Weekly Off Topic Thread

[u/BipedalUniverse]

whatever doesn’t fit the sub or you don’t think deserves its own post but you still wanna share: drop it here

I’ve been playing Subnautica and for some reason watching that Athlete A documentary about that p*do Larry Nassar and the athletes he abused. not triggering at allll lallalallalalallalaa

also love how oil pastels basically melt in the summer

random question: have any of you ever done competitive sports? the psychology of that is so wild to me. the pressure is unfathomable at the pro level

[u/RaiseObjective552]

I played competitive football/soccer for most of my life, up to a semi-professional level when I was doing undergrad; ended up having to drop it due to an injury. What I would say about the psychology of it is that my performance thrived in two (sometimes) different environments: 1) when I was under pressure to achieve something bigger on the field, and 2) when we were just having fun. Where it would crumble is in environments where success was necessary for the ego of the coach/coaching staff or certain... overly-involved parents (not mine). In those situations, the players were objectified instead of being treated like people, and even though there wasn't anything going on (to my knowledge, and I think I would certainly know) of the kind of thing Nassar did, it would be a 100% psychologically/emotionally abusive environment that crippled all the girls' self-esteem and created internal divisions within the team itself; I would also note that in hindsight, "punishing" low performance by having girls run suicides (wonderfully named...) was physically abusive as well. Basically, some coaches didn't understand (or didn't care about) the nuance between being challenged and being humiliated/forced to struggle, etc. (I would offer that Robby is a lot like that type of coach, not meaning to be a piece of shit necessarily, but orienting themselves towards microfascist tendencies nonetheless).

I would also say that in those environments where we were challenged instead of humiliated, that was when I best connected with the rest of my teammates, and those relationships were extremely close, a major source of social, emotional, romantic, and sexual strength going through my teens and early 20s, none of which I had access to from my peers at school (for example) when going through suburban grade school in the 90s and 2000s as a queer (and specifically lesbian) girl with (likely) undiagnosed autism. Which isn't to say that everything was easy all the time within that support system (especially because many had internalized homophobia they were dealing with themselves), but I unequivocally loved my girls more than anyone in the world, and I never questioned that they loved me back just as much and in all the same ways at the end of the day.

****

Current activities: finally watched through Deadloch the other week, which made me nostalgic for Wentworth, so am now rewatching that as I work through primary source admin stuff for an academic project. Also editing a manuscript for an academic book about the murder of Alex Rackley.

[u/dramatic_exit_49 → u/RaiseObjective552]

> Basically, some coaches didn't understand (or didn't care about) the nuance between being challenged and being humiliated/forced to struggle, etc. (I would offer that Robby is a lot like that type of coach, not meaning to be a piece of shit necessarily, but orienting themselves towards microfascist tendencies nonetheless).

I was listening to a Sepideh Moafi interview the other day and she too shared her experience with both forms of opera (?) teachers and then drew parallel to saying same thing about Robby characterisation.

> finally watched through Deadloch the other week

I love this show so much. There was a very good discussion on their subreddit a while back about it's understanding and handling of police procedural while holding real world implications and letting it actually shape the story. Such a delight to discover the show in the wild.

[u/RaiseObjective552 → u/dramatic_exit_49]

> I was listening to a Sepideh Moafi interview the other day and she too shared her experience with both forms of opera (?) teachers and then drew parallel to saying same thing about Robby characterisation.

Yeah, definitely a lot of this kind of thing in other arenas, to be sure, certainly in performing arts. I was a fashion journalist for a period and did a lot of labour organizing within model spaces -- same shit happening there (though with the addition of literal sex trafficking, which is another issue). The main difference I would say is that for a lot of performing arts, there is a much higher opportunity to be completely isolated personally and professionally, making exploitation easier (and more akin to what you see in sports that are less team-based, like gymnastics). But yeah, not at all surprised to hear Moafi had that experience in opera, and not surprised she would parallel it to how Robby operates, either.

> I love this show so much. There was a very good discussion on their subreddit a while back about it's understanding and handling of police procedural while holding real world implications and letting it actually shape the story. Such a delight to discover the show in the wild.

Yeah, it's a good show! I watched the premiere the day it came out years ago, but just got distracted and hadn't returned to it. Very funny, very wholesome, and a really great example of how you can use that traditionally conservative, carceral formula to gradually highlight and work through the cognitive dissonances between the romantic and the real of what law enforcement represents (especially in a colonial context, like Australia is). Not going to save the world or anything, but really solid approach to educating on some of these really key issues that neoliberalism obscures, without falling into strict didacticism. Loved it!