Is there a limit to entertainment?
If you ever want to see adults acting like kids (or worse), just walk into a bar on a Friday night. Entertainment has no limits. Art has no boundaries or borders. I love sports, besides the fact that my anxiety during an intense game of tennis peaks to an uncontrollable level, I love the thrill.
To me watching sports or better-playing sports is excellent entertainment. They are pure entertainment.
This past weekend got me into thinking about whether entertainment is pure.
The divide created by one of the most anticipated events in a sport, which shall remain unnamed, was so large that it went beyond social media. Fights and riots broke out after the event was over; it was chaos. But, chaos is natural in a sporting event. However, this one was made too political by the organizers.
That is what the problem is; it is so easy to instigate hate among people these days.
I was talking to someone at my gym about the event. I asked, "Wasn't it crazy?" To which he replied, "Yeah, I knew he would lose since the opponent is more skilled. It was natural why it got out of hand. The game was not between two athletes, but more about the countries they were from."
The reaction post event was pretty much felt across parts of the world.
A sport is about the game, the players involved and fandoms, but this was beyond that. This event was not about the athletes or fighters, but it came down to race, religion and countries. The organizers need to promote the event, but the way it was promoted, was wrong––so wrong. Someone tweeted about the event saying, "It ended the way it was put together."
Maybe entertainment has no limits, but we do.
Think about your reactions, emotions, what the best or worst thing you are willing to do out of excitement for the form of entertainment you look up to. How you react to what you are shown or told, is something we all need to think twice about.
Most of the pre-game trash talk is meant to create a hype; most of it is television, but we forget, for most people, it is more than television. When you target an opponent to a personal level, those watching get personal too. The aftermath of this weekend's event showed the extremes people can go to.
It showed the level of hatred that was spread.
Just how easy it was to lose complete control and instigate hate, and how easy it is to make groups fight. Rivalries over a sport can become real and can just as quickly turn into bullying. So, people, every time you get heeded about something, take a step back and think twice about any good your role can do.
Let's keep checks on our extreme emotions.
