keep politics out of the game

[SeaEagleRock8]

Well then, you will be a huge supporter of the club coming up with an appropriate jersey design which reflect those worthwhile causes as well as the LGBT community ...

No I'm not really a big fan of turning the jersey into a billboard, in general.
As for "reflect those worthwhile causes" ... depends exactly what on earth they are doing for 'those causes'.
Fyi a long time ago spent 2 years working for the Salvation Army (not a member, just drove trucks as an employee) and that solidified my dislike of charities, both in practice and in principle.
A lot of so-called charitable campaigns amount to mere lip service, and don't touch the root cause of the issue they purport to deal with. As you may well agree.

 

[Woodsie]

Regardless of all this pissing about who’s got the biggest donger

Good Lord ... If people start posting dick pics ... I'm out ...

(Disclaimer ... not that there is anything wrong with that ...)

 

[SeaEagleRock8]

Yep, other people's rights and opinions have never been a high priority for you.

Not sure about rights, but true, many opinions I do not care for.

 

[Mark from Brisbane]

Good Lord ... If people start posting dick pics ... I'm out ...

(Disclaimer ... not that there is anything wrong with that ...)

Tim Paine is the expert on that !!

 

[Terry Zarsoff]

At first glance, you can understand why people might answer a poll that way. It’s an understandable sentiment.

Delving deeper though - were other nations right to ban sporting contact (admittedly whilst allowing other forms of interaction to continue) with the apartheid regime in South Africa? I think so.

Are we right to ban Russia from international sporting contests after the invasion of Ukraine? Yes.

If China invaded Taiwan, would sporting bans be one appropriate (albeit relatively minor) countermeasure? Yes again.

Was it right to suspend the Berlin Olympics of 1916* and the Tokyo and Rome games of 1940 and ‘44 respectively - yes again.

So using sport as a platform to voice protest against unseemly practices, apparently condoned by the relevant government, like the strip search of an Australian woman at Qatar’s Doha airport being just one example - would seem entirely appropriate.

*Hitler then mixed aspects of his politics with sport in 1936.

 

[SeaEagleRock8]

But if you are a sports person , stick to what you do best.

If you want to go down the road of any of the above after sport , then go for it.

This was always the accepted way in the past, but it seems times are changing.
Well, i'd say the evidence is overwhelming that it is changing!
Do you think the trend can be turned back?

 

[SeaEagleRock8]

Tim Paine is the expert on that !!

Now you're mixing sport with politics!
His position as Aussie test captain was untenable politically, legally he was fine??!

 

[Mark from Brisbane]

No I'm not really a big fan of turning the jersey into a billboard, in general.
As for "reflect those worthwhile causes" ... depends exactly what on earth they are doing for 'those causes'.
Fyi a long time ago spent 2 years working for the Salvation Army (not a member, just drove trucks as an employee) and that solidified my dislike of charities, both in practice and in principle.
A lot of so-called charitable campaigns amount to mere lip service, and don't touch the root cause of the issue they purport to deal with. As you may well agree.

One of the big issues most charities have is how much of a single dollar donated gets to the people they are raising it for.

It’s why I no longer donate to any major charity.

I was in the Apex service club for 20 years, the now have the Apex Foundation.

Every person working in it is a volunteer.

Their head office and administrative costs are fully sponsored.

Their investment portfolio ( 20 million) is managed by a large corporate , at no cost.

They have Zoom meetings , except for their AGM.

99.5 cents in every dollar raised goes to where it is supposed to go.

Not a single charity that you’d know can claim that.

 

[Mark from Brisbane]

This was always the accepted way in the past, but it seems times are changing.
Well, i'd say the evidence is overwhelming that it is changing!
Do you think the trend can be turned back?

No it’s gone too far now , they are famous people these days and use their fame to push their cause.

Sad really

 

[Woodsie]

At first glance, you can understand why people might answer a poll that way. It’s an understandable sentiment.

Delving deeper though - were other nations right to ban sporting contact (admittedly whilst allowing other forms of interaction to continue) with the apartheid regime in South Africa? I think so.

Are we right to ban Russia from international sporting contests after the invasion of Ukraine? Yes.

If China invaded Taiwan, would sporting bans be one appropriate (albeit relatively minor) countermeasure? Yes again.

So using sport as a platform to voice protest against unseemly practices, apparently condoned by the relevant government, like the strip search of an Australian woman at Qatar’s Doha airport being just one example - would seem entirely appropriate.

Yes ... the issue of sport with "roque" nations is exactly the domain of Gov't policy and the Foreign affairs office ...

 

[SeaEagleRock8]

No it’s gone too far now , they are famous people these days and use their fame to push their cause.

Sad really

Well the corporate world has made them stars. Maybe in some egalitarian future (far away, just before the Earth finally conks out) there won't be professional sports, only local sport for fun?

