Author: Matt Lambourne

The Link between Sports, TV and Human Behaviour

I apologise for the frequency of my last 2 articles but would like to get this one on paper so to speak before i lose my train of thought. Its the summertime! (no shit Matt!) and that can only mean one thing, sports!

Now as i have done in all my previous articles i am looking at this from a purely English perspective, so i am unsure if this is the case for our readers across the BP pond, namely USA and Canada, but English life (in the mainstream) revolves around the success of our teams to triumph in everything we do. For some bizarre reason English sports fans seem to think we are better than everyone at everything, although i can openly say we are not the best at any sport i can think of!

English sportsmen and women are under immense pressure to win everything. I am sitting here at my desk watching The Wimbledon Tennis championships, funnily enough the only time of year English people give a fuck about the sport. it’s w wonderful sight to behold however, the crowd is packed full with the cross of St.George (the english flag) and they are fully behind Tim Henman (our one good Tennis player) in good old English jubilation. However it doesn’t take long for this united uphoria to turn into anxiety. Henman is quite confortable in this match playing a Morrocan guy whose name i cannot remember but everytime Henman drops a point or fluffs his 1st serve the crowd are all over him like a pack of hungry dogs.

This puts untold pressure on Henman to do better next point around even though he is being proverbally baited by the crowd. This makes it fustrating for me to watch the game as i just get fed up of hearing some drunk yobbo in the crowd shouting “Goooooooo’on Tim!”, makes the English look like a bunch of animals and really pisses me off!

The media here are no better however. Before the championship starts the newspapers will be giving away free banners and flags to support Tim Henman blah blah, England hasn’t won Wimbledon for 60 years, he is our only hope blah blah. All the focus is on this one person to deliever the ambition of a nation! Not bad for a guy who actually only came into the spot light when he whacked a ball girl in the face with a tennis ball in fustration!

The point i am trying to make is that English people are the envy of the world when we are doing well, as soon it looks bleak we turn into a nation of absolute idiots. At the same time Wimbledon is taking place it is also the European Football (Soccer) Championships taking place in Portugal and England yet again are the focal point of the tournament, not because our team is the best, but because our fans have a reputation of causing trouble wherever they go! The opening game we played France, a great game that England were winning until the last minute when France scored 2 sucker punch goals to defeat us.

The nation was in shock! Fortunately the fans in Portugal behaved, probably too drunk to cause any “Aggro” as we call it here, but back at home it was a different story. Fans left the bars and rioted! RIOTED! over a game of Football, what the fuck is that all about?

Anyway, soon after this we forgot about the France defeat and won our 2 other 1st round matches against Switzerland and Croatia, mainly thanks to our young sensation Wayne Rooney, an 18 year old boy quickly turned around our campaign scoring 4 goals in 2 games. Now the pressure was off the team and all on a teenage boy, the nation should be ashamed.

In the England then lost to Portugal in contaversial circumstances and again the nation weeps. To cut along story short, these comments are to prove a small point. Long have we read and heard about the argument that Video games and violent TV is a direct causes of violent behaviour in everyday life. This i believe is the biggest unfounded statement i’ve ever heard in my life. However, i do believe that at least in the case of the English (i cannot vouch for America/Canada) that sport is a much bigger trigger for violence and crime! So England…. you better win something soon or we’ll be overrun by crime ok!

My next point is in regards to something we all either love or hate, REALITY TV!

You can’t escape, it has come from nowhere at all to being on every TV station, 24 hours a day in some cases, but what is it about reality TV we like so much? I’ll come back to that question shortly however i wanted to tell you about a recent thought i had whilst watching a movie i had not seen for a very long time quite recently, The Running Man, starring Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Now when this movie was released in 1987 no one had any clue what Reality TV was. The film for those who haven’t seen it is about a wrongly inprisioned man who is given the chance to win back his freedom by appearing on TV show “The Running Man” where he must survive empty handed against 4 deadly Stalkers. In the story of the film this is the highest rating TV show in history and life now revolves around the show. The ULTIMATE reality TV show. I’ve always wanted this to become a real show, shows how my head works i guess, but it offers interesting parallels to modern life and the sudden explosion of Reality TV, consider the following :-

1. We have witnessed, especially in the States, the rise of unorthodox punishments to treat convictted fellons. Participation in such an event as the Running Man or another form of Reality TV could be considered the same.

