The Super Bowl is this weekend, and I probably won't be watching. Which, yes, I am aware makes me somewhat unusual among Americans, but hey, you can't help what you prefer to do. And since, every year, I get questions along the lines of "Why are you not watching the Super Bowl?" I thought I'd lay out why, exactly, I don't give a crap. It's because of one person.
Specifically, that one guy, the one who follows up that question with "What the hell is wrong with you?"
I'm not angry or worked up or protesting the Super Bowl; for a lot of people, watching the game is about hanging out with friends and family. It's like being pissed off everybody goes home for Thanksgiving. And 90% of football fans are just normal people who enjoy the game, don't take it too seriously, and have fun.
But there's always that one guy who just does not seem to get that I do not care about football. This guy, actually.
You might as well tell this guy you're a Venusian, or that you're too busy impaling children. I've had people be baffled, be outraged, be confused, a whole spectrum of reactions that are really vastly inappropriate for discovering somebody doesn't share your passion for your hobby. I've never had a stamp collector try to pick a fistfight with me. I've never had a jogger ask me what the hell was wrong with me that I didn't want to go jogging with him. It's even worse when they're a fantasy football fanatic, because nothing amplifies an ultimately pointless hobby like a competition where there's literally nothing whatsoever on the line.
Please note, that as I'm a long time gamer, nothing in that last sentence is sarcasm. Swap out "football" with "video games" and that last sentence pretty much sums up 45% of my waking hours in college. Similarly, seeing people who should know better go ballistic over trivia (and all sports are trivia) isn't exactly an uncommon sight.
It's the entitlement that gets me, the sense that this guy thinks everybody should care as much about grown men throwing a ball around as much as they do, and if you don't, something is wrong with you.
In short, I never watch the Super Bowl because there's only so often you can see a grown man act like a child over it before you just find yourself with a distaste for the whole thing and an active desire to avoid it, and the man-child associated with it, completely. Besides, now that we have the Internet, the ads are available online. And, one hopes, a bar will be showing the only event this Sunday that really matters: The Puppy Bowl.
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As a male who doesn't care about sports in the least, I give this post a 10/10. I respect people's hobbies, but when I make it pretty obvious that I have no interest in performance in the or , please - I implore you - change the subject to something we're both interested in!