Why does Europe like Soccer (Football)

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At Pacman. For me, the solving of the problem is pretty easy. Concerning that a rioting pack of English scum was rioting and looting and burning marching through Zürich, knife-stabbing, the simple solution, don't let any English, Belgians or Dutch come in. Just send them home at the frontier or send them straight to jail. That's the simple and easy solution. And if I had a say, I'd do it.

And the same would be for Ice-Hockey. Just from the train straight to jail. Next day, they can go home again.

[ July 04, 2003, 20:15: Message edited by: Yago ]

 

Absolutely right Yago, that's the only way to deal with things like that, but it rarely ever happens though. And it still doesn't tell anything about the root of the problem.

 

Going back a bit, Laches linked to a "Top 10 most difficult things to do in sport" or some such.

Well, I agree that those things are indeed very tricky, but the most difficult thing to do in sport is:

A perfect 9 dart finish in a tournament, on stage. No room for error, no chance of good fortune or luck. Batting averages in Baseball, home runs, etc, sure difficult, but I dare say that if most players swung the bat at every delivery they would connect at some point.

I can only name 3 darts players who have ever done a 9 dart finish on stage. None of them were "great athletes" by any stretch of definition of athletisism, but they all achieved perfection under pressure.

 

I'm drawing a line. It's my line and my definition so if ya don't like it tough! Anything that can be done with a beer and cig in your hand isn't a sport. This rules out darts.

Just saw sports center and for some reason they had some soccer team in red, Manchester I think, on their plays of the day -- right behind the swimming pigs. Really, the soccer play of the day got beat out by the swimming pigs in the US. Reminded me of this thread.

And looking back over this:

I completely disagree. I have an idea too, and it's the sort to get me branded racist but I suppose since I'm anonymous to a certain extent I can deal with the brand.

See, there are far more little white kids playing basketball in Indiana morning, day, and night than there are little black kids. Still though, the state of Indiana produces more top notch black Division I basketball prospects than it does white Division I basketball prospects. The state of Alabama has far more little white kids who play football their entire life than little black kids yet virtually all of the top notch Division I prospects are black. So, it isn't that black people concentrate or participate more and that white kids don't pursue it.

In my opinion there are just a disproportionately high number of really talented African American athletes. See the 'African American?' See the dangerous waters I'm headed? Now, I spent a bit of time in Alabama and I've spent a bit of time in Africa - Sudan mostly. I've walked the streets of both places and there just don't seem to be as many athletic looking people in Sudan as there were in Alabama. Now, some of this had to do with nutrition I'm sure. And while Africa, for example the Kenyans, does produce some outstanding athletes it seems more in proportion for a huge number of people while the athleticism produced by African Americans is disproportionately high.

So, people are animals -- all people. Growing up working a bit at a horse farm I know that animals can be bred to achieve superior traits. African Americans came to the US as slaves. If you were buying a slave would you want to buy the scrawny weak guy or the strongest most athletic guy? So, they took the most athletic people they could kidnap and brought them to the US as slaves. Then, they proceeded to breed/rape them based on their athleticism which they saw as 'being a strong slave' and all of this had an effect. So, that's my theory. Brand me if you will.

[ July 23, 2003, 18:19: Message edited by: Laches ]

 

On the boring issue - I love football but I can't stand watching it. Every time I see football on TV or go to watch a match, I alway want to go out and play it. I rarely watch a whole match.

As for English fans being hooligans. They are and they should be banned. It just keeps getting worse. Gangs of hooligans go to matches specifically to cause as much trouble as possible - they have absolutely no interest in football. Our attitude to solving the problem seems to be finding other countries with worse hooligan problems (our current favourite seems to be Turkey) and then saying we are better than them.

 

I think that's another roadblock. Meaning neither could convince the other, because there isn't too much data around.

A. I am still convinced, that sport and music are those branches, where perfomance counts more then anywhere else and minoritiy-members, if talented, can find success which they can not find anywhere else.

B. In sports, there comes a critical age, where a choice has to be made. Either concentrate and invest a lot of time into sports, or invest in learning a "normal" profession, considering that the "normal" profession looks less risky and will probably yield a decent income and a good life.