2. 9/11 has increased the justifcation of the state to use “emergency power” to tighten security. Whether or not this breach of civil rights is justifiable is unknown to us, as the crucial infor itself is witheld, in the “public interest.” Therefor, the state has taken on more powers, with fewer checks. Media corporations are commercial entities, and the success of News Corporations in recent years raises the prospect of a monopoly channel or channels controlled by a single interest group. So if the media and government were to combine, as has fleetingly occurred, the effect would be a blanket monopoly of coverage, in which the government can justify its every move through propaganda, censorship, and the many means in which the public has shown to be susceptible. The example of this is set by the Running Man as the government has collasped and the country now controlled by major corporations, Bill Gates for president anyone?

Pull these strands together, and add the prospect of continued or worse “threats from outside” as they have been characterised (real or imagined), and we have a situation in which the reality of The Running Man is one hell of a lot more realistic than in 1987, when it was a mere fantasy. To control what people see and hear is to cotnrol what they think, and to make people feel threatened from outside is enough cause for them to accept sacrafice, such as those of civil liberties, to deal with this. This is called a problem-reaction-solution effect.

Other examples of how screwed up the media are heading is the Truman Show, a wonderful perhaps tongue in cheek movie about a man who was born into a reality TV show, his home Town just one big TV studio, his wife and friends are actors, his life controlled by a creative team of producers. This was released shortly the current boom of Reality TV but just how far away are we from such a show happening?

I hope i haven’t rambled on for too long but i really think my 2 points, especially reality TV are worth discussion, i’d like to know your thoughts on how these 2 things effect human behaviour, why we are all so consumed by success and how nowdays fiction just isn’t enough and more and more we want the “real thing” on TV.

Michael Moore – Patriot or Treasoness?

That seems to be the most interesting debate of the moment on the BP boards and something that seems to hit sensitive spots in us all. I for one being English do not know a great deal about Michael Moore, i’ve heard of his books and saw the hilarious Oscars 2002 ( i think it was) speech against Bush, but i have seen Bowling For Columbine and understand what he is fighting for.

When i saw Bowling For Columbine i must admit i really thought to myself “why the fuck would anyone want to live in America!?!” Now i truely and honestly do not wish to offend the America users of BP by that comment, but BFC portrays your country as a damn scary place to live in!

To cut a long story short after seeing BFC i was totally convinced that America is full of whackos (referring mainly to that guy who was related to one of the Oklahoma bombers and that school kid was sad he wasn’t on te most wanted list in his school!), believed Chartlton Heston is poor excuse for a human being a large percentage of America’s are uneducated enough to really believe that Marilyn Manson was somehow to blame for Columbine!

However there are a number of sources who claim that Moore is no better than the US government as he is deceitful in his depiction of the truth. I have read a number of these claims (not all) and must admit they are well researched and do make me wish to re-evalutate my stance on Moore, which until not too long ago was that he is a model American.

So is Moore’s lifelong crusade really a fight for the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth (so help me god 🙂 or really just a carefully disguised attempted at changing US politics to his own suit and making a quick buck at the same time?

I cannot say for certain because i do not know the man, so that particular argument is very much open to debate. However one thing in my eyes that is definately not open to debate is the following :-

1. BFC is purely a way one ticket, it offers very little in supporting argument for Gun laws as it stands in the US, it is totally way one and very bias!

2. My title of this column is Patriot or Tresoness? By now you’ve probably made up your minds on which side you believe Michael Moore to be on, however to support my column i seeked the “exact” meaning of the two to see which best describes what i believe to be Michael Moore. (my source is dictionary.com)

Patriot = one who loves and defends his or her country

Treason = The offense of attempting to overthrow the government of the state to which the offender owes allegiance, or of betraying the state into the hands of a foreign power; disloyalty; treachery.

