The Olympics

[David Casseres]

[David Friedman sez]
>I agree.  Sports is far more important to a healthy mind and bosy than 
>any erudition.  I'll take Michael Jordan's athleticism over Descarte's 
>lazy intellectualism any day of the week.  So, a lot of people DO give a 
>fuck about sports, be they professional or not.  Myopic attitude towards 
>sports are as silly as Mao's myopic views of intellectualism and 
>culture.  Nice company to keep, don't you think? 

It seems that we have an important distinction to make: there's DOING 
sports and there's WATCHING sports.  Doing sports (broadly defined) can 
indeed be very important.  Watching sports is another thing.  I feel it's 
healthy to go watch sports in the flesh, but questionable at best when 
it's a matter of slumping in front of the tube and having some dope yell 
a lot of duckspeak in your ear.

I must say that I watch the Olympics every time, and bitch loudly about 
the way they're conducted and televised (which are actually one and the 
same thing).  It's like picking at a scab.  But at least I don't subject 
myself, ever, to televised pro football, which is no sport at all but a 
gladiatorial spectacle designed to stupefy the masses just exactly like 
its Roman predecessors.

Ob. Pynchon:  I wonder howcum Pynchon, in his restless picturing and 
repicturing of everything American, has not dealt much with commercial 
sports?

Cheers,
David