Quotes & Sayings About Spectator Sports

I got out of that immediately was that now, all of a sudden, rock music had become a spectator sport, that corporate labels and their bands were the new establishment, and punk was there to fight them the way the activist hippies must have fought what the establishment must have been ten years before. And it was interesting to see the reactions in different parts of the country. — Jello Biafra

Now tell me this. What would you consider the greatest spectator sport in the country today? Would you say it was baseball, basketball, football? ... It's politics. That's right, politics. Millions and millions of people following it every day in the newspapers, over the TV and the radio. Now mind you, they wouldn't get mixed up in this themselves for all the tea in China, but they know the names and numbers of all the players. And what they can't tell the coaches about strategy. Oh, you should see some of the letters I get. — Frank Nugent

Producing Bob Dylan was pretty much a spectator sport. — Al Kooper

I believe marriage is a spectator sport. — Elizabeth McCracken

Saving civilization is not a spectator sport. — Lester R. Brown

Morality is not a spectator sport. — Thomas Lickona

War, we have come to believe, is a spectator sport. The military and the press have turned war into a vast video arcade game. Its very essence-death-is hidden from public view. — Chris Hedges

The only time I got the absolute most insanely nervous in my life was at the Olympic trials, because archery is a horrible spectator sport. Nobody goes and watches an archery tournament. Because the targets are three-quarters of a football field away. Who can tell who's winning? You can't even see your own target from where you are. — Geena Davis

Life is too precious to be a spectator sport. We are no longer merely fans, rooting for the winning team. We are the team. We are the grown-ups. Whatever you believe is true, now is the time to give your respectful, inquisitive, and compassionate self to it. — Vicki Robin

There is only one emotion that I know of which has absolutely no place in spectator sport and death to it - laughter. — Rene Maheu

My favourite spectator sport is watching people who should know better searching for something (and often claiming to find it) where it never could be. Women claiming to find feminism in Islam is a good one. — Julie Burchill

Environmentali sm isn't a spectator sport. You actually have to stand up and demand that we be vigilant in protecting our air and water. — Lisa P. Jackson

In one respect, it's easier to open a restaurant in New York because you get more media attention than anywhere else. Almost everyone will try a new place once, irrespective of the reviews, because it's a spectator sport. — Danny Meyer

Life is not a spectator sport. If you're going to spend your whole life in the grandstand just watching what goes on, in my opinion you're wasting your life. — Jackie Robinson

Life is not a spectator sport. — Jackie Robinson

In no other sport must the spectator move. — John Updike

For the amoral herd that fears boredom above all else, everything becomes entertainment. Sex and sport, politics and the arts are transformed into entertainment ... Nothing is immune from the demand that boredom be relieved (but without personal involvement, for mass society is a spectator society). — Merold Westphal

Sex in the nineties is boring. The problem is that it has gone from an active act to a spectator sport. We watch people make love on television and in films. We call 900 numbers to hear what someone would do to us if they weren't sitting in a boiler room of other dirty talkers reading from a prepared script. — Erma Bombeck

I think the government should be spying on all Arabs, engaging in torture as a televised spectator sport, dropping daisy cutters wantonly throughout the Middle East and sending liberals to Guantanamo. — Ann Coulter

Curiosity, easily frightened, takes refuge in puzzles, murder mysteries, and spectator sports. — Mason Cooley

You keep meaning to cultivate an expertise in spectator sport. More and more you realize that sports trivia is crucial to male camaraderie. You keenly feel your ignorance. You are locked out of the largest fraternity in the country. — Jay McInerney

You
can see all of this online. But that's cheating. No computer program
can compare to the physical experience. It's like learning how to
play a virtual sports game. You're not really playing anything,
against anyone. You're just a spectator. People are becoming
spectators of their own lives instead of living them. But the best part
is getting in the game. That's when it's all worth it. — Katie Kacvinsky

Whatever you do to recover from a loss, people will be critical because they believe that the only way to recover is their way. And you will even run into some people who should be run into by rhinos because they actually don't want to see you get over your tragedy at all; grief is a spectator sport for them. — Joan Rivers

Good spectator sports share certain fundamentals. Their competitors battle head-to-head. Their winners are determined objectively: fastest runner, most points. They are refereed, not judged. — Alex Berenson

