Politics in ice-hockey (sport) isnt such bad thing

[MeHateHe]

More people were dying in non-hockey countries from prominent IIHF members (at least prominent now). War in Ukraine is ongoing so anything is possible (unfortunately) but Vietnam far surpasses it in life lost (and even losses of neighbouring countries from American bombing).

More people were dying in non-hockey countries from prominent IIHF members (at least prominent now). War in Ukraine is ongoing so anything is possible (unfortunately) but Vietnam far surpasses it in life lost (and even losses of neighbouring countries from American bombing).


I think it's fine to sanction Russia, I also think the US probably should have been sanctioned by the IIHF during their invasions in the 2000s.

I'm sure the analogies between a naked land grab that is threatening to destabilize nearly a century of European peace and plunge the entire world into a war and the blundering invasion of a Soviet proxy by a terrified US made sense when Tucker explained them to you, but if you read my post you'll see I suggested viewing this through context. The sanctions exist to get Putin to stop, both because he's killing Ukrainian civilians and because Germans, Poles, Czechs and the rest are nervous that they're next.

I'm glad that you think that American imperialism under Bush (primarily) was a problem. I'm curious if you said so at the time, or if it's just more convenient for you to support Russia now. Myself, I opposed the invasion of Iraq and anything more than a targeted campaign in Afghanistan. The failure of the international community to act appropriately then is not an excuse for them to fail to act now.

 

[Czechboy]

Shocked

 

[MeHateHe]

Shocked

Thats-a-shame.gif

 

[Big Phil]

Let's get one thing straight here, you want Russia in the tournament for your own selfish reasons. You want to be entertained. That's fine. You are right that the entertainment would increase because of the tensions between the west and Russia, but using the war to sell tickets and increase tv ratings is, in my honest opinion, completely tasteless.

I'm most often against virtue signaling, but I don't find this to be about that. This is about sanctions, and sports has a role, albeit perhaps a small one, in all of that. Ice hockey is closely connected with Russian politics and powerful people in the country, and banning their national team can help raise the question among their population, that unlike what their state ruled media is telling them, maybe Putin is up to no good.

Of course, sports has a role to play in peace making and relations between countries. That's why I think Russia should be allowed back into sports not long after the war ends. But only then. And the animosity will still be there when that day comes, similar to during the cold war, and it will be there for a long time.

The thing is there is not precedent for it in hockey. The closest thing was the Canada Cup in 1980 being pushed to 1981 because of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. But all teams still participated. We all know the Soviets were there in the 1980 Olympics. Anyone remember the Iraq invasion in 2003? We all do. Has it aged well? It was 50/50 split in popularity at the time. But we all know how it aged. U.S. still participated. No one even suggested otherwise.

No one has mentioned using the war to sell tickets. What I am saying is we could use Ovechkin, Kucherov, Vasi, etc. to sell tickets. That should be a pretty good team to watch, and since we already had a tournament in 2016 that annoyingly had a gimmick and a slight asterisk to it (even though we won) I would hate to see the first best on best we've had since 2014 to be fair, to actually NOT be a best on best. War is complicated, no matter whether you think Ukraine is squeaky clean or not in all of this, it is still very complicated. Sports shouldn't suffer over it.

 

[Elvs]

The thing is there is not precedent for it in hockey. The closest thing was the Canada Cup in 1980 being pushed to 1981 because of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. But all teams still participated. We all know the Soviets were there in the 1980 Olympics. Anyone remember the Iraq invasion in 2003? We all do. Has it aged well? It was 50/50 split in popularity at the time. But we all know how it aged. U.S. still participated. No one even suggested otherwise.

No one has mentioned using the war to sell tickets. What I am saying is we could use Ovechkin, Kucherov, Vasi, etc. to sell tickets. That should be a pretty good team to watch, and since we already had a tournament in 2016 that annoyingly had a gimmick and a slight asterisk to it (even though we won) I would hate to see the first best on best we've had since 2014 to be fair, to actually NOT be a best on best. War is complicated, no matter whether you think Ukraine is squeaky clean or not in all of this, it is still very complicated. Sports shouldn't suffer over it.

