Subject: FW: The price we pay.
It strikes me that one of the great injustices of modern times is that sport has become the domain of the relatively well off, or at least those who can afford the subscription to the Sky and BT sports channels.
There is not much left for the poorer section of society to watch, other than snooker, the occasional athletics meeting, Rugby Internationals and of course, everyone's perennial favorite, the Badminton Horse Trial. Everything else has been bought up by Sky and more recently BT, and unless you can afford the £60 quid plus, a month, all those eye watering events discussed on the news and in the papers are off limits to ordinary mortals.
When I was growing up the game of football was the working man's elixir. For Half a Crown (two shillings and sixpence in the old money) you could pass through the turnstiles in any ground and watch a match. Today the game costs £50 to £80 quid and that's without a bag of salt and vinegar crisps. The people's game has been transformed into a game watched by the more comfortably off and the man in the street, who used to slavishly support his team week in week out, come wind or rain, now has to go into the Dog and Duck to watch it for the price of a pint or three, roughly £8 to £12.
Yet another example of how society has been dismembered into those that have and those that haven't, the poor and the comparably not so poor. We're not talking of a Ferrari on the driveway but a relatively expensive, £60-70 Sky monthly subscription to watch the game you love, of which at least 50%, of your subscription covers the time the adverts are screened, selling you stuff you never imagined you wanted. Factor in the eye watering amounts paid to the football clubs which has now skewed football, as it has skewed golf, motor racing and the cricket league in India, to such an extent that the players, now mega rich themselves, live on a different planet to the rest of us.
This contortion of what society, not so long ago, thought fair and normal, that sport is for everyone, not packaged and siloed off only to those who can afford it.
It's the essence of capitalism, that the consumer is chosen by the size of their monthly pay cheque, finds another hurdle to differentiate us by.
You were identified when born by which side of the rail track you lived on, what we would now refer to as your post code. But the national interest in sport crossed all barriers and it was an unspoken bond to always make these sports available right across the demarcation line of economic well being. You still had to pay the entrance fee but this fee was carefully controlled not to exclude the fans. Once in the ground the differentials clicked in and the price of a seat in the main stand, close to the directors box made those areas out of reach to the ordinary fan, but no matter, he was catered for within the ground and could cheer his head off as loud as anyone.
Then the monetisation of everything became the norm, the financial leverage that a brand could obtain and soon some bright, 'non fan' saw the opportunity to exploit the brand and we are where we are today.
The spin off is that the Premier League can afford to buy the best players irrespective of country, the down side is that the local footballers don't get to play on the weekly fixture list and our nation team is poor as a result.
There are consequences for everything and when the next, smooth talking snake oil salesman comes knocking on your door (and I don't only mean Boris) look behind the glib promises for the hidden downside, usually the price you pay is more than the entrance fee.
There is not much left for the poorer section of society to watch, other than snooker, the occasional athletics meeting, Rugby Internationals and of course, everyone's perennial favorite, the Badminton Horse Trial. Everything else has been bought up by Sky and more recently BT, and unless you can afford the £60 quid plus, a month, all those eye watering events discussed on the news and in the papers are off limits to ordinary mortals.
When I was growing up the game of football was the working man's elixir. For Half a Crown (two shillings and sixpence in the old money) you could pass through the turnstiles in any ground and watch a match. Today the game costs £50 to £80 quid and that's without a bag of salt and vinegar crisps. The people's game has been transformed into a game watched by the more comfortably off and the man in the street, who used to slavishly support his team week in week out, come wind or rain, now has to go into the Dog and Duck to watch it for the price of a pint or three, roughly £8 to £12.
Yet another example of how society has been dismembered into those that have and those that haven't, the poor and the comparably not so poor. We're not talking of a Ferrari on the driveway but a relatively expensive, £60-70 Sky monthly subscription to watch the game you love, of which at least 50%, of your subscription covers the time the adverts are screened, selling you stuff you never imagined you wanted. Factor in the eye watering amounts paid to the football clubs which has now skewed football, as it has skewed golf, motor racing and the cricket league in India, to such an extent that the players, now mega rich themselves, live on a different planet to the rest of us.
This contortion of what society, not so long ago, thought fair and normal, that sport is for everyone, not packaged and siloed off only to those who can afford it.
It's the essence of capitalism, that the consumer is chosen by the size of their monthly pay cheque, finds another hurdle to differentiate us by.
You were identified when born by which side of the rail track you lived on, what we would now refer to as your post code. But the national interest in sport crossed all barriers and it was an unspoken bond to always make these sports available right across the demarcation line of economic well being. You still had to pay the entrance fee but this fee was carefully controlled not to exclude the fans. Once in the ground the differentials clicked in and the price of a seat in the main stand, close to the directors box made those areas out of reach to the ordinary fan, but no matter, he was catered for within the ground and could cheer his head off as loud as anyone.
Then the monetisation of everything became the norm, the financial leverage that a brand could obtain and soon some bright, 'non fan' saw the opportunity to exploit the brand and we are where we are today.
The spin off is that the Premier League can afford to buy the best players irrespective of country, the down side is that the local footballers don't get to play on the weekly fixture list and our nation team is poor as a result.
There are consequences for everything and when the next, smooth talking snake oil salesman comes knocking on your door (and I don't only mean Boris) look behind the glib promises for the hidden downside, usually the price you pay is more than the entrance fee.
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