Replies

The very idea of losing used to be hateful to all real Americans (Patton at least in the movie), now just get paid and go shopping. That is more myth than true - Americans - judging by Olympic results - have only dominated after WW2 - before that the USA always did OK but we were not the world champs or the standard or anything like that. Jesse Owens was not a big deal not because he was black and defeated the then Nazi Germans (something that was played up later) but that he was an underdog American who won. I do know Americans don't do history well - organized sports are a young thing - remember prize boxing was illegal until maybe the late 1920s and early 30s. The first modern Olympics were only held in the later half of the 1800s and only came into their own in the early 1900s. The modern-modern Olympics (my phrase for it) where atheletes could actually earn sponsorship probably started in 1984 - 1988 and became a sneaker and sports apparel sponsored business in the 1990s. International baseball is still in its infancy. So don't get all bent out of shape about American not domionating a sport - we have not been around long enough in world competitions to claim dominance in many sports.

Its one thing not to dominate sports in general and quite another to not dominate our own sports. Losing in anything has been hateful to Americans my whole life. When NY Giants play the Dallas Cowboys the fans of both teams want to win badly. We have always loved our local sports teams with a passion and our local sports teams used to hate the opponent (now so much money is involved athletes tend to see each other as business associates).

Americans my whole life wanted to beat the Soviets in the Olympics as they were our arch enemy. We relished in defeating them. We didn't always win but the passion to win and the desire to win and the hatred of losing was always there, in everything.

The problem I have is that we elevate these pro basketball players to god-like levels. In America we have pounded in the head of everyone that basketball is a black mans sport (as is boxing) and that their athletic prowess is superior to everyone else's, and for the most part most people believe that. Now we have Europeans and Argentinians beating us in what was supposed to be our sport dominated by the worlds best athletes.

Just because we lose doesn't mean the idea of losing isn't hateful. It may not be to Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton but for most Americans it is.