The purpose isn't secret and never was. The objective is to allow political dissidents under repressive regimes a method of communicating politically online without getting in trouble by their governments. Hopefully this would lead to grass-roots "regime change" around the world.
That is called "politics," and altruism isn't the purpose, or the claimed purpose. The claimed purpose is that it is in the national interest of the United States for other countries to adopt similar concepts of democracy and free expression. That it is also believed to be good for the locals is nice, but not the objective.
Why did some people ever think it was about anything else? I'll bet the slashdot articles about Tor during the time period you signed up explained it just the same way I did; as a thing to enable political speech and encourage Democracy.
People are sure soft in the head to have just somehow decided it was for some other purpose, with no source document saying it was that other thing. Some guy on the internet says, "it is for privacy, you know, so you can hide from the gubermint." Vaguely true, yes, but not generally true. Which government, and for what purpose? That is the critical part. People who want to avoid the US government should probably avoid projects sponsored BY the US Government for the purpose of spreading American values.;)
That's pretty derpy. The government prints the bills, but they don't "print money" except in places like Zimbabwe. I'll admit it is a popular theme in right-wing media, though. So perhaps you've just been overly propagandized.
It is the banks that "print money" in the sense you meant it, not the government.
http://www.bankofengland.co.uk... is the document that most of us read last year. It was a bit of a bombshell, mostly because it admits things already known but in the past officially denied. But the old public version of how it works still has the banks creating the money, not the government.
They don't even need flaws, since it wasn't designed to offer the privacy people are wishing it provided. They simply need access to enough of the network, and they can see who is doing what.
The purpose is to facilitate political dissidents under repressive regimes, the design is based on the idea that the repressive regimes are somewhat isolated, and they'd never have the global access in order to figure out who is doing what. Cheap cameras and hard drives probably have tipped that balance, though, since a repressive regime can easily afford to record video in all cyber-cafes and store it indefinitely.
If I never see the word hivemind again, it will be too soon. Grow up.
The Green Brain by Frank Herbert is one of the great works of modern fiction. When you're old enough, you should read it. I'll warn you though, there is a hive mind involved.
Tor wasn't created for "privacy," it was created to help political dissidents in authoritarian regimes to communicate with each other and the outside world without their government being able to identify and punish them. Which I guess is a type of privacy. But politics was the goal, not privacy; specifically, encouraging representative government in places where it is banned and discussion of it stifled.
I'm for privacy, but looking for it in the wrong places is your own fault. Just like, if you have contraband in your pocket that you want to keep private, and you accidentally drop it in front of a cop: that is your own fault, your privacy wasn't violated, you simply didn't defend it rigorously.
Okay, this new different point is more true than the first one.
And yeah, the idea of pushing a button to take control while the car is in motion is... just insanely stupid, and would never make it out of testing.
That said, when it starts to the snow and the car pulls to the side of the road and turns on the emergency flashers, a lot of people are going to want that car to have a manual mode that they can use to take over driving. But no, they modes won't be mixed. The car will stop itself before allowing the human to take control.
The whole, "press a button to take over in an emergency" is just magical thinking.
Or, you don't understand the training that leads to success.
Your theory is, you know better than the Champion how to train for his or her sport.
My theory is, I'm just stating facts about where the injuries happen. My assumption is that the trainers have made these calculations according to professional formulas.
Chinese have different values, but "Capitalism" might not mean what you think it means. If you read Adam Smith, you might find that Capitalism means the Government regulating business to ensure a level playing field, which causes Capital to rule because all a person needs to start a business and compete is the capital. Without those Government controls, existing business will conspire to keep out or at least disadvantage newcomers, and politics and connections will be required, not just capital. The thing that modern Westerners often push as "Capitalism" is exactly what existed when Adam Smith wrote his book; not the thing actually described.
Similarly, China doesn't have "Communism," or "Socialism" either. Modern China has Capitalism, along with a single party political system. China doesn't have the sort of central economic control that the Soviet Union had. Instead, the Government controls industry by investing in a large number of the successful businesses. For example, many of the technology fabrication companies are about 25% government owned. So they use Capital and their partial ownership in order to influence business. And if I go to China and meet a farmer with a big idea who wants to start a business, and I invest in it so that he has the capital, he can start that business and compete.
