Last Update - Tue Nov 05 2024
HWS RR 2017 (Round Robin) -- Round 5, Room 4
Jason Xiao & Tin Puljić
PM
LO
| OG |OG |OG | OO |
80,81 81,84
Sports
Introduction
Sport is a deeply archaic institution which mars the path to liberation for many. Because its seemingly innocuous reverence of sport as an essential part of national identity reinforces an old boys club which ultimately prevents the democratization of culture and national identity to those we think needed the most in a society that's already deeply discriminatory in many ways On that basis Kate and I are extremely happy to propose.
Layout the Structure
Two different things coming from this speech
First of all I'm going to explain what exactly we're talking about what looks like what we think the counterfactual looks like,
Second of all I am going to move into three constructive claims
First of all we're talk about whysports is deeply inaccessible and why it’s harmful for representation
Secondly, I want to talk about the social opportunity cost that comes from prioritizing sport
Third of all I want to talk about why using sport as a part of national identity oftentimes means that governments which are corrupt or inefficient are better able to hide their atrocities and abuses
What does it look like ?
To begin with we're talking about the dominance of sport and iconography and predominance with the news coverage and other national culture institutions within places like the United States where they revere multiple sports like the NFL, in places like Canada where they Revere hockey and places like the UK where they care about soccer.
This is not just a mere light of these things states, it is a time of that sport towards national culture that states saying that we are uniquely get it and as uniquely important to who we are and what constitutes the state
Counterfactual
what do you think is a plausible alternative to this ?
We think a world in which we prioritize things like civic nationalism or just basic culture and non location-based traits such as general values about democratic norms etc are the likely replacement. The reason why we think this is because in the absence of sport, we think that there are no other large countervailing forces which would replace it and thus the default which
are all these other factors that we've identified are likely to be the counterfactual
-Alternative proposed is too vague
- CG’s alt was about how minorities (who spearhead success in sports) will be revered even if its not tied to national identity
but we are further going to argue that even if other things replaces it, why support is uniquely bad in comparison to all other forms of cultural identity and participation with wide scale events that means it is damaging
So three claims
Claim
1. number one why sport is deeply inaccessible ?
And the claim here is not just that sport is difficult to participate in it but ss actively discriminatory, reinforces stigmas and biases that exclude people from the National Dialogue
Analysis
Why is it the case ? I identify two reason why sport is so uniquely misogynist and racist
Number one, because of historical demographic reasons it's important to note that in the vast majority of history people who are able to participate in sport were those with lots of leisure time, people who are extremely wealthy enough and people who largely represented dominant majority groups within society.
Mechanism
Over time this may have changed, the top-level investors tend to be those people who were previously athletes in the 1950s and the 1960s. These people ended up being the one to control clubs or coaches who control the cultures of these places and that means that's extremely slow to respond to general societal shifts because it's largely composed of an old boys club who is largely the leadership of these different types of sport and teams
Why The upper echelon of sport institutions are made up of privileged rich people i.e old boys’s club
Sub-claim
The second thing to note is that there are significant market forces which drive the exclusionary nature of sport.
Mechanism
So for instance the fact that you only want to able-bodied people because you want to see “highest pinnacle of sport” in quotation marks. Because you want to see the “highest pinnacle of sports”, you also exclude people like women so there's a large group of people who are naturally excluded from it
Due to societal perceptions, people only want to see able-bodied men participate
Further Analysis
which means that they don't have a moderating effect on that sport and its culture and they are the audience members we have to be responsive to because these people aren't participating within the sport itself. Because they aren't in locker rooms
Impact
Why is it incredibly harmful ?
First of all I want to point out that this means that some people just don't feel like they're part of the natural culture. They do not get the benefits of feeling like have cohesion with their
communities and that they're part of something bigger because they aren't part of that narrative or that national image
Claim
The second thing I want to say is that it granted a platform to terrible people
Analysis
They got to platform - first of all athletes who oftentimes do heinous things and are excused on the basis of the fact that they are simply good at this sport.
Preemptive
Now we acknowledge anyone who is good at something that is valuable will be excused. The unique problem is given the demographics of these people and the fact that managers for instance don't care about domestic abuse there isn’t any internal checks and balances to prevent that kind of activity.
The exclusiveness of the argument isn’t strong enough
Possible alternative: Greater backlash against accusations since its now considered patriotic ro support the athlete in question
Example
People like Mayweather who is notorious for having assaulted multiple wives of multiple girlfriends getting off stock free from the public because he's a successful boxer the most successful boxer out there.
Furthermore we think players at large objects will be treated terribly for instance blackberries and crab they do poorly gets taped coded and have
bananas going out thumping are called monkeys and have that as an iconography that's important is incredibly incredibly exclusionary
POI
“after France won the 1998 world cup with majority of their players being Arab and black, support for jean-marie Le Pence ring wing party literally dropped by half because the private French people felt …….”