Now i will admit that the defination of Treason is very different in respects to the English Monarchy and the US Government, but essentially they mean the same thing. Personally i no longer see Michael Moore as the patriot i once did, he may love America but he does nothing to defend it, he makes it look weak to the world and really highlights it was a terribly run country. However more interesting he falls almost categortically into the defination of Treason as he does misleads people with he points of view ( as he did with Heston in BFC) he solidly betrays his government and is disloyal to his President.

Now weather you believe him to be either, by defination alone he is not a patriot and is very close to being guilty of treason. Now in England treason is probably the worst crime a person can commit and anyone suspected of treason would almost certainly be in prison for life, a few years ago be killed.

I would like to end this column by once again leaving this argument totally open to debate as it purely written in my own perception. However i would add that respect Moore for what he is trying to do and to stand against the US government alone is a very brave thing to do…….. i wonder what the odds are on his assasination?

Shortly following my last article for BP I already had an idea for the next one which I thought would make for interesting reading, something very different from the gloomy subject of my first piece. However recent events surrounding the Iraqi occupancy have again opened bitter wounds for me and others, namely the Nick Berg incident amongst others and I feel a strong obligation to write about this subject once more.

Over the past few weeks a number of terrible photos have been released to the media showing US soldiers torturing, belittling and intimidating their Iraqi prisoners at Abu Grahib prison. The timing for this of course could not of been worse as the co-ilition finds itself losing more soldiers during the handover of the country than during the actual invasion. I think it is important to make the point that the action of these people does not reflect on the overall stance of Westerners towards the Arab people nor that of any democray in it’s simplicity, but those responsible for the torture are no better than the people we fought to remove from Iraq and should be punished equally for their crime, but they’ll probably just get thrown out of the army.

Shortly after the shock of these US photos being released a British newspaper (The Daily Mirror) released similar pictures of UK soldiers performing such acts upon their captives, namely parading them around naked, urinating on them and assaulting them with butt of their rifles. This of course caused mass contraversy back here in England and many were calling for a full withdrawl from Iraq as the mission of a peaceful handover had become unattainable. It later turned out that these pictures were staged and fake, the editor of that newspaper was duely shown the door. But it would appear that someone has purposefully tried to sabotage our mission in Iraq therefore putting thousands of co-ilition soldiers in grave danger. But why would someone want to do this?

We are only looking at this situation from a western point of view at this time, imagine what is like to see these pictures on TV if you are an Iraqi! Try to imagine a huge, technically advanced army bulldozing it’s way into your city, seemingly in peace and then seeing the contrary that has recently been revealed. You would no doubt feel terrible angst and hate for those people. Unfortunately I feel that Nick Berg is a direct consequence of these revealations. Now regardless of what you think of Nick Berg even being in Iraq or even worse why he stayed after being advised to leave no man deserves what he suffered. I feel relunctant to reveal this but having heard of this story I simply had to see it to believe it. I went on Kazaa and found it pretty quickly and watched. I wish I hadn’t.

I will not go into the gory details of what is one of the most disturbing things I have ever seen but I will tell you how I felt when I saw it, apart from being physically sick! I felt angst and I felt hate. I wanted to take retribution. Even though I have few connections to America apart from my BP buddies and I have never met nor heard of Nick Berg previously, I wanted to avenge him. I have only felt this way once before in my life, that was at the time of 9/11. In my place of work I have a very significant number of Asian colleagues, most from Pakistan whom I generally get on with very well but during the aftermath of 9/11 I felt very bitter towards.

Even though I knew deep down these guys are just normal people and had nothing to with it I still felt resentment and anger towards these people. Unfortunatley there even was a small minority whom I worked with who felt 9/11 was a good thing! I simply cannot comprehend that opinion. Going to work each day for many months had a horrible tension in the air that I wish not to relive. The reason I tell you of this experience is very important because having watched Nick Berg die and having repressed emotions resurface it reminded me of a story that came out in the UK shortly after 9/11, a story of someone who felt as I did but took it too far.

After 9/11, the UK (I am sure this was the case in the US also) there were a number of unprovoked revenge attacks on Asians in our communities. One person however that was caught up in this was a man who had no prior violent related convictions and had a family. A normal guy you might say. However having watched 9/11 on TV he felt the same as me, he felt overwhelming angst and hate towards the Asian community at large. Within a few days his rage had consumed him and he went out one night, indiscriminately targetted two young Asian men and beat them to death.