Unlike my esteemed colleague Garry Kasparov, I don't restrict the strength of opposition to Elo <2000, as fly-swatting makes poor spectator sport. (on simultaneous exhibitions) — Nigel Short

I do feel for me that cinema has somehow ceased to be a spectator sport. I get tremendous excitement out of making it rather than watching it. — Peter Greenaway

Chess will always be in the doldrums as a spectator sport while a draw is given equal mathematical value as a decisive result. — Michael Basman

Democracy is not a spectator sport. It is a difficult, hard, full-contact, participatory endeavor. — Cory Booker

You cannot say, 'Go! Go! Rah! Rah! Good move!' People want some emotion. Chess is an art and not a spectator sport. — Garry Kasparov

Why did God make tigers so good at catching prey, and at the same time make prey so good at getting away from tigers? You'd think that if God wanted one thing or the other to happen he'd have engineered it rather better. Maybe he enjoyed the spectator sport? — Richard Dawkins

Perhaps future space probes will be plastered in commercial logos, just as Formula One cars are now. Perhaps Robot Wars in space will be a lucrative spectator sport. If humans venture back to the moon, and even beyond, they may carry commercial insignia rather than national flags. — Martin Rees

Politics, life, and business are not spectator sports. You have to get involved to get ahead. Most importantly, when you reach that level of success, keep the door open and the ladder down for others to follow. — Ron Brown

We are making politics a spectator sport in which our only duty is to vote somebody into office and then retire to the grandstands. — David Gergen

In life, be a participant, not a spectator. — Lou Holtz

The American people are sheep. They're comfortable, rich, working. It's like the Romans, they're happy with bread and their spectator sports. The Super Bowl means more to them than any right. — Jack Kevorkian

People tell me, "I'm glad you said that." But this is not a spectator sport. This is an activity that requires daily moral awakening as well as a commitment that leads to real change. — Bill Bradley

The stakes ... are too high for government to be a spectator sport. — Barbara Jordan

I don't regard nature as a spectator sport. — Ed Zern

I love my homeland, but it's an absurd country. Politics in the Philippines is like spectator sports! — Miguel Syjuco

I think that there's some brainwashing going on with this idea that we don't have time to cook anymore. We have made cooking seem much more complicated than it is, and part of that comes from watching cooking shows on television-we've turned cooking into a spectator sport ... My wife and I both work, and we can get a very nice dinner on the table in a half hour. It would not take any less time for us to drive to a fast-food outlet and order, sit down, and bus our table. — Michael Pollan

I'm doing a book, 'Chasing Science,' about the pleasures of science as a spectator sport. — Frederik Pohl

A writer is a spectator, looking at everything with a highly critical eye. — Bernard Malamud

Drinking is not a spectator sport. — Jim Brosnan

We resist mindlessness of any kind. Again, drugs, like television, are fine for other people. The more enslaved they are, the easier it is for us, as long as they stay out of our way. Whether it's through religiously-imposed ignorance, spectator sports, crack, pot, coke, heroin - or the consumer insecurities imposed by the almighty Tube - it's fine with us as long as it keeps sheep more docile and easily contained. That doesn't mean we have to subject ourselves to it. Military generals don't step out on the missile range and volunteer as targets for the latest prototype weapons — Blanche Barton

We have been deformed by educational and religious institutions that treat us as members of an audience instead of actors in a drama, so we become adults who treat democracy as a spectator sport. — Parker Palmer

Mathematics is not a spectator sport! — George Polya

Pornography and cooking shows have created two new spectator sports. — Mason Cooley

I think we have got to start again and go right back to first principles. The argument I shall advance, surprising as it may seem coming from the author of the earlier chapters, is that, for an understanding of the evolution of modern man, we must begin by throwing out the gene as the sole basis of our ideas on evolution. If there is only one Creator who made the tiger and the lamb, the cheetah and the gazelle, what is He playing at? Is he a sadist who enjoys spectator blood sports? ... Is he manuvering to maximize David Attenborough's television ratings? — Richard Dawkins

There are so many wizards of the computer, stock market, test tube, and spectator sport, but so few of the art of life. — Mantak Chia