Rugby isn't a game. It's an assault course dreamt up by a sadist

For example, where or what is the Arsenal? And why do men who don’t even live there act like victory for "my team" is a matter of life and death? Sport turns everyone into animals; the football fans act without rhyme or reason. If they lose, they beat someone up. If they win, they beat someone up. Why not cut out the middleman and just have 2,000 men on a pitch hitting each other with clubs? It’s made worse by the overuse of the word "historic". Man landing on the Moon is historic. The battle of Agincourt is historic. Andy Murray winning a tennis match is not historic. Nor is there any need to lionise people who can run very fast, jump quite high or swim quickly. Dogs, kangaroos and fish do these things every day of the week and no one’s offering them a knighthood. wrote:

http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/timstanley/100226273/rugby-isnt-a-game-its-an-assault-course-dreamt-up-by-a-sadist/

I'll just quote part of it here.There's a paywall thing (after 20 or so articles a month) and I wouldn't want the site to get into trouble if I quoted all of it.

Your description of rugby reminds me of a recent description of football I heard from my daughter. She was talking to some people who like watching football and she told them, "I really don't understand football. It seems to me it's just a bunch of guys running around and hitting each other." One of the fans looked at her and responded, "Yeah, that's about it."

Truly historic events.

I really do not understand what is so fun about seeing a millionaire kick a ball around. (In which they became millionaires by kicking balls around which is even stranger)

People then talk of 'Oh the teamwork' and all that silly nonsense which I then reply "Why not military training then if you want teamwork so much? Besides it actually gives you survival skills and ways to survive in life or death situations while kicking a football around... and idolising somebody just because they can jump faster and all that is rather dull especially if you consider people whose physical strength is tested in the most dangerous condition. They also have to work as a unit instead of gloating about how much more milliseconds you can cut within 100m- they would just consider that to be a useful attribute not something to give medals about. They give medals out for a far higher and noble deeds then just being able to run faster or kick a ball around better than somebody else"

And a friend of mine essentially agrees and dreams of introducing military training in schools because we both went through something like that and have found it to be more useful than any PE classes and games (UK schools- essentially entire afternoon concentrating on one game or the other depending on what you prefer. Took fencing because sword skill may actually be useful instead of hurling or kicking balls around) Also, the camaraderie fostered after going through the training was much stronger. We may have been lucky in terms of what kind of officers and NCO we got as instructors, but from personal experience, it was much more useful and endearing. And actually taught leadership skills once you start becoming responsible for squads and companies.

Responsibility is something I do not think you really learn in sports even if you are a team captain because you do not really answer to anybody and there is no clear command structure which means you can just blame somebody for something. While if you are a sergeant in charge of a squad, you better have a good reason why your squad did poorly on exercises or else the people above you will start shouting at you. And then you have to get your act together and make your squad better and as a sergeant, you are supposed to know things better than a raw recruit and to expect them to do things like a veteran is stupid so in the end it is the sergeant's responsibility to get things straight (will involve shouting, but generally things get done in the end- some exceptions to people who become megalomaniacs, who are the people who give the military a bad name)