Capitalism has nothing to do with Democracy. In many ways China is more capitalist than the US. If a Chinese business person goes to a village, buys all the bananas and creates an artificial shortage, and then raises the price 300%, that is punishable by death. Why? Because he's creating an illegal monopoly, and using it to ruin the market. Leveraging existing business to keep everybody else out and maintain a monopoly is the most anti-Capitalist thing you can do. China is one of the few places with clear bans on almost any anti-competitive practice. (Disclaimer: I'm only measuring the Chinese economy internally; foreigners like me don't have the same market access that Chinese people do. Just ask any US car company)
The words are so misused, they don't usually have much meaning. Chinese people value national unity more than others. Some people just assert that means they're repeating propaganda; but in reality they threw out almost everything Mao taught. They don't have political freedom, but it also isn't what most people want. Chinese people claim to actually want good governance, not western political theory. And the current propaganda seems to mirror the cultural norms. If you use real popular ideas and phrases as your propaganda, it is natural for people then to complain mostly about if you're actually following it. It is a totally different situation than when propaganda is used to try to manipulate views, or frighten enemies. The whole concept that most westerns have of propaganda is absurdist anyway when it is applied outside the context of elections. Their government has no reason to push propaganda that differs from cultural norms; their goal is to maintain the status quo, they're not trying to indoctrinate anybody.
What would aliens care about the form of government used on another planet?
I've seen humans kill a hen because she was mismanaging the yard. A rooster can meet his doom by giving too many political speeches near the humans, too.
One thing that would make me even more interested in combat sports than I am already: ban commenters from using chess analogies. (I say that as a successful amateur chess combatant)
Nothing makes a person (in any non-chess event) look stupider than comparing things to chess as an attempt at an accessible metaphor. Chess is not an accessible metaphor; nobody who needs an accessible metaphor would even understand an actual relevant chess example. And modern chess is highly pragmatic, there are basically no portable generalities to apply. It is entirely abstract and arbitrary.
I doubt it. With the right promotion you should be able to control who the audience wants to win. And since you've averaged it down to a mob decision, they'll pick "their guy" most of the time, regardless of the fight stats. I predict an almost identical percent of "bad" decisions to the current system.
This is hard, I know, because "tenses." But lets try.
Boxing is over [30+career length] years old. Therefore, if the result 30 years after the end of a fighters career was "vegetable" followed by "suing a bunch of people including government employees," then that would already have happened.
Your ignorance of both lawsuits and fighting just blares loudly through that. If you knew about lawsuits and boxing, even just in passing as a person who reads news articles about those things, then you'd know that the referee is always an employee of the State fighting commission that is overseeing the bout. You even say "Government," which is funny. You might be interested to know that there is blanket prohibition against suing the government; you can only sue the government for things that the government has established laws allowing you to sue over. So even if you can prove that it is the fault of the State Boxing Commission that you were allowed to make poor life choices, and that those choices led to disabling injury, you still can't sue them. You can't even recover medical expenses, unless there is some law explicitly allowing you to. For example, if you accused the State Boxing Commission of violating your civil rights, you could probably force them to change a rule. But you don't have a civil right that requires the government to nanny you through adulthood. It would have to be a real case, like if boxing refs allowed boxers of one race to get punched even after they were knocked out. That is what a real lawsuit would look like. Brain injury, there is no civil right to not get injured. People get injured every day.
You can't sue your opponent, or the promoter, because it was a legal activity regulated by the State Boxing Commission, so even if you can prove that you were in fact harmed, you can't prove that anybody else was being grossly negligent. Following regulations established by the relevant governing agency proves that they were attempting to be responsible, and the State has examined the conditions of the fight and signed off on it before hand. So there is no way you're going to sue them later. Even if you can prove they were partially responsible for your condition, that does not automatically mean they are financially liable for it.
But lets say none of that was true, and you actually could sue. Boxing would have been sued out of existence... before your parents were born. Because that is how long the current rules have been in place. So when your parents were children, it was already known; old boxers are often a bit slow; but they're not vegetables.
The scenario where there would be lawsuits would be if it wasn't regulated, but it wasn't banned, either. Then there are lots of people that you might sue, maybe even including the ref, because he would just be some guy the promoter hired, and not an employee of the State Boxing Commission. The UFC started out that way; if not for regulation by the State commissions, that would be a real fear; they would be one judge tossing out a release form away from a business-ending lawsuit. But that didn't happen, instead they did it for years with no serious injuries and the Commissions adopted the modern Unified Rules of Mixed Martial Arts. That is why even though the UFC is facing a potential class action lawsuit from fighters, it isn't over injuries, it is over pay and contract conditions.
Did you consider the problem might be that your job sucks, and your workplace has an unhealthy water-cooler culture?
