The Superbowl is nothing more than watching rich people fight over a ball while companies spend obscene amounts of money to blast advertisements at you.
The Superbowl is nothing more than watching rich people fight over a ball while companies spend obscene amounts of money to blast advertisements at you.
No offense or judgement meant to anyone if that's your thing (to each their own). That's just how I see pretty much all professional sports - the super bowl is just the poster child for it.
The players on the field have more in common than us than the billionaires who own the teams. Don't confuse them for the actual rich class. Over an average NFL career most players make less money than most people will over their career, and they leave football with severely damaged bodies and minds.
They are workers just like us, many of them go on to live in poverty, just like us. The players aren't your enemy, the owners are.
Also, the NFL is a shit company.
Remember how they fucked over Kaepernick because he had the NERVE to kneel & stand up to injustice?
Also, remember how they formed a PARTNERSHIP with Musk's twitter AFTER he had shown everyone what a fascist white supremacist he is & promoted the worst people/"views"?
Fuck supporting that shit.
I'm not into sports and I have no plans to watch the Superb Owl today, but I do have a big appreciation for humans being awesome, and for that I can usually appreciate watching even if I don't care who wins.
Watching a 300lb man accelerate like a freight train or someone jump several feet into the air, twist over backwards, catch a ball and land where they meant to is definitely something I enjoy, because they do work their asses off to get that good and I can appreciate anybody's passion at that level.
That said, totally agree on the money side, it taints so many things (looking at you IOC).
bad post, clearly a popular opinion
Next you're gonna tell me that the Marvel movies are nothing but watching rich people pretend to be fighting each other while poorer people pay to go watch. And WWE wrestling is...well actually the same description.
They are rich because we pay (with money or ads) to watch them. We pay because they entertain us.
Bread & Circuses
I've never cared much about football and it's almost impossible to live in the US without constantly having to hear about it. I have to admit I've enjoyed the fact the Taylor Swift is now being shoe horned into football and people are mad cause they don't want to hear about her. If either fell off the face of the earth I wouldn't lose a second of sleep but oh the sweet sweet irony of listening to football fans whine about having to see and hear something they don't care about shoved in their face, Oh I'm so sorry that's happening to you, whats that like? Please tell me all about it.
I don't remember a ball or ads but I did find out the best owl.
Everything sounds weird when you break it down to the right essentials.
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Watching sequential images arranged to trick your brain into experiencing a story while you crush mutated grains between your teeth.
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Manually manipulating on-screen pixels at meaningful times to change later output.
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Interpreting shapes of printed ink in an attempt to replicate another person's mental patterns with the goal of experiencing a shared hallucination.
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Touring elaborately-staged displays of old junk and household items, sometimes with commentary.
"Everything is weird when you think on it too overly." And as a correlary, everything is frivolous when you essentialize it too uncommonly.
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Yup, it's Bread and Circuses all over again.
also something to note: they intentionally edge the fans constantly - the game's only an hour long. but we gotta pause play for commercials every few fucking moments, over and over again. punctuate edging with violent conflict - add in the lore/fanfic/tradition/dream job aspects - oh yeah, it keeps their attention.
all to watch grown men run around in spandex playing a children's game for millions of dollars, giving each other crippling brain and body injuries that will follow them into their graves.
...and it is not even a real ball!
I don't mind people not liking sports the same way I'm happy if someone enjoys Post Malone music or Woody Allen movies even though they're terrible to me. I do get annoyed with people who make not liking sports a huge part of their personality though. Those who hear a conversation between others who are interested in a game and just have roll their eyes and make a comment involving the word, "sports ball".
I just think the sport is really neat.
The ads are pretty overkill even compared to what I see here in Europe during the soccer world cup, and yeah athletes are paid ridiculous amounts, but at the end of the day it's a lot of fun to watch, at least for me. It's a battle of both wits and raw athleticism between people pushing the limits of what the human body can do. That's super cool, and all the story lines that arise or crumble from the competition are immensely entertaining to follow.
When you get down to it capitalism tarnishes everything anyway, a lot of entertainment media is very much just vehicles to sell even more shit, but they can still be enjoyable in and of themselves.
At least it brought us the Puppy Bowl. Which is also full of ads, but hey, puppies.
It’s true.
At some point, though, you just let it go. It’s just easier that way. Watch it, don’t, like it, don’t, none of that changes what it is. And, presuming CTEs still wipe out 90% of players in the future, it won’t be around forever.
I watched the Nickelodeon one and absolutely enjoyed all the zingers from Tom Kenny as SpongeBob.
It's fun.
Greatest argument for it is that it's an incredible display and even celebration of some truly awe inspiring and extreme feats that human bodies are capable of. I've never been able to get into favorite teams or anything, but every time I'm around somewhere a good football team/game is on, dang if I don't see some incredible things.
I've zero interest, but I was forced by my wife to bust out the digital antenna and make it happen. She's only watching for taylor swift and the commercials though.
There's a reason I'm not watching it right now.
Downvoted because I agree (this is !unpopularopinion@lemmy.world)
That's not an opinion. It's a reductionist description, a mere list of facts.
Professional sports are watched by brainwashed fuckwits.