So this is sometimes a symmetric right because sometimes they have positive successes and they don’t get scapegoating.
It only happens when they are considered successful; otherwise they get blamed for failing
I want to know even in the best case scenario how do you hear the dialogue play out they say ahh black people are more superior physically and then they play on the traditional racist tropes so even though you might get some acceptance sometimes we say in the vast majority of circumstances because only one person can win, you're gonna get racism and even in the successes you reinforce racist tropes which albeit may not empower far right nationalism, it is the wrong way in which to include these people in the fold and actually has the same harms. Given the fact that there are some negative negative circumstances where this occurs, the benefit is remarkably marginal.
2nd Argument
Argument number two on the social opportunity cost
Where this money/resources could have been allocated
two things in note here
number one I want to point out that the national sporting culture me that there's a deep investment in sports like the subsidization of soccer fields or the construction of stadiums in the vast majority of North American cities. This is a waste of money this is money that could otherwise go to other more accessible forms of culture like revamping the National Lakes or more importantly solving important problems that press people on day to day basis like poverty. I know this is the opportunity cost argument I admit isn't sexy but I think it's a massive impact in the billions of dollars in North America which is funneled towards these sports stadiums every single year
Possible inclusion: Money is still spent on sports but now it get pivoted more towards smaller local leagues, clubs benefitting rural communities. A greater diversity of different sports gets funding instead of hyper fixating on the only successful one/s .
the second thing that I want to point out is that this means that you oftentimes spend inordinate amounts of money to bid for competitions because when sport is a part of the national culture you want to hold the biggest competitions which is incredibly damaging again massive cost that often times associated.
POI
I'll take a poi before protected time
“In poor countries where people don’t have that many opportunities, when they actually go ahead and make big in sports, they become a national source of pride. Say Jamaica with Usain Bolt”
Okay but the problem is in the vast majority circumstances you are not going to succeed and that national pride that's always exclusionary which is the harm that we identified
The “exclusionary material” may not apply to Jamaica as it comparatively racially homogeneous
so even if you help some people it is comparatively worse than other any other form of sport because there any other form of identity because of less misogynist for the demographic reasons identified etc etc etc…. So any replacement including the likely replacement I think is better form of getting pride, a better form of recognition and identifying yourself
Why is it done terribly ? i.e Opp’s characterization is likely to be bad
um the bidding for these competitions is bad not just because of the cost that I want to note but doesn't because oftentimes leads to the displacement of homeless populations nearby so for
instance look at the Vancouver Olympics or the Brazil Olympics. The desire to big competitions like this that's part of your national culture actually excludes people further on a tangible level
finally Why does this help to distract populations ?
On an internal level your successes mean that you distract the population from the grills (scrutiny/issues) that occur and this is unique because countries like Russia use victories in sporting events as a unique way to say that our countries are better than others due to the fact that these sports are competitive and combative so that they can play on the rhetoric and notions of superiority over other states and strongman nationalism
but secondly, external abuse gets more difficult to attack because countries are now judged by how well they do the sport and that's the main coverage on them. See Beijing where what they helps today people stop talk about the human rights abuses in the director
Proud to propose
Tin Puljić
LO | OO
81, 84
Introduction
As someone grown up in the culture of sport we simply cannot explain just what to extent OG is wrong because of that all rebuttals will be integrated
Framing
Let's begin it with the idea of identity whether or not it's accessible and a few other benefits you
lose on the spot
On accessibility:
1. First let’s start with demographics. Note that in a lot of countries the people who bring
the greatest foreign successes to that country are very often members of minorities. To the extent of which that happens, they get to co-opt being a part of national pride.
Substantiate the importance of the POI
That's why I mentioned the example I did when the French national team won the 1998 World Cup support for the right-wing party literally went down
Mechanism
why because of a “cognitive dissonance mechanism”- I take pride in sport I believe it's part of my identity which I identify with. If this person who is a part of a minority community has managed to create such elation in my psychology, has managed to literally make me happier that they've ever been in the last four years then they have some
intrinsic worth.
Cognitive Dissonance: the discomfort a person feels when their behavior does not align with their values or beliefs. Cognitive dissonance is a psychological phenomenon that occurs when a person holds two contradictory beliefs at the same time
This cognitive dissonance is exactly what makes people challenge the stereotypes that these people members of minorities are unable to provide for our society aren't able to participate in our national pride because they're directly opting into what brings us that pride
You are more likely to challenge preconceived biases against minorities because they are providing you with fulfillment
Example
note also if you want to talk about America the majority of the best basketball players in the
United States are black people. People like Michael Jordan people like Magic Johnson people who formed the dream team of 1992
Why is it relevant ?