Apples and oranges. The 2003 invasion of Iraq wasn't justified, but it was widely thought of as a war against terrorism. Wether the real goal was oil or something else, it wasn't to annex Iraq and enslave it's people. Nor did the U.S. tear down it's own free press, imprison protestors, mobilize it's civilians and send them to war, threaten additonal countries with direct military confrontation, or threaten the entire world with nuclear war.

I understand that for many people in North America, this war is far away and thus difficult to relate to. You keep comparing Russia to USA of 2003, meanwhile Europeans see Russia more as Nazi Germany of 1939. A similar situation would be a dictator coming to power in the U.S, ordering an invasion on Canada with the goal to annex the country and/or taking it's democracy away. Simultaneously this hypothetical dictator would imprison protestors, violate the airspace of Mexico and Columbia (like Russia has done to threaten Sweden and Finland), and also hinting at starting nuclear war with the rest of the world.

You can bet someone would suggest to ban the U.S. from sports if this happened, especially if it was believed that USA wouldn't stop with Canada, but had goals to annex more countries afterwards.

Anyway, it doesn't matter what you or I think. The hockey federations of Europe won't compete in a tournament involving Russia. Thus, the NHL is gonna have to choose: make this a 8-10 team tournament without Russia, or make this a 4-6 team tournament without Sweden, Finland, Czechia and others.

 

[dryz]

No one has mentioned using the war to sell tickets. What I am saying is we could use Ovechkin, Kucherov, Vasi, etc. to sell tickets. That should be a pretty good team to watch, and since we already had a tournament in 2016 that annoyingly had a gimmick and a slight asterisk to it (even though we won) I would hate to see the first best on best we've had since 2014 to be fair, to actually NOT be a best on best. War is complicated, no matter whether you think Ukraine is squeaky clean or not in all of this, it is still very complicated. Sports shouldn't suffer over it.

There is only one clear agressor, one country which commits crimes against humanity each and every day. What is complicated exactly? And you want to use players, who many of them, publicly supported the invasion back in 2014, promoted the idea that Ukraine are nazis and cheered for their deranged dictator, to sell tickets?

Anyway you will have it with an asterisk either way because if you allow Russia to compete then at least Czechia, Finland, Sweden and probably others won't participate. I'm pretty sure of that.

 

[Barnum]

Sometimes you can't go online without reading what he's saying, so what can you do? He's irritating, that's about it.

Get famous, and we can all be annoyed by what you say on the interwebzzz too, which goes for every single one of us if we got famous. I don’t forget the things you said about Sandy Hook and 9-11 and you weren’t censored. There is not one single thing LeBron has ever said that comes close to what you said about those two real life tragedies but it was allowed and life moves on. We are allowed to agree or disagree with an opinion but we are not allowed to shut someone up.

It‘s funny how the crowd that wants to shut up athletes for speaking their mind are the first people to scream about free speech being abused for opinions they do like. If you (everyone) is allowed to speak out in this country, than so are athletes, that’s how it works. It’s why god created the TV remote.…change the channel if you don’t like it.

 

[Pavel Buchnevich]

I'd rather have Russia than Czech Republic in the tournament. Russia will add more on the ice.

If Czech Republic doesn't want to play in a tournament with Russia, they can sit this one out.

 

[Elvs]

I'd rather have Russia than Czech Republic in the tournament. Russia will add more on the ice.

If Czech Republic doesn't want to play in a tournament with Russia, they can sit this one out.

K. Enjoy your four team tournament with Russia and Belarus.

 

[JackSlater]

Why has this Russian troll not been banned yet? He already got dozens of threads locked after infesting them with his fascist nonsense.

There are Russian trolls... he isn't one. He gave a hockey opinion - disagree, passionately if you want, rather than call for a ban. You'll convince more people that way.

 

[Jussi]

I'd rather have Russia than Czech Republic in the tournament. Russia will add more on the ice.

If Czech Republic doesn't want to play in a tournament with Russia, they can sit this one out.

In the modern day best-on-best tournament era, Czechs have actually won a tournament. In fact, Finland have more medals in this era than Russia. So Russia won't be missed.

As some poster here said, case closed.

 

[SoupNazi]

Closed.