Perhaps my first real experience with this phenomena came as a young teenager who was into video games and fantasy. This immediately surrounded me with other people of the same ilk, and a healthy majority of those people don’t know anything about sports. And they’re really impressed with themselves because of it. I bought into it for a while, too, even though I always generally enjoyed competition. It was half-hearted on my part, but I didn’t know anything about sports, so hey, I might as well go out all the way on being cool because of it.
As I’ve grown older, I’ve grown more fond of every sort of sport. Especially the ones where people can actually impede their opponent physically (soccer, tennis, football, basketball, hockey, baseball, any sort of fighting), as opposed to pageantry (anything where judges determine 100% of the winners — figure skating, etc). I love seeing the skill of getting an object into a small, well defined zone (because I’m a man and that’s what we live for), and I love the physical form of cock-blocking that stopping the other guy represents (because if I’m not getting it, you aren’t either). Kidding, sort of, with the sexual metaphors there. But I do enjoy seeing a good goal in hockey or soccer, a sheer display of determination in tennis, or a well delivered tackle in football that rattles someone’s teeth. When it comes to physical sport I am but a savage.
The more I’ve learned about the intricacies involved in these sports, the more I appreciate them. The rules and scoring system in tennis is one of those systems I absolutely adore. The strategy in a baseball game. The sheer athleticism of skating at top speed and shooting a puck in hockey, or stripping said puck from another man who is determined to get around you. It’s just amazing prowess and I appreciate seeing it. To the extent I’ll even watch women play most of those sports (but not the WNBA), just because I like picking a team to win and seeing them win, or lamenting over the loss.
But not watching football doesn’t make you special.
Lots of people throughout history didn’t watch football. Most of humanity didn’t watch football. It doesn’t make them special, either.
Being ignorant is not a badge of honor.
I don’t know who a lot of famous people are, and I don’t watch a lot of non-sports television. I also don’t go around telling people how I don’t, and snorting derisively at those who do. I genuinely don’t care what Lady Gaga wears, and I also genuinely don’t care if someone else does. They’re spending their allotted minutes in life on it. That’s fine with me. I’ll spend my time watching the Saints disappoint us all again.
It is downright impressive how impressed most people are with themselves for not knowing something. Mathematics is the next cool thing not to know, apparently. “I don’t do math.”
Right, that explains the debt ratio in the United States, right there.
“I don’t watch the news” preens the person who still goes out and votes. (Which explains every Democrat elected to office in the last thirty years.)
Yes, you are very special for being intentionally ignorant on a subject that impacts you directly.
No, wait, you’re just a dumbass. Anyone preening about how cool they are for not knowing something needs a swift and forceful kick to the balls or other genitals. You should legally be allowed to cause them brief, non-damaging physical pain — and the best part is?
They’d never know the law was being passed to protest against it.