They all went to advocate for extremely progressive causes. Successful advocates which cut across demographic lines. Why ? because people felt pride in them winning the fucking Olympics. So when Magic Johnson came out and said “I'm an advocate for like AIDS relief and we have to accept these people” a lot of people who were basketball fans were usually conservative listened to him
Mechanism
because they were able to empathize with the guy because they knew his personal story, they read his interviews, he was no longer just a person who has AIDS, he was someone who brought me happiness and who directly made me feel proud because of my national identity
Impact
At that point you're more likely to listen to these people because they bring you happiness.
Sub-Claim
Note this cuts across many countries, the majority of the members of the football team in Germany are Turks, in France is the Algerians, in Croatia it's the Bosnians.
This narrative transcends geographic, ethnic, etc biases
Analysis
Members of minorities who do not necessarily have access to jobs but this is something they have access to based on pure physical skill. At that point they manage to break stereotypes for other groups in society
Rebuttal 1
this is something they ignore they talk about ableism and misogyny
-Paraphrasing OG
Identify Possible Symmetry
not yeah, most of life is unfortunately ableist
but at least in sports you can't have things such as the Paralympics which is something that the nations also take pride in. Note that the Croatian national team is very efficient in gathering money and donations for our Paralympians. Why because they get to Co-pt the narrative.
Using factual examples to disprove OG’s ableist material
Look we guys made you so fucking happy when we reached the World Cup final, there are other people who can do the same for you and you need to divert your attention to them. that attention is exclusively diverted if it's done by people whom you trust most often not politicians because people like to bash the state most often not people who are perceived as having a liberal bias and trying to change our culture but people who directly opt into traditional norms people who wear a cross around their neck when they play games people have their hand over their heart when the hear the national anthem even get a boner when they see that they're more likely to listen these kinds of people we also know that like yes society is misogynist and we completely agree with open government
Rebuttal 2
but given us they cannot fiat in civic nationalism in given that other types of nationalism are equally exclusionary i.e because the army is perceived as being an immense thing because the society generally misogynist it so most of our stories about national
heroes and most of our myths revolve around the men
Questions their ability to bring about the counterfactual and why other possibilities which are equally likely are bad
At least in our world if you're a smaller country where there aren’t that many sports to choose from you're also doing to co-op to women in sports. with Maria Sharapova in tennis for Russia Note Tina Maze in skiing for slovenia women gets to be national heroines, women get to hold her hand over their heart when they hear the anthem as well when people feel that national pride the same type of stigmatization goes down
Further Mechanization
this is accessible because it cuts over demographic and class lines because there are success stories Luca Modric was literally a war child is now the best footballer in the world you can identify with that regardless of what class you’re from, he’s also a Bosnian
It’s is easier to identify with them as they were the ones who brought you happiness.
Rebuttal 3
They say you tend to get more distracted on our side
Referring to how states use success in sports as a medium to distract citizens from internal political problems (corruption, crime, inflation)
Injecting symmetry in the debate
We say necessarily in alot of countries that identify with sport this tend to be countries are fucked up, countries in which people feel they have no other hope. We say it is a good thing to have a feeling of happiness and elation. We say even if you count your days based on when the next game is going to be that is a coping mechanism to survive from day to day. This is also a benefit on our side
Socio-Political circumstances is not going to change on either side but at least they are happy because of sports
but before I talk about who will get platformed… I’ll take a poi from closing….
POI
“Do you stand behind members of national teams in sports matches where they might have had conflicts with before making symbolic physical gestures that might insult or provoke people”
Okay, just a second and look at what they say in a POI that some people make inflammatory remarks and they get away with it because they're nationalists. But note, in many cases this hurts the performance of the teams. So a Croatian player declared a Domagoj VIda shouted out Ukrainian fascists paroles before the World Cup finals in 2018 the entirety of the National Football Association and the fans were very quick label him as fascist
FIFA's disciplinary committee has sent a warning to the player Domagoj Vida due to his video statement following the 2018 FIFA World Cup match where Croatia knocked out Russia in the QF," The statement in question was “Glory to Ukraine”
because they were afraid of his remarks hurting the team and the team being sanctioned exactly because it fitting into the narrative of national pride but we see comparatively who we do give a platform to are people who can advocate
for political change because sports heroes are seen as bipartisan people who are not tainted by politics therefore
they have the power of agenda-setting noticing at home but also internationally so in tennis player Novak Djokovic talks about the plight of
Serbs in Kosovo people abroad I'm going to click on these articles because our aim is not no joke which is saying then
they pressured the government to take action to reduce the plight of these people but is any also have a general setting power and hope because people
listen to all these four people have to say and it they consider important to be important as well this means that necessarily they
have the power of agenda-setting to get politicians to act on certain issues because at the end of the day people are
more likely to listen to guys who bring them happiness rather conditions throughout pathetic bubbles this also gives you a platform to become a
political activist yourself local iberian footballer George Dubya it's currently the president of Liberia