Find a geek job, your co-workers might instead work at work, and engage in sports and other healthy entertainments during their off-time. I know I'm way more likely to hear people talking about hiking or skiing or semi-pro roller derby (I am not even joking) than TV-sports. Trail running is so popular that the hiking trails are often congested these days.
If you think boxers make a lot of money, you should be advised; a day job they might be doing during most of their career is likely to be something like "retail clerk" or "bag boy." Think about that... they're making so little as professionals, that their "real job" is minimum wage. Most fighters fight because they love to do it. The average pay is way, way below median. And the percent of "professional" fighters making more than the median wage is probably less than 2%. It is very similar to painting, or music, in that regard. Most of the people doing it are making very little at it, or even losing money. But they love it. And they value the "little things" enough to do what they love.
Roller derby is violent and brutal, but look how much fun they're having. It is a popular sport... to engage in. Half the audience are players from the other teams, too. The local rugby leagues are the same; any spectators are friends or relatives of the players, or play on another team.
The problem with the people you spend time with isn't that they are interested in sports. It is that they're observing life pass by on a television. That may be average, but it isn't very nerdy. Nerds play harder.
You're mostly right. You're closer than he is, and thank you for taking the time.
However, what you may have missed is that the negative "jock culture" does exist, but it is associated with team sports, especially football. Wrestling, unless it is "professional" wrestling, you're competing by yourself even when there is also team scoring. So the natural culture is very different.
As far as special treatment, that is a real thing. No, not every student athlete gets special treatment. There are few schools where wrestling has the public interest level to cause the effect. But in many towns in America, HS football is the biggest social event in town. It is a major aspect of local cultural identity. And the varsity athletes definitely get special treatment; especially if the coach says they're important players. Few places have a cultural identity connected to the HS wrestling team, and few wrestling coaches would want to ask for special treatment, or teach the athletes to expect it.
In college it is only a little bit different; few schools, and probably not your "top engineering school," have wrestling as a money-maker. But football or basketball often bring in lots and lots of money in alumni donations. And if it is a walk-on sport, then of course there would be no special treatment. But recruited athletes in money-making sports absolutely get special treatment. At many Universities they have a whole special building where they can get 1 on 1 tutoring in any subject. Unlimited. Special luxury computer labs. Etc. And I'm only talking about the perks that would appeal to an academically-minded non-athlete. The local Uni cut wrestling a few years ago, but when they had the program they were in a basement under the swimming pool, and didn't have access to any of the special facilities.
Most teams it isn't really fund-raising of the type you describe, but rather a booster dinner where the parents each pay a little bit of money, and the richest 5% of the parents pay a lot more, conspicuously, in front of all the other parents, to bid on some fake item and support the team. Your point is spot-on, though; none of that money would have gone to academics, or art, or to the chess club.
When I was in HS, we actually did programming that the department could sell for real money, and we did have new computers, and a self-sustaining department budget. The same school stopped doing that a decade ago, because outsourcing killed the premise of cheap code. If the same kids that could write valuable code were asked to wash cars, they'd do such an awful job they wouldn't make enough money to buy a single netbook. At least, the ones I went to school with.
So, you despise a whole class of activity because some people pay for it. How, uhm, enlightened?
You do realize that you could love sports with the same premise; people can actually play the sports. You could love sports, and still hate paying to watch.
Grandpa, lets try again to find your pills, alright?
If by football you meant soccer, then that is true. If you meant American football, absolutely false, and not even a close one, assuming we're only measuring significant impacts that could cause a concussion.
Hockey, I don't believe it without seeing empirical impact data.
In an MMA fight, if you take a blow to the head that leaves you dazed for a few seconds, it is usually the end of the fight. In those other sports, everybody would stand in a circle around you for a minute, and if you appeared to have recovered, you'd be allowed to keep playing. The biggest risk to the brain is from repeated injury in the short term; the initial concussion causes swelling, and makes additional impacts cause more damage to the brain, progressively. In MMA the action continues until it is stopped, and if stopped due to injury, it is the end of the fight. So even though I agree there are more head impacts in MMA than soccer, I'm not convinced that soccer has less brain injury. Repeatedly heading the ball could easily cause a level of brain swelling highly unlikely in an MMA fight. High school soccer players who use their head to strike the ball (which is required if you want to play with skill) are known to have reduced concentration afterwards. Jumping to conclusions can damage the brain, if it influences which sport you engage in.