C. "Minority members" in European sports are not the same as in US sports. In my country specific mostly Turks and Yugoslavians. In the Netherlands people from Surinam. In France mostly Algerians. A lot of Turks and Yugoslavians in my country are in bad situation. A lot of them (but not all of course) can't speak the language and failed terribly at school. They're outlook for a good job is grim, but that makes them even more ambitious in sport-matters. There they can succeed. And as long in France things happen like:" You're arab, you're not welcome at the lycaeum" but on the other hand the French national team consists to a big part out of immigrants, I still am in favour of my perception.

D. To slavery. They searched at the african coast for specific tribes. They had a "profile". They were looking for tribes which lifed from agriculture. Those tribes mostly had a hierarchic structure which made it more easy to integrate them into life on a plantage and were used to agricultural work. That's was one of the main reasons, why American Natives vanished so fast as they came into slavery. Most of them lived not in an agricultural society, but were "hunters and gatherers" and died very fast, as they were put into the mines and on the fields to a very different kind of work. Therefore the african-slave-replacements were specificly chosen from tribes, which economicaly already lived from such kind of work. Other tribes were completly left alone. But still, the lost in human lives was huge. For one slave which reached the Americas, 9 other peole died. In what kind this "profile" may be described as "athletic", I don't know.

 

Maybe because the nine that died was from hardships and mistreatment, the one who survived was the fittest and probably the one with the best genes. Imagine that for a number of years these people suffered almost anything so only the best survived and after that it is logical only the fittest to be able to withstand any hardship. In our days this hardships have "purified" their DNA from most malfunctions so they are closer to perfect than most other people
At least this is the conclusion me and my friends have reached for the dominance of black people in sports

 

Excellent point Yago, France would have never become worldchamps if it wasn't for the immigrants. Some people may not know this, but even Zidane isn't really French. He's an Algerian with a French passport, and France owes him everything.

Btw, same goes for Holland. Without our boys from surinam and our Caribean buddies, we wouldn't have such a good team.

 

A. Evolution works not so fast.

B. That's "social darwinism" and the Germans have disproved the validity of that thought. Or in the other case, they should have one the war.

C. For one 9 had to die means the whole process form getting them, transporting them to the Americas. That's the forcefull kidnapping (war), which caused victims. Than family-members suddenly left alone or killed out of convience, children and elderly didn't prove to be usefull. Some commited suicide. Others starved. Others were victim of discipline-measures. Some were thrown over board because of space-issues. So, survival hadn't necessarily something to do with "stamina".

 

On ESPN over the last couple of days they've joked about a couple of couples. One is that Keyshawn Johnson and Serena Williams are dating and the guy said - I have first draft of their kid no matter what sport it plays. The other couple is Mia Hamm and Nomar Garciaparra and a similar idea - we expect their kids to have a good chance of being good athletes.

I mean, we're not talking about evolution at all. That's a misunderstanding of what's being said. What we're talking about is, imo, the common sensical notion that if two beautiful people have a kid we expect there is an increased chance they'll have a beautiful kid. It's no surprise that Kate Hudson's mom was Goldie Hawn or that Liv Tyler's mom was a supermodel. Makes sense doesn't it? Same story here but with athleticism. Walter Payton's kid was a highly recruited football star a couple of years ago - not surprising. Kellen Winslow Sr. was a hall of famer and his son may turn out to be better.

People are animals right? Why is it that the great horses get the highest studding fees? Because we think that there is a higher chance they'll produce great offspring.

Also, the idea that music is more of a meritocracy than other aspects of society is demonstrably false imo. The evidence exists in the form of numerous one hit wonders and manufactured hits like Spears and the boy bands.

 

If that's true (and from observation there certainly appears to be a fair chance of that), then the Colleges over there have already had the auction for the Marion Jones / Tim Montgommery kid.

Boy that's gonna be a fast one!

 

Well, yes there I agree. If someones 1.95m, it is highly likely that the kids would be tall. The same if the parents would be both 1.60m, that the kids propably would be small.

If I understand correctly, some people are born with the better capability to consume air (vocabulary lack, vocabulary lack), meaning their blood particles do that naturally better then other peoples. So, they will become good runners. That's something that may be inherited.

But those traits are not given to a whole poulation. One individual in a village can have that, his neighbour or even relatives may have it not.