Naturally he was jailed for life, but he was asked why he did what he did, he was asked why did he target two people he knew had nothing to do with 9/11. Now I cannot quote this piece word for word but his response was something like the following : –

“I’m sorry for what I have done, as anyone who knows me will tell you, I am not a violent nor am I a racist. I knew these people had nothing to do with the 9/11 catastrophy but after I saw what happened, I wanted all of these people to die. I wanted to make the world a better place, and I thought it would be without these people in it”.

Now I know right now a lot of you who are reading this will think “What a load of bullshit!”. I am sorry to say, I do not agree with you. To be so bold I would even say he has a point. Now I am not saying all Asians should be killed, nor I that wish to kill any of them myself, and I am not saying what he did was right or the things he said were 100% accurate, but I do totally relate to this person’s emotions. When I watched 9/11 unfold as it happened and then watched Nick Berg die I felt exactly the same way he did, I would just never do what he did because that is wrong.

The point of this entire article is to try and open everyone’s eyes to the pain and the extreme anger that must be felt by those who live in Iraq, not just how we feel when we hear of another co-ilition soldier being shot, or unfortunately circumstances such as those that ended the life of Nick Berg. Everything that we think and feel regarding this occupation must be 10 fold for the men and women of Iraq.

I would just like to close this article with a brief note to the figureheads behind our occupation in Iraq. It is a good thing that we rid Iraq of Saddam Hussain, but we cannot force Democracy onto a country that has no concept of it. Democracy is a choice not a prerequisite to live in the modern world, and I feel that Bush and Blair are certainly not practicing what they preach with their actions in Iraq.

I hope that you have found this interesting as it is an important topic for everyone.
MVD

Alas, Baloolapalooza will finally get an insight into the mind of Matt Van Dam. Just for all those that know me from the PWF you will already have your head in your hands waiting for whatever grandiose and egotistical bullshit I can possibly come up with…

Well you are wrong. My intention is purely nothing more than to offer those readers of BaloolaPalooza an English spin on life in the world as we know it… or sometimes don’t. I will however add that my writing will pull no punches and will have no limitations to the possible controversy it may unravel. I will not write with the intention of pleasing other people, I write merely to amuse myself but you are all welcome to join the ride.

So what has being happening in the world lately? For me, the overwhelming topic is the War against Terrorism. Nearly 3 years on from 9.11 the world is still being plunged into chaos and catastrophe, namely by a number of mislead and impressionable individuals who are killing the innocent in the name of their God(s). Now, the whole world gets the US prospective on this situation, Bush will continue to send Americans to die, fighting to keep a country stable that seemingly cannot be saved from it’s own wrath and he expects the rest of the co-illation to do the same. But are we right to continue fighting a war we cannot win?

For me, Vietnam comes to mind when i think of what is currently going down in the Middle East. It was a case of the US forcing its own political agenda onto a nation divided by not only war, but by civilisation. Vietnam in the north and in the south is a country lost somewhere in the Ancient and the Modern and simply were not ready for what western civilisation was bringing to the table. America (or should i say its leaders) in their infinite wisdom sent hundreds of thousands of men to Vietnam to die in order to give this deeply eastern culture a shimmer of Western life… they failed.

It is reported that around 14% of the entire population of Vietnam was lost in the conflict, for the sake of politics is this something that we can just take on the chin and forget about? For me it can very easily go the same way in Iraq. Americans die, Britons die, Italians die, Japanese die and you better believe Iraqis die. My question to you all is this… should we continue to police the world and forsake our countrymen in the name of world peace when they clearly do not want us there, or should we simply police our own lands better? Crime, death, sickness and poverty are real, not just in parts of the world we can do nothing about, but in our very own Countries, Cities and Neighbourhoods. Should we really act god for the world when such things are happening on our own shores? We’ll all have a different answer to this as no particular answer is the right one, i personally feel the co-ilition should remove it’s presence from Iraq and allow them to live their own life, weather they choose to do it in peace or not.

Thanks for your audience, MVD.