In MMA there is no count, the fight continues until the fighter is unable to defend themselves in the present tense. Actual "knockout" situations often happen where the ref is already calling it a KO before the fighter hits the ground. It is generally believed that this reduces brain injury, and that the "standing 8 count" in boxing allows recovery time that encourages additional injury and brain swelling. That is still disputed, though.
As far as the rules of boxing and the actual premise of the article (getting fans interested) it wouldn't help at all, because there are so many controversial knock-downs in boxing. Often the ref calls it a "slip" when it is a knockdown, or a knockdown when it is a slip. With a one count, every other fight would be ended by that particular controversy, so it would just make it more fake-y than it is now.
That is absolute hogwash. You might want to cite a source, because many of those fighters are still fighting, and if they had an existing known brain injury, they wouldn't be cleared to fight.
Presumably you just grabbed a list of fighters who received automatic post-fight suspensions because of (presumed) mild concussions. If you get knocked out during a fight, there is an automatic "injury suspension" given out by the fight commission. That is based on possibility of injury, not an actual medical diagnosis of brain injury. It is, however, still listed as due to "concussion."
Learn what the words mean, and mention your sources.
One time in fencing class we were trying out "saber" style, which mimics combat from horseback. I managed to parry my opponent's attack with enough force to cut the end off of his saber, including the protective plastic tip! We both made another lunge at each other (in saber style you're expected to attack recklessly, not take turns) before we noticed the equipment malfunction. I was lucky he didn't stab me in the heart, or (he wasn't that big, really) poke my eye out.
In all the weapons training I did, none of the fencing drew blood. None of the boken sparring drew blood. (it did leave some marks, to be sure) The one time I had a bloody injury was in amtgard, using swords with so much padding that it is safe for kids! What happened was, the duct tape on the outer wrapping had some sweat on it, and when it hit my knuckle, the tape stuck to my skin, and split open. I still have a scar, 25 years later.
A friend of mine got a serious bamboo sliver during kendo practice. Definitely drew blood; he had it surgically removed.
You should watch the movie Karate Kid, you might discover that while there are some barbarians in martial arts, (as there are some in all things) there is also a non-barbaric tradition of martial arts, and it generally empowers the defender more than the attacker, and is used to decrease violence, not increase it. Historically, when martial arts is intended to kill, weapons are used. When it is practiced without a weapon, it is almost always regarded as a means to enforce peace.
It is true that sometimes unskilled competitors get into a ring, and it can be a bit lame, and pointlessly violent. But that is very different than what the UFC most often is; an exposition of valuable martial arts techniques.
It is also true that if you were hit in the head like that, you'd probably die. But you'd probably die if you went off a ski jump, too. Actual athletes with trained bodies aren't taking the same risk. Their bodies are accustomed to the activity; their brains don't swell up after a single punch the way a person on the street's would. Regular light sparring, and the nervous system will acclimate.
Shaolin monks kick each other in the balls repeatedly, in order to strengthen their bodies in case they have to defend the temple. MMA is mild, and even timid, compared with many righteous examples of martial arts training.
True competitive barbarism reached its pinnacle with pistol duels. A good chance for both to die, skill or training would not save you, and (unlike sword dueling) there is not even any military benefit from the training.
I said it was hard to find a career-ending injury. And I was right. You found one in twenty five years of the sport.
Even when retirement is a synonym for "career ending injury"?
The vast majority of those injuries happen during training, and wouldn't have been career-ending if they happened in a fight because there isn't always a doctor on hand during training, but there is at the fight. At the fight the injury gets evaluated immediately, and the limb is properly immobilized in the locker room, and the fighter transported immediately to a surgical facility if needed. In training, first you wait to see if it gets better on its own, and if it is actually serious, you've damaged it more by waiting and using it.
Also, a lot of the "career ending" injuries are actually treatable, and the reason it is career-ending is because the fighter doesn't earn enough money fighting to warrant investing in the corrective surgery. The same fighter in the same medical situation would probably keep fighting if they're a fan favorite, unless they're at the end of their career and already made a lot of money.
Amusingly, your link doesn't even talk about fight-ending injury, it talks about a fighter getting old and losing his edge, and losing his ability to take a punch without getting knocked out, and having to retire. He didn't actually have a fight-ending injury. He is one of the record holders for most UFC fights, too, and it is a known thing that professional fighting causes wear on the body and that you can't compete forever. The same is also true of professional basketball, football, etc. MMA fighters have longer career prospects than football players, for example.
(Your link was.uk so I will note that my response is using American English sports terms)
Slashdot Mirror
The purpose isn't secret and never was. The objective is to allow political dissidents under repressive regimes a method of communicating politically online without getting in trouble by their governments. Hopefully this would lead to grass-roots "regime change" around the world.