 

[Woodsie]

Now you're mixing sport with politics!
His position as Aussie test captain was untenable politically, legally he was fine??!

Not politically ... socially ... his personal character was under question ... not his political views .

 

[Terry Zarsoff]

Yes ... the issue of sport with "roque" nations is exactly the domain of Gov't policy and the Foreign affairs office ...

This bloke?

 

[SeaEagleRock8]

No it’s gone too far now , they are famous people these days and use their fame to push their cause.

Sad really

Its quite a factor, I'm assuming, that if you have 'a cause', such as belong to an environment group, or maybe are Indigenous and acutely aware of some issue(s), when you become famous and are able to be interviewed on mass media there must be incredible pressure from your group to use that high profile to help that cause.

 

[SeaEagleRock8]

Not politically ... socially ... his personal character was under question ... not his political views .

His character, true, not his poltical views.
But it would be political if CA ignored it and condoned his act by retaiing him.
It wasn't Tim paine being political, but I meant it was a political decision of CA to boot him because they'd look bad if they didn't?

 

[Woodsie]

His character, true, not his poltical views.
But it would be political if CA ignored it and condoned his act by retaiing him.
It wasn't Tim paine being political, but I meant it was a political decision of CA to boot him because they'd look bad if they didn't?

OK .. I'll give you that .

 

[SeaEagleRock8]

 

[Mark from Brisbane]

His character, true, not his poltical views.
But it would be political if CA ignored it and condoned his act by retaiing him.
It wasn't Tim paine being political, but I meant it was a political decision of CA to boot him because they'd look bad if they didn't?

This is very sexist and I apologise for that but Tim Paine desperately needs to go to Specsavers.

His wife is dead set a 12 out of 10 on the Richter scale.

And I’ve seen a photo of the lady he was sending dick pics to , and let’s just say she’s , well , nice.

 

[Ron E. Gibbs]

Thanks for such a thoughtful and wide-ranging post, SeaEagleRock8. To sum up the state of affairs using the title of a dud 2009 romantic comedy: "It's Complicated".

But if anyone really thinks that sport, commerce and social issues (which I prefer to the term "politics") aren't inextricably linked, they are looking back fondly at a bygone era that probably never existed in the first place.

The only purity left in sport these days, if there is any, is the purity of the contest. In rugby league, that's the purity of the game, 80 minutes of two teams going at it so that their supporters, numpties like you and me, can forget about the **** going on in their lives and the world around them, and cheer for their players and their clubs. And it turns out we can't even count on that.

Sport, as you have no doubt heard, is a business. Sure, on one level it exists for the fans, but really, it exists so that a small number of individuals and corporations can make money off it. The Super League war was proof of that. And when sport becomes an entertainment "product", it also becomes a media product, and the media loves… conflict.

For the media, rugby league is a giant soap opera, and every player atrocity, every boardroom manoeuvre, every bit of controversy means more money for Channel Nine, Fairfax (owned by Nine) and News Corp (including Fox Sports). It is in their interests to intertwine sport, politics and social issues as much as they possibly can, to keep it in the headlines and footy forums, and then to run more stories and opinion pieces and polls about how bad it is that sport and politics are so intertwined, and what are we going to do about it?

Good or bad, the genie has long been out of the bottle: sport cannot exist in a social or commercial vacuum and never will. Sporting organisations are going to take a position on social issues whether we like it or not, as will clubs and individual players. And hoping that it will all go away and crying out, "Why can't it all just be about the footy?" isn't going to make it so. We are going to have to learn how to deal with it and make it work.

My biggest fear is that we've already fallen into the trap of letting players (and fans) believe that a sporting club's team jersey - which represents the club, the sporting body (in this case, the NRL) and, from time to time (even if "too bloody often") various social issues and initiatives - is also somehow a banner of individual rights, beliefs and personal choice. It's not - it's a ****ing football jersey. It represents the club and the team, not the depths of your soul. And if you allow players (either as individuals or acting in a bloc) to pick and choose which jerseys (and whether you like it or not, there will be more than one Manly jersey every year) they will and will not wear, you are eroding the very concept of what it means to be in a team and part of a team.

So yeah, it's probably only going to to get messier from here.

 

[Deleted member 26876]

Dribble

Should be transferred to the general forum area.

Now, I haven't even read the initial post yet but I see an opportunity for intervention time and that made me so excited

Look, I know i've only just found out that 'red pill' is short for angry pill, but if you don't taper down the intake soon I will have to transfer you straight to the general nothing area.

Here's a few things people talk about that people in the general nothing area don't ever get to talk about

• Questions about whether pineapple should be allowed to place itself on pizza?
• Reality-questioning questions like can blind people dream? The chicken or the egg?

The list goes ON

Can you imagine life without these types of questions
We'd lose our sanity even quicker without them!

Stick around red pill, forum = thoughts