The formula for success seems to be either: send a likeable person with a catchy song. Sam Ryder succeed on both fronts. Olly Alexander succeeds on neither.Originally Posted by Waffdon
OR
Get invaded.
The formula for success seems to be either: send a likeable person with a catchy song. Sam Ryder succeed on both fronts. Olly Alexander succeeds on neither.
OR
Get invaded.
Wasn't the argument about us coming second that at the time we were Ukraine's biggest European ally?
Which falls flat on it's arse when you realise we did so well because the juries lapped it up (they weren't keen on Ukraine) because they aren't as politically swayed as the general mongos.
Plus the general mongos only had us in 5th in the televoting.
Had this stuck in my head since Saturday, along with a strange new found desire to visit Yerevan.
The French song is quality
Coincidentally the song and singers name backwards means "visit Yerevan" in Armenian.
It sounds like what you'd have to listen to for hours on end in the backing music if they became playable on Civ 6/7/8 or whatever they're up to now.
Patiently waiting for 7.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/athletic...s/cg39x2jg5pgo
In a similar vein I was struck by the conclusion to this article on what I find to be an interesting subject, which (despite having no evidence to support) decided to settle on it being a self-fulfilling prophecy based on harmful assumptions as to why black sprinters are so much better than white ones.
That's settled that then.But the belief remains strong and perception is powerful - it can make or break champions.
No way these guys are accepting that sort of thing, once you accept one racial explanation then a whole can of worms is opened for others and the next thing you know you're strapping on your armband in the green room at Nuremberg. Or so they think.
I mean quite fucking obviously people of west African heritage sprint faster on average, and you know what? I bet they really have bigger dicks as well.
There's some astonishing avoiding of actual facts in there to maintain that position too. While they do mention the last white sprinter to win the 100m was back in 1980, they then completely avoid a stat far more telling than that - 189 men in history have run under 10 seconds and only two of them were white, 1.1%. I can't easily get the numbers but I guarantee that % only decreases when you count multiple sub-10 second times from the same athlete, but there they are, pointing to Richard Kilty (and his 60m World gold medal in 2014 no less) as some sort of counter-argument to the obvious conclusion.
They make a fair point that science can't yet prove why this is the case, but there's far too much in that article that suggests it's anything other than genetic make up, completely at odds with the numbers that strongly suggest it absolutely is.
Not that I necessarily disagree with you, but does that mean the British have some unique genetic disposition towards snooker aptitude also as yet undetected by science?
That article seems to be arguing against some dumb strawman argument of "all blacks are good sprinters" which anyone with half a brain knows it is not true. Yet if you trace where most top sprinters and most top distance runners come from, you can see that there is some very strong correlation with specific locations/lineages.
I particularly like this quote:
The man wrote a whole book on the topic and came away with the conclusion that genes play a huge role in athletic ability. Yet they choose one quote that makes it seem like he thinks it is all nonsense. The book is worth reading, by the way."All that ACTN3 can tell us, it seems, is who will not be competing in the [Olympic] 100m final," wrote David Epstein, in his book The Sports Gene.
"And it is not even doing a very specific job of that, given that it is only ruling out about one billion of the seven billion people on earth."
Last edited by Pepe; 14-05-2024 at 01:32 PM.
How many people ever got to play snooker across the world compared to how many people ever tried to run fast across the world?
In certain parts of the Midlands, the only way to escape violent marauding gangs is to make a 35 break and then leave them in a tricky spot behind the yellow.
That one is easy, bar China (who should really be better by now) no one plays it properly outside of England. And actually, you can see the decline in quality within these shores since the number of people with opportunities to play were vastly reduced post the smoking ban.
Isn't it much the same as sprinting though, an elite performance pathway yields world class results with the right input.
I guess the assumption is that everyone gets the chance to run fast regardless of background or status, but doesn't that equally miss the point that it is the bit that gets you to the last few percent that makes the difference? And is there more evidence of that being true for West African genetics in sprinting than it is for British Isles heritage in snooker? And yet one of those is patently absurd.
White Americans (for example) have the same exact access to the elite performance pathway that yields world class results, do they not?
I'm not sure I fully understand this post, so apologies in advance if I'm not answering your point(s), but.... The whole World runs the 100m, until China came along only Britain properly played snooker, which is the reason why they're comfortably the best. The equivalent in sprinting would be if everyone in Jamaica ran, but only three (white) people in England did it and in such a case there'd be absolutely no mystery over the disparity in times.
As it is, we're actively trying to be good at sprinting and I dare say we pump a shit load more money into it than Jamaica do, yet we're losing by about 6-10 metres (EDIT: to correct the maths fail). And again, our black sprinters absolutely shit all over our white ones.
Last edited by Yevrah; 15-05-2024 at 02:03 PM.
In fact and on that last point, one of my best mates was obscenely good at sprinting as a kid. Would rock up for sports day in his Linford Christie vest and be laughed at until he ran, at which point he'd win by well over a second.
He was pretty good at county level and I think ran somewhere around the 11 second mark as a (professionally timed) PB at his running club. The reason he gave it up? When the age groups/scope of competition changed he found himself up against runners from London and he was nowhere near them. He is, needless to say, white.
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