That is called "politics," and altruism isn't the purpose, or the claimed purpose. The claimed purpose is that it is in the national interest of the United States for other countries to adopt similar concepts of democracy and free expression. That it is also believed to be good for the locals is nice, but not the objective.
Why did some people ever think it was about anything else? I'll bet the slashdot articles about Tor during the time period you signed up explained it just the same way I did; as a thing to enable political speech and encourage Democracy.
People are sure soft in the head to have just somehow decided it was for some other purpose, with no source document saying it was that other thing. Some guy on the internet says, "it is for privacy, you know, so you can hide from the gubermint." Vaguely true, yes, but not generally true. Which government, and for what purpose? That is the critical part. People who want to avoid the US government should probably avoid projects sponsored BY the US Government for the purpose of spreading American values. ;)
That's pretty derpy. The government prints the bills, but they don't "print money" except in places like Zimbabwe. I'll admit it is a popular theme in right-wing media, though. So perhaps you've just been overly propagandized.
It is the banks that "print money" in the sense you meant it, not the government.
http://www.bankofengland.co.uk... is the document that most of us read last year. It was a bit of a bombshell, mostly because it admits things already known but in the past officially denied. But the old public version of how it works still has the banks creating the money, not the government.
See also: http://moneymyths.org.uk/pdf/W...
They don't even need flaws, since it wasn't designed to offer the privacy people are wishing it provided. They simply need access to enough of the network, and they can see who is doing what.
The purpose is to facilitate political dissidents under repressive regimes, the design is based on the idea that the repressive regimes are somewhat isolated, and they'd never have the global access in order to figure out who is doing what. Cheap cameras and hard drives probably have tipped that balance, though, since a repressive regime can easily afford to record video in all cyber-cafes and store it indefinitely.
If I never see the word hivemind again, it will be too soon. Grow up.
The Green Brain by Frank Herbert is one of the great works of modern fiction. When you're old enough, you should read it. I'll warn you though, there is a hive mind involved.
You're just engaging in low-information thinking.
Tor wasn't created for "privacy," it was created to help political dissidents in authoritarian regimes to communicate with each other and the outside world without their government being able to identify and punish them. Which I guess is a type of privacy. But politics was the goal, not privacy; specifically, encouraging representative government in places where it is banned and discussion of it stifled.
I'm for privacy, but looking for it in the wrong places is your own fault. Just like, if you have contraband in your pocket that you want to keep private, and you accidentally drop it in front of a cop: that is your own fault, your privacy wasn't violated, you simply didn't defend it rigorously.
lol, good point. I'll meditate on the use cases.
Okay, this new different point is more true than the first one.
And yeah, the idea of pushing a button to take control while the car is in motion is... just insanely stupid, and would never make it out of testing.
That said, when it starts to the snow and the car pulls to the side of the road and turns on the emergency flashers, a lot of people are going to want that car to have a manual mode that they can use to take over driving. But no, they modes won't be mixed. The car will stop itself before allowing the human to take control.
The whole, "press a button to take over in an emergency" is just magical thinking.
Or, you don't understand the training that leads to success.
Your theory is, you know better than the Champion how to train for his or her sport.
My theory is, I'm just stating facts about where the injuries happen. My assumption is that the trainers have made these calculations according to professional formulas.
Chinese have different values, but "Capitalism" might not mean what you think it means. If you read Adam Smith, you might find that Capitalism means the Government regulating business to ensure a level playing field, which causes Capital to rule because all a person needs to start a business and compete is the capital. Without those Government controls, existing business will conspire to keep out or at least disadvantage newcomers, and politics and connections will be required, not just capital. The thing that modern Westerners often push as "Capitalism" is exactly what existed when Adam Smith wrote his book; not the thing actually described.
Similarly, China doesn't have "Communism," or "Socialism" either. Modern China has Capitalism, along with a single party political system. China doesn't have the sort of central economic control that the Soviet Union had. Instead, the Government controls industry by investing in a large number of the successful businesses. For example, many of the technology fabrication companies are about 25% government owned. So they use Capital and their partial ownership in order to influence business. And if I go to China and meet a farmer with a big idea who wants to start a business, and I invest in it so that he has the capital, he can start that business and compete.
