From britdisc-owner@csv.warwick.ac.uk Mon Mar 12 16:22:53 2001 Received: (from daemon@localhost) by pansy.csv.warwick.ac.uk (8.10.1/8.9.3) id f2CGGJ311836 for britdisc-outgoing; Mon, 12 Mar 2001 16:16:19 GMT Received: from daffodil.csv.warwick.ac.uk (root@daffodil [137.205.192.30]) by pansy.csv.warwick.ac.uk (8.10.1/8.9.3) with ESMTP id f2CGGCv11772 for <britdisc-real@pansy.csv.warwick.ac.uk>; Mon, 12 Mar 2001 16:16:12 GMT Received: from renko.ucs.ed.ac.uk (renko.ucs.ed.ac.uk [129.215.13.3]) by daffodil.csv.warwick.ac.uk (8.10.1/8.9.3) with ESMTP id f2CGG8L00539 for <britdisc@csv.warwick.ac.uk>; Mon, 12 Mar 2001 16:16:10 GMT Received: from srv1.mech.ed.ac.uk (trogers@rupert.mech.ed.ac.uk [129.215.113.221]) by renko.ucs.ed.ac.uk (8.8.7/8.8.7) with ESMTP id QAA25738 for <britdisc@csv.warwick.ac.uk>; Mon, 12 Mar 2001 16:15:45 GMT Message-ID: <3AACF599.2B0A849F@srv1.mech.ed.ac.uk> Date: Mon, 12 Mar 2001 16:13:13 +0000 From: Tim Rogers <trogers@srv1.mech.ed.ac.uk> X-Mailer: Mozilla 4.61 [en] (X11; I; Linux 2.2.12-20smp i686) X-Accept-Language: en MIME-Version: 1.0 To: britdisc@csv.warwick.ac.uk Subject: Ultimate Directions: Do we care about our routes? Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Sender: owner-britdisc@warwick.ac.uk Precedence: bulk Do we care about our routes? ===================== How many of these statements do we hear the echo of? 1) "Other sports do this; we should do this" 2) "We want to be on TV; we want to play professional sport" 3) "We have graduated from university, are now earning a bit more money and we need more comfort: hotels, pitches all to the highest possible standard." 4) "We need to be more status conscious" 5) "We are so desperate to win that we forget that we are playing a game, and even play under such a rigid mandate that we forget to express ourselves." 6) "We need to be much more institutionalised, so we can get more respect from other institutions" The founders of our beautiful game had a vision: a new sport that was not like traditional sports. Do we reject everything from our culture, because the time it was written in has gone out of fashion? People who believed more in that culture have left the sport, they don't like the conflict and yes to a certain extent it is their fault that they haven't propagated their vision. Incidently, I do call fowls when I see them, and as anybody who has ever played in my team will tell you I am as committed in a game as you will find any ultimate player to be. I also love the high of competitive ultimate, the passion, the pain, the freedom of expression, the fight, and even the social tension. Its what makes us human! Sport is life on fast forward. I think we as a community need to be more introspective. Even if we did want to be on TV then who is going to be interested in a wannabee sport. Tim Ro Sham Bo "You don't lose your soul all at once; you lose it a bit at a time." Not sure who said that, but its very true.