstall up to 3 programs.

I will have to pay for the registered version if I want to use it again.

But Final Uninstaller is a good program. I swear by it!

The usual uninstall procedure does not clean up the registry files related to the program.

You would have to go into the registry and manually delete all associated files, but that is very risky, because if you delete the wrong files, you could screw up some of your other programs.

So, It's best to use Final Uninstaller, because it will remove the correct files in the registry that are related to the program that is being uninstalled.

Anyway, if that particular topic has some kind of virus embedded in it, then for our safety, that topic should be deleted.

[HugeFanOfBadReligion]

Well, it isn't confirmed to be a virus yet, so I don't know what we should do. To be fair, I once got those kind of warnings on a Bad Religion fan page I visit because it had content from the official Bad Religion website, which supposedly had malware on it, however I'm 99% sure there was nothing harmful on that fan page or the official Bad Religion website. So I don't know what should be done. Perhaps someone has the ability on their computer to somehow view the page without allowing any files to enter their computer or something? I don't know what should be done, it's up to whichever staff makes a decision first I guess, or whatever everyone agrees on. I honestly have no idea what would be an appropriate action, because we don't want any visitors to get viruses, but we also don't know if there actually is any malware.

[Fat Man]

Well, it isn't confirmed to be a virus yet, so I don't know what we should do. To be fair, I once got those kind of warnings on a Bad Religion fan page I visit because it had content from the official Bad Religion website, which supposedly had malware on it, however I'm 99% sure there was nothing harmful on that fan page or the official Bad Religion website. So I don't know what should be done. Perhaps someone has the ability on their computer to somehow view the page without allowing any files to enter their computer or something? I don't know what should be done, it's up to whichever staff makes a decision first I guess, or whatever everyone agrees on. I honestly have no idea what would be an appropriate action, because we don't want any visitors to get viruses, but we also don't know if there actually is any malware.

My Mozilla Firefox warns me of malware when I'm about to enter a web site, so I always back out, and not enter that web site.

I'm still getting sports Newsletters and on one of them, I clicked on unsubscribe, but as I was about to enter the web page to unsubscribe, I was blocked by a malware warning.

So, that's how these sports web sites work now.

Once some love-life sports scum subscribe you to a shitty Newsletter you don't want, they put malicious software on their unsubscribe pages to keep you from unsubscribing to their retarded sports Newsletters.

Next, these sports web sites will put some kind of malware on your computer that will block you from going to any web site that is not a sports web site.

Organized sports is treason!

They should get the firing squad!

[Skul]

The link to the malware site is no longer there. Nothing to worry about, as far as I'm concerned.

As for the unsubscribe page malware warning, I wouldn't take that as confirmed. No matter how good a program is, it will sometimes take innocent lines of code on a webpage or program as virii or malware. I can't remember which anti-virus program it was, but had it suggest that I delete this certain program (can't remember the name of that, either) every time I ran a virus check. Well, if Program X carried a virus, then I think I would have noticed by that time.

If you still don't feel safe clicking on it, if you have an old computer that you don't use anymore (or have a friend who does), then you could hook that up and use it to unsubscribe. If that computer gets infected, then it won't matter, since you're not going to be using it, anyway. But I seriously doubt they would put malware on their unsubscription page. They could get fined or shut down for that.

[Fat Man]

The link to the malware site is no longer there. Nothing to worry about, as far as I'm concerned.

As for the unsubscribe page malware warning, I wouldn't take that as confirmed. No matter how good a program is, it will sometimes take innocent lines of code on a webpage or program as virii or malware. I can't remember which anti-virus program it was, but had it suggest that I delete this certain program (can't remember the name of that, either) every time I ran a virus check. Well, if Program X carried a virus, then I think I would have noticed by that time.

If you still don't feel safe clicking on it, if you have an old computer that you don't use anymore (or have a friend who does), then you could hook that up and use it to unsubscribe. If that computer gets infected, then it won't matter, since you're not going to be using it, anyway. But I seriously doubt they would put malware on their unsubscription page. They could get fined or shut down for that.

Uh! We're talking about a sports page.

Sports people can get way with all kinds of shit.

That's why football players rape our women, because they know they can get away with it.

[Skul]

Fine, don't believe me.

[Donald]

Uh! We're talking about a sports page.

Sports people can get way with all kinds of shit.

That's why football players rape our women, because they know they can get away with it.

Sadly it seems that football players and other famous people will always be in line for an easy time in court, and this is because anyone who would dare have them sent down would have thousands or even millions of angry fans wanting them dead for affecting the performance of that player's team if the jailed player was to be one of the best on the team. Who knows, some of the jury members may even support the team of the player they're prosecuting. Yes, fame will always affect the course of justice and famous people will receive lighter punishments than ordinary citizens, and its because the power and influence celebrities have can be known to frighten some. I dont believe that fame should have any effect whatsoever on the enforcement of the law but it will always be the case, as our world is biased.

[Fat Man]

Fine, don't believe me.

It's not that I don't believe you.

I'm still getting $98 dollar invoices in my snail mail from Sports Illustrated demanding that I pay up, when I did not order a subscription from them.

It was during the harassment from the 4channer, someone had ordered the subscription using my E-mail address.

I tried calling them to straighten out the mess, explaining to them that I never ordered a magazine subscription from them.

Now, in my most recent invoice, they're threatening me with legal action if I don't pay up, and it's been referred to a collection agency.

So, legally, I'm in deep shit right now.

And so, I wouldn't put anything past these sports scum.

I can't afford to live in a world that has sports in it.

And now, I have more reasons to hate sports people!

I'm still getting raped, financially that is.