Capitalism has nothing to do with Democracy. In many ways China is more capitalist than the US. If a Chinese business person goes to a village, buys all the bananas and creates an artificial shortage, and then raises the price 300%, that is punishable by death. Why? Because he's creating an illegal monopoly, and using it to ruin the market. Leveraging existing business to keep everybody else out and maintain a monopoly is the most anti-Capitalist thing you can do. China is one of the few places with clear bans on almost any anti-competitive practice. (Disclaimer: I'm only measuring the Chinese economy internally; foreigners like me don't have the same market access that Chinese people do. Just ask any US car company)
The words are so misused, they don't usually have much meaning. Chinese people value national unity more than others. Some people just assert that means they're repeating propaganda; but in reality they threw out almost everything Mao taught. They don't have political freedom, but it also isn't what most people want. Chinese people claim to actually want good governance, not western political theory. And the current propaganda seems to mirror the cultural norms. If you use real popular ideas and phrases as your propaganda, it is natural for people then to complain mostly about if you're actually following it. It is a totally different situation than when propaganda is used to try to manipulate views, or frighten enemies. The whole concept that most westerns have of propaganda is absurdist anyway when it is applied outside the context of elections. Their government has no reason to push propaganda that differs from cultural norms; their goal is to maintain the status quo, they're not trying to indoctrinate anybody.
What would aliens care about the form of government used on another planet?
I've seen humans kill a hen because she was mismanaging the yard. A rooster can meet his doom by giving too many political speeches near the humans, too.
The expression is, "for Fuck's sake."
It is already a "foul." That is how "clean" the sport is. ;)
One thing that would make me even more interested in combat sports than I am already: ban commenters from using chess analogies. (I say that as a successful amateur chess combatant)
Nothing makes a person (in any non-chess event) look stupider than comparing things to chess as an attempt at an accessible metaphor. Chess is not an accessible metaphor; nobody who needs an accessible metaphor would even understand an actual relevant chess example. And modern chess is highly pragmatic, there are basically no portable generalities to apply. It is entirely abstract and arbitrary.
I doubt it. With the right promotion you should be able to control who the audience wants to win. And since you've averaged it down to a mob decision, they'll pick "their guy" most of the time, regardless of the fight stats. I predict an almost identical percent of "bad" decisions to the current system.
This is hard, I know, because "tenses." But lets try.
Boxing is over [30+career length] years old. Therefore, if the result 30 years after the end of a fighters career was "vegetable" followed by "suing a bunch of people including government employees," then that would already have happened.
Your ignorance of both lawsuits and fighting just blares loudly through that. If you knew about lawsuits and boxing, even just in passing as a person who reads news articles about those things, then you'd know that the referee is always an employee of the State fighting commission that is overseeing the bout. You even say "Government," which is funny. You might be interested to know that there is blanket prohibition against suing the government; you can only sue the government for things that the government has established laws allowing you to sue over. So even if you can prove that it is the fault of the State Boxing Commission that you were allowed to make poor life choices, and that those choices led to disabling injury, you still can't sue them. You can't even recover medical expenses, unless there is some law explicitly allowing you to. For example, if you accused the State Boxing Commission of violating your civil rights, you could probably force them to change a rule. But you don't have a civil right that requires the government to nanny you through adulthood. It would have to be a real case, like if boxing refs allowed boxers of one race to get punched even after they were knocked out. That is what a real lawsuit would look like. Brain injury, there is no civil right to not get injured. People get injured every day.
You can't sue your opponent, or the promoter, because it was a legal activity regulated by the State Boxing Commission, so even if you can prove that you were in fact harmed, you can't prove that anybody else was being grossly negligent. Following regulations established by the relevant governing agency proves that they were attempting to be responsible, and the State has examined the conditions of the fight and signed off on it before hand. So there is no way you're going to sue them later. Even if you can prove they were partially responsible for your condition, that does not automatically mean they are financially liable for it.
But lets say none of that was true, and you actually could sue. Boxing would have been sued out of existence... before your parents were born. Because that is how long the current rules have been in place. So when your parents were children, it was already known; old boxers are often a bit slow; but they're not vegetables.
The scenario where there would be lawsuits would be if it wasn't regulated, but it wasn't banned, either. Then there are lots of people that you might sue, maybe even including the ref, because he would just be some guy the promoter hired, and not an employee of the State Boxing Commission. The UFC started out that way; if not for regulation by the State commissions, that would be a real fear; they would be one judge tossing out a release form away from a business-ending lawsuit. But that didn't happen, instead they did it for years with no serious injuries and the Commissions adopted the modern Unified Rules of Mixed Martial Arts. That is why even though the UFC is facing a potential class action lawsuit from fighters, it isn't over injuries, it is over pay and contract conditions.