 

I agree, and that's why I noted that in my time in Africa I didn't notice a disproportionately high number of athletic looking people. African Americans are another story though. They were put into a very, very horrific situation where it was difficult to survive. Your chances of surviving improve with you athleticism. Put it into D&D terms - two first level fighters each face an orc. One fighter has 18 str/con/dex and the other has 9 str/con/dex -- who is most likely to survive that encounter?

Then, slave owners would 'reward' the strongest, most athletic slaves by having them have sex with more women. So, the strongest most athletic slave would have sex with lots and lots of women producing lots and lots of offspring while the weaker slaves were not allowed to do this. They perceived slaves like we do horses and bred them accordingly. If we can breed horses to be stronger and faster, I suspect the same could be done for people - as unsavory as that may be.

So, they preferred atheltic slaves in the first place (they brought the higest prices and were less 'expendable'). Then that athleticism gave them a better chance of surviving a brutal and inhumane environment. Then the most athletic slaves were bred in hopes of producing more.

It's kinda like the Dune books -- the bad asses were the guys who grew up in the vicious desert and the bad asses who were sent to the vicious prison planet.

Oh, and Marion Jones' kid has gotta be a Tar Heel.

EDIT - regarding the quoted passage above - we're also not saying 'all African Americans are better athletes than group X' either, just that there is a disproportionately high number of great African American athletes and this may be an explanation for why.

[ July 24, 2003, 20:20: Message edited by: Laches ]

 

Well, there is something to it. But I do not think that any attempt of "breeding" was successfull. Because the time-period was still to short, to involve enough generations (that sounds horrible). If this plays a factor, I still think then it was the choice made in Africa. They picked certain tribes which they found to be suited for the work they needed done, as said before, tribes which actually had great similarities to the European societies.

But that may influence the potential. But that does not necessarily need to signify that it's exploited. People who do "physical" work, most tend to value physical appearance. Bottom line. It would be interesting to know how many African-Americans are working in physical demanding jobs or how many times the day they do sports compared to others.

 

Oh, I'm not so sure we're thinking of the same timelines here. Generally it's accepted the first slaves were brought to Virginia in 1619 by a Dutch ship. The American Civil War that abolished slavery lasted until 1865.

That's 246 years during which slaves were brought to the US and forced to breed by slave owners. Now, I think almost a quarter of a century is enough time to have a rather dramatic impact.

 

I guess you mean quarter of a thousand. My understanding is, that even in the Americas, they didn't live long. So they had to bring more and more. ¨

I don't know when the slave-triangle has been put in place, but I'd involve the Spanish and the Portugese too. It most have started around 1550 or so.

Still, I do not know how many generations are necessary to have an impact in "breeding". I am guessing here, but still I think that there are rather more generations necessary. I still think that the "choises" made in who kidnapping in Africa would have made the biggest impact.

 

Yeah, I meant quarter of a millenia. Me no count so good.

Still, in 250 years a rather significant impact can occur. Again, horse breeding is a good example of this. The story of how Secretariat came to be, from Bold Ruler, is probably a good example.

 

Yago i believe you misunderstood me

I did not speak about evolution i speaked about elimination of the weakest. The slave traders took the people they saw as the fittest and the trip took care of the rest leaving only the ones who were strong enough to survive the process.
Furthermore if i am not mistaken there was another selection by the farmers choosing only the best as they believed they should be the rest...
So as the concequent posts say if you have two parents with a very good selection of genes it is most probably logical that the child will be very good genetically speaking.

I think they lost the war because they were wrong as to who has the best genes the answer is simple we do

Of course, although i implied it in my previous post now i will say it openly. This applies only to African American since to them was put the pressure and the whole ordeal.
Africans (black or other) are good middle and long distance runners because they are forced to practice in these distances every day since mass transpotation does not exist or is too expensive for most of them in their countries.

 

Well, the problem is that most of the blacks in the Americas are spoiled with "white" blood of their former owners, so the gene stock wasn't kept clean. Following that thought.

here

Well, actually, if the "social darwinist" theory would be right. African-American would be able to perform way better then the other inhabitants of the Americas. They would be stronger, smarter, would be less likely to get sick, sicknesses like asthma ot that would be very uncommon in that population group. How can anyone else compete with them in anything ? They were bred from the best, right ?

But then, anything I know is that "social darwinism" has nothing to do with biology at all is deemed by biologist usually as humbug.

[ July 26, 2003, 01:33: Message edited by: Yago ]