Professional sports are entertaining for many people. As are other forms of entertainment also full of ads and rich people doing silly things. But, I agree that the Super Bowl is over the top obnoxious. As much as I usually like watching football, I tend to avoid the Super Bowl unless one of my favorite teams is playing, which, unfortunately, is rare.
Too many blow outs because one team lacks a defense. Guess it depends on what they use to rank a defense. Interceptions, fumbles, sacks, turn overs, safeties or safetys, ha safety’s no one gets a fucking safety, you throw the ball away, some guy has got a concussion if he gets sacked for a safety, he couldn’t tell where he was at, but I guess it’s better than a turn over on downs. But I mean what I’m trying to say is if everyone plays the game perfect then it’s just blocking, tackling, and getting in the way. You can’t guarantee you’re gonna get interceptions or swat passes or get any fumbles, you just tackle when they run or after they catch the ball. Short and steady works in madden, you play as the shittiest team and beat the returning football champions, but it’s no easy win. Like if you’re playing as the 2006 patriots vs the lions (0- 16) lions, or one of those western football teams like the raiders, they had some bad years but, it’s winnable with them against the best on all madden, you gotta be really strong and stay focused, any unopen receiver pass is an interception, but most teams punt the ball on 4th down. We play this professionally or it’s some crazy childish game, you don’t do the hail Mary till ends of half’s if necessary, but even if your gonna lose you may want to narrow the score a bit or get on the board.
Anytime they go to throw the football or shoot the basketball your supposed to throw one of your hands in the hair like you’re gonna block it and it psychs the guy out some, like whoever’s about one on one or double teaming him. I never seen a guy make shot if I put my hand in the hair, no kidding, I never missed one, fade away!!.
So this year’s Super Bowl Chiefs - Lions, or maybe Bills. The bills will throw it if you let them in there. God damn does New York love losing championship games, either that or they gotta win with a perfect score.
Fuckin Bills, you pricks, if I wasn’t involved with Buffalo, we’d spank your Amazonian asses, that’s how you show your guests you give them a blizzard football game.
Yeah Amazon is based in Buffalo chase that bank boo ya. Someone asked what that place was and they took off north west expanding everything before the gates closed again, literally.
So I gotta own the lions, giants, patriots and the bills, and then they find out I’m some old mfl commissioner. Well that’s gonna look like fraud. Well is it fraud or was it simulations. Come on Sean Seidel tell us. You wanted me to buy the Chargers because I liked San Diego but if I’m in San Diego then so is Dale Ross, so it’s different down here when we’re in San Diego, someone has to pay all these people a settlement who moved there.
But the god damn chiefs, they rape everyone, I don’t know if we’d let the lions play chiefs, we got a good thing going here with pizzas and watching NFL football. The chiefs must all have their own tribe they lead. Different parts of the season are different. After thanksgiving everything changes and then Christmas football games.
We use to want two NFL teams in the same area so like you could get into one arena or play for it where you have to win to get into the league, but you may need two more teams or even a whole division. You start bitchin and complaining about stuff and no one says it but like they’d wanna see you try,
It gives the area a certain buzz, or it’s all this traffic going east and west, north and south, football and weed doing this. With baked cookies, icing and candy.
I know it sucks Ren ever since Joe Louis arena flooded it’s been all down hill for us, no one wanted to invest millions of dollars into some area with big muscular teenagers talking about dropping out of school and not playing no prosports. What do you mean Ren your doing more steroids than Arnold Swarzennegger, wait a minute you guys are wrestlers.
We can’t paint the metal and Jerry rig it, we’ll get sued if something happens and you’re supposed to pump oxygen up top there for the people watching and suck all the co2 and methane out the ceiling.
Stadiums become a nest for breeding bacteria and viruses. Joe Louis arena was somewhat solid tungsten. And that’s why no one liked it or wanted it used that currently played or watched hockey. The palace was sanitized or it was too dirty to operate.
I didn’t want 4 stadiums in the same square mile, an opera theater, a boardwalk riverfront, the pistons left auburn hills, man that palace was something else, you get a certain buzz in there. They play basketball and hockey in the same place. We probably should watch basketball and some hoops but it became some getting high thing. We don’t lie about the disease thing as people that’s why we just kept getting high till they stop talking like a bunch of looneys. We smoked crack because you all were saying stuff that usually crack heads would say, so where is the rock that you were smokin man.
Then why didn’t you guys bring it up, that I commit fraud by posting flyers in public and then it not going on, well I thought we were all getting arrested because fighting is illegal and we’re doing this in public, and it’s some kind of dictatorship, we did call that the Detroit police department once before Mexico or whoever this guy is with big bales and last name not Guzman moved in back in 04. With wrestling it was a bit harder to organize local wrestling, with the nfl you just set up a table in a field or on a hill somewhere and you do NFL stuff. That’s how the league was pre 2009. After that it became more like madden till 2014.
watching rich people fight over a ball
Put them in an enclosed space and let the poors sit above and laugh at them, and you might have won over the Lemmings as fans!
Advertisers are the best at spreading word.
It's probably why award shows (which are also smothered with ads) get so much publicity.