Now, eat your vegetables, Sonny.
Did you consider the problem might be that your job sucks, and your workplace has an unhealthy water-cooler culture?
Find a geek job, your co-workers might instead work at work, and engage in sports and other healthy entertainments during their off-time. I know I'm way more likely to hear people talking about hiking or skiing or semi-pro roller derby (I am not even joking) than TV-sports. Trail running is so popular that the hiking trails are often congested these days.
If you think boxers make a lot of money, you should be advised; a day job they might be doing during most of their career is likely to be something like "retail clerk" or "bag boy." Think about that... they're making so little as professionals, that their "real job" is minimum wage. Most fighters fight because they love to do it. The average pay is way, way below median. And the percent of "professional" fighters making more than the median wage is probably less than 2%. It is very similar to painting, or music, in that regard. Most of the people doing it are making very little at it, or even losing money. But they love it. And they value the "little things" enough to do what they love.
Roller derby is violent and brutal, but look how much fun they're having. It is a popular sport... to engage in. Half the audience are players from the other teams, too. The local rugby leagues are the same; any spectators are friends or relatives of the players, or play on another team.
The problem with the people you spend time with isn't that they are interested in sports. It is that they're observing life pass by on a television. That may be average, but it isn't very nerdy. Nerds play harder.
You're mostly right. You're closer than he is, and thank you for taking the time.
However, what you may have missed is that the negative "jock culture" does exist, but it is associated with team sports, especially football. Wrestling, unless it is "professional" wrestling, you're competing by yourself even when there is also team scoring. So the natural culture is very different.
As far as special treatment, that is a real thing. No, not every student athlete gets special treatment. There are few schools where wrestling has the public interest level to cause the effect. But in many towns in America, HS football is the biggest social event in town. It is a major aspect of local cultural identity. And the varsity athletes definitely get special treatment; especially if the coach says they're important players. Few places have a cultural identity connected to the HS wrestling team, and few wrestling coaches would want to ask for special treatment, or teach the athletes to expect it.
In college it is only a little bit different; few schools, and probably not your "top engineering school," have wrestling as a money-maker. But football or basketball often bring in lots and lots of money in alumni donations. And if it is a walk-on sport, then of course there would be no special treatment. But recruited athletes in money-making sports absolutely get special treatment. At many Universities they have a whole special building where they can get 1 on 1 tutoring in any subject. Unlimited. Special luxury computer labs. Etc. And I'm only talking about the perks that would appeal to an academically-minded non-athlete. The local Uni cut wrestling a few years ago, but when they had the program they were in a basement under the swimming pool, and didn't have access to any of the special facilities.
Most teams it isn't really fund-raising of the type you describe, but rather a booster dinner where the parents each pay a little bit of money, and the richest 5% of the parents pay a lot more, conspicuously, in front of all the other parents, to bid on some fake item and support the team. Your point is spot-on, though; none of that money would have gone to academics, or art, or to the chess club.
When I was in HS, we actually did programming that the department could sell for real money, and we did have new computers, and a self-sustaining department budget. The same school stopped doing that a decade ago, because outsourcing killed the premise of cheap code. If the same kids that could write valuable code were asked to wash cars, they'd do such an awful job they wouldn't make enough money to buy a single netbook. At least, the ones I went to school with.
Just because they're full of themselves, doesn't make it highbrow.
So, you despise a whole class of activity because some people pay for it. How, uhm, enlightened?
You do realize that you could love sports with the same premise; people can actually play the sports. You could love sports, and still hate paying to watch.
Grandpa, lets try again to find your pills, alright?
If by football you meant soccer, then that is true. If you meant American football, absolutely false, and not even a close one, assuming we're only measuring significant impacts that could cause a concussion.
Hockey, I don't believe it without seeing empirical impact data.
In an MMA fight, if you take a blow to the head that leaves you dazed for a few seconds, it is usually the end of the fight. In those other sports, everybody would stand in a circle around you for a minute, and if you appeared to have recovered, you'd be allowed to keep playing. The biggest risk to the brain is from repeated injury in the short term; the initial concussion causes swelling, and makes additional impacts cause more damage to the brain, progressively. In MMA the action continues until it is stopped, and if stopped due to injury, it is the end of the fight. So even though I agree there are more head impacts in MMA than soccer, I'm not convinced that soccer has less brain injury. Repeatedly heading the ball could easily cause a level of brain swelling highly unlikely in an MMA fight. High school soccer players who use their head to strike the ball (which is required if you want to play with skill) are known to have reduced concentration afterwards. Jumping to conclusions can damage the brain, if it influences which sport you engage in.
