What the hell is wrong with humans?

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So, I was listening to the radio, right, and apparently, as it happens, despite it being a feature about finances in sports... yep, all that followed is shouting. This is the species I'm trying to understand?! I might as well bash my head on a door, it will surely reveal as much valuable info as a BBC report on money in sport which, it appears, is all about who screams the loudest... wtf.

Ha? I don't understand. Are you sure you're in the right state of mind?

He sounds in his right mind.

Maybe he just witnessed people on the BBC radio segment shouting instead of debating in a civil way and now he is questioning humanity?

That seems reasonable to me.

So...you actually understand what the OP is talking about?

Maybe you can explain to the rest of us.

BBC radio tends to be rather shouty and sensational when it comes to sport announcements. Plenty of bizarrely enthusiastic debate and angry yelling over each other.

I've never really understood it either, but some people are just really into sports.

he is decrying the lack of civility in public.

This wasn't a debate, although those have annoying aspects too... but, regardless of what the topic is about, if it involves sports, somehow, this organization (and I suspect many others...) is obsessed with including nonsensical commentary from the middle of some match or another, which inevitably has those shouting idiots. It's, like, one can't just be interested in knowing about the finances, or other aspects, of sports, without also getting literally the only profession who is required to shout (how their throats cope I've no idea, I usually can't stop coughing when I even dare to talk for a bit, in the rare occasions I have one person to talk to...) - why the hell, though, they think they need to include match commentaries in the middle of "this is why this organization is going bankrupt" is beyond me (and destroys my ears, of course, but it's not like the BBC ever goddamn cared about people with noise sensitivities or not having non-sequiturs for that matter... and, needless to say, I find it very difficult to understand any of the reasonable discourse amid all the shouting...)

You can't debate with football hooligans.

You use your vocal fry or your false vocal cords instead of your vocal cords and you're fine.

I already did? See above.

The OP is doing what auntblabby has since said in this thread since my post - decrying a lack of civility in public discussion.

He is now despairing at humanity in general.

Nothing more complicated than that.

I've certainly noticed that most people seem unable or unwilling to engage in co-operative debate. Most of them would rather try to shout the other party down or otherwise "win" the discussion. It's usually worse when it's a thorny subject such as religion or politics, and I suppose sport can also get thorny among those who think there's something important about it. But I wouldn't think anybody who behaves like that would convince anybody else of their opinion. Certainly the moment somebody starts presenting their case aggressively and unfairly like that, I tend to switch off.

So from my perspective there is something wrong with many humans. I don't know why. Maybe sport attracts that kind of problem because it attracts competitive people? But sport isn't the only subject that suffers from it. I guess courtesy just isn't valued by everybody. Maybe it's more of a problem on the media and online than it is in real life, and it's a mistake to judge the human race by looking at that kind of spectacle.

Step 1: The OP listens to what he thinks is going to be a constructive discussion about the topic "finances in sports"

Step 2: Instead of hearing this constructive discussion, he hears instead a shouting match of sorts.

Step 3: He is in a reflective, existentialist mindset and laments about understanding this 'species', the human species.

Step 4: He complains about this situation, and in his frustration, mentions how he feels he wants to bash his head on a door.

Hmmm...

I guess they do sports differently on British TV than here.

Here sportcasters are allowed to be light and jocular and even biased in way that they dont allow the rest of the news crew to be. But they dont mimic the crowds in the stadiums and yell all of the time. And at live events they announcers can get excited. Ofen its one real newscaster and couple of retired jocks. Often they all act like drunken morons who cant get anything right in their commentary. Not that I am an expert since I rarely watch sports on TV, but...American sportcasters dont act like soccer hooligans...at least.

In the US...this is about as bad it gets


https://youtu.be/KKNnXZqQom8

Usually, I'm not even sure what they say since they always shout it out, but yeah, it's at a much higher volume than that... and always what the news broadcasts, randomly, as if the one thing in the world that people tuning in want, in all of eternity, is some guy shouting his head off from two days ago... I got so irritated I threw my headphones in anger, and once I did break them... it's just, so nonsensical; and, it's one thing to have a single segment where they shout to their heart's content, or something, but this feature (which I bizarrely am still interested in, since I usually listen to financial stuff) has the shouting interspersed with the calm talk. So, for a noise-sensitive person, you can imagine, it's like trying to navigate a minefield...

Oh, sports. i can imagine that. Energetic critics yell and scream, bringing in football hooligans or the like, and making the scene noisy enough for them to be comfortable.

It's only 150 pages but it's a page-turner with a lot of valuable thoughts connecting what we are at root to what we are 'now' as we're wrapped in confusion about our own nature (and ideas like blank-slatism still bounce around as valid):




Also check into Rene Girard's theory of memetic desire.

To the question of why we have idiots who seem to lack self-control on the news - excitement makes more advertising dollars than truth, fact-finding, or measured discussion (measured discussion dials people's sexual arousal down to zero ergo it's bad where as people fighting or 'tribe against tribe' is where all of the excitement and entertainment is). Then if it makes money it's not a matter of whether it's right or wrong, it's whether they can legally get away with it or where whatever amount of memetic buzz they create is more lucrative than the fines or slaps on the wrist they get. It's news using Twitter and TikTok's kind of algorithm-hacking. It's a market where an 'aught' and an 'is' are the same thing.