In MMA there is no count, the fight continues until the fighter is unable to defend themselves in the present tense. Actual "knockout" situations often happen where the ref is already calling it a KO before the fighter hits the ground. It is generally believed that this reduces brain injury, and that the "standing 8 count" in boxing allows recovery time that encourages additional injury and brain swelling. That is still disputed, though.
As far as the rules of boxing and the actual premise of the article (getting fans interested) it wouldn't help at all, because there are so many controversial knock-downs in boxing. Often the ref calls it a "slip" when it is a knockdown, or a knockdown when it is a slip. With a one count, every other fight would be ended by that particular controversy, so it would just make it more fake-y than it is now.
That is absolute hogwash. You might want to cite a source, because many of those fighters are still fighting, and if they had an existing known brain injury, they wouldn't be cleared to fight.
Presumably you just grabbed a list of fighters who received automatic post-fight suspensions because of (presumed) mild concussions. If you get knocked out during a fight, there is an automatic "injury suspension" given out by the fight commission. That is based on possibility of injury, not an actual medical diagnosis of brain injury. It is, however, still listed as due to "concussion."
Learn what the words mean, and mention your sources.
One time in fencing class we were trying out "saber" style, which mimics combat from horseback. I managed to parry my opponent's attack with enough force to cut the end off of his saber, including the protective plastic tip! We both made another lunge at each other (in saber style you're expected to attack recklessly, not take turns) before we noticed the equipment malfunction. I was lucky he didn't stab me in the heart, or (he wasn't that big, really) poke my eye out.
In all the weapons training I did, none of the fencing drew blood. None of the boken sparring drew blood. (it did leave some marks, to be sure) The one time I had a bloody injury was in amtgard, using swords with so much padding that it is safe for kids! What happened was, the duct tape on the outer wrapping had some sweat on it, and when it hit my knuckle, the tape stuck to my skin, and split open. I still have a scar, 25 years later.
A friend of mine got a serious bamboo sliver during kendo practice. Definitely drew blood; he had it surgically removed.
You should watch the movie Karate Kid, you might discover that while there are some barbarians in martial arts, (as there are some in all things) there is also a non-barbaric tradition of martial arts, and it generally empowers the defender more than the attacker, and is used to decrease violence, not increase it. Historically, when martial arts is intended to kill, weapons are used. When it is practiced without a weapon, it is almost always regarded as a means to enforce peace.
It is true that sometimes unskilled competitors get into a ring, and it can be a bit lame, and pointlessly violent. But that is very different than what the UFC most often is; an exposition of valuable martial arts techniques.
It is also true that if you were hit in the head like that, you'd probably die. But you'd probably die if you went off a ski jump, too. Actual athletes with trained bodies aren't taking the same risk. Their bodies are accustomed to the activity; their brains don't swell up after a single punch the way a person on the street's would. Regular light sparring, and the nervous system will acclimate.
Shaolin monks kick each other in the balls repeatedly, in order to strengthen their bodies in case they have to defend the temple. MMA is mild, and even timid, compared with many righteous examples of martial arts training.
True competitive barbarism reached its pinnacle with pistol duels. A good chance for both to die, skill or training would not save you, and (unlike sword dueling) there is not even any military benefit from the training.
Even when retirement is a synonym for "career ending injury"?
The vast majority of those injuries happen during training, and wouldn't have been career-ending if they happened in a fight because there isn't always a doctor on hand during training, but there is at the fight. At the fight the injury gets evaluated immediately, and the limb is properly immobilized in the locker room, and the fighter transported immediately to a surgical facility if needed. In training, first you wait to see if it gets better on its own, and if it is actually serious, you've damaged it more by waiting and using it.
Also, a lot of the "career ending" injuries are actually treatable, and the reason it is career-ending is because the fighter doesn't earn enough money fighting to warrant investing in the corrective surgery. The same fighter in the same medical situation would probably keep fighting if they're a fan favorite, unless they're at the end of their career and already made a lot of money.
Amusingly, your link doesn't even talk about fight-ending injury, it talks about a fighter getting old and losing his edge, and losing his ability to take a punch without getting knocked out, and having to retire. He didn't actually have a fight-ending injury. He is one of the record holders for most UFC fights, too, and it is a known thing that professional fighting causes wear on the body and that you can't compete forever. The same is also true of professional basketball, football, etc. MMA fighters have longer career prospects than football players, for example.
(Your link was .uk so I will note that my response is using American English sports terms)