International Rugby

[Monty]

Marler is right that the Haka should be binned

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/rugby-union/articles/c629qx5e6plo

Yep, agreed, it's nonsense.

Wonder why people hate England in the rugby.

[paul_e]

Marler is right that the Haka should be binned

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/rugby-union/articles/c629qx5e6plo

Yep, agreed, it's nonsense.

Wonder why people hate England in the rugby.

? because a handful of people think starting games with a war dance is a bit anachronistic?

[cdbearsfan]

Just stand still for two minutes. It's one of the few rugby traditions that doesn't involve ligting farts or dining on the tears of the Proletariat.

[Monty]

Marler is right that the Haka should be binned

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/rugby-union/articles/c629qx5e6plo

Yep, agreed, it's nonsense.

Wonder why people hate England in the rugby.

? because a handful of people think starting games with a war dance is a bit anachronistic?

Just think that the English, of all people, should keep their thoughts to themselves over what Pacific cultural habits are current or out of date. Also, considering that they sing a hymn for the health of the monarch before the game, and during it sing (with ironicidal ignorance) a gospel song from the slave plantations of US states named after English queens, maybe it's generally in their best interests to not look too hard at which rugby traditions should or should not be 'binned'.

[paul_e]

Just think that the English, of all people, should keep their thoughts to themselves over what Pacific cultural habits are current or out of date. Also, considering that they sing a hymn for the health of the monarch before the game, and during it sing (with ironicidal ignorance) a gospel song from the slave plantations of US states named after English queens, maybe it's generally in their best interests to not look too hard at which rugby traditions should or should not be 'binned'.

My god do you ever not think that maybe this sort of shit isn't worth it? I don't like the haka, I think it's something that made sense in the past but I don't see the point any more. Could you sometimes try reading an opinion on something unimportant like this without feeling the need to do this shit?

[Meanwood Villa]

https://youtu.be/56aITpYIQk8?si=BY9nyYetZ0nhmxZq

Best Haka

[cdbearsfan]

You put your left leg in...

[cdbearsfan]

Just think that the English, of all people, should keep their thoughts to themselves over what Pacific cultural habits are current or out of date. Also, considering that they sing a hymn for the health of the monarch before the game, and during it sing (with ironicidal ignorance) a gospel song from the slave plantations of US states named after English queens, maybe it's generally in their best interests to not look too hard at which rugby traditions should or should not be 'binned'.

My god do you ever not think that maybe this sort of shit isn't worth it? I don't like the haka, I think it's something that made sense in the past but I don't see the point any more. Could you sometimes try reading an opinion on something unimportant like this without feeling the need to do this shit?

If lengthy rants about entirely trivial matters are banned my post count has just halved. ☹️

[Monty]

Just think that the English, of all people, should keep their thoughts to themselves over what Pacific cultural habits are current or out of date. Also, considering that they sing a hymn for the health of the monarch before the game, and during it sing (with ironicidal ignorance) a gospel song from the slave plantations of US states named after English queens, maybe it's generally in their best interests to not look too hard at which rugby traditions should or should not be 'binned'.

My god do you ever not think that maybe this sort of shit isn't worth it? I don't like the haka, I think it's something that made sense in the past but I don't see the point any more. Could you sometimes try reading an opinion on something unimportant like this without feeling the need to do this shit?

It's just my opinion man.

[paul_e]

Just think that the English, of all people, should keep their thoughts to themselves over what Pacific cultural habits are current or out of date. Also, considering that they sing a hymn for the health of the monarch before the game, and during it sing (with ironicidal ignorance) a gospel song from the slave plantations of US states named after English queens, maybe it's generally in their best interests to not look too hard at which rugby traditions should or should not be 'binned'.

My god do you ever not think that maybe this sort of shit isn't worth it? I don't like the haka, I think it's something that made sense in the past but I don't see the point any more. Could you sometimes try reading an opinion on something unimportant like this without feeling the need to do this shit?

It's just my opinion man.

and it was just mine, but you felt the need to bring things in that have nothing to do with the fact that, for me, adding a little dance before games of rugby is a bit of a throw-back to when tours were a rarity and no one really knew much about the opposition and it was part of the mystery. That hasn't been true for years.

[Monty]

And it has morphed into a tradition that definitely helps bring casual eyes to NZ games. I mean, when they started doing the haka the All Blacks were all whites, so it's unsurprising that its meaning has changed as more and more actual Maori people are involved in it.

NZ is by no means perfect on this score, but the fact that everyone does the haka, everyone learns Maori at school, is all surely a reflection as to why that country has such a considerably better record on indigenous rights etc than, say, Australia. Given the extraordinarily dark history of all of this, not to mention sport's role in Empire and all of that, I really think that having 'a little dance' (not dismissive or patronising at all!) before a little game is just about the smallest problem on earth.

Edit: in fact, isn't all sport just 'having a little dance'?

[PaulWinch again]

I like it, it adds something different. I wouldn’t spin the comment out more widely to what the English should or shouldn’t do. But I do think Marler needs to be a bit less dim.

[Monty]

I wouldn’t spin the comment out more widely to what the English should or shouldn’t do.

Trouble is, that's exactly what the rest of the world immediately thinks. As Andy Bull put it in mine and Paul's favourite newspaper*, 'and the English wonder why the rest of the world seems to take so much pleasure in beating them'.

*This is a Joke.

[cdbearsfan]

It seems odd to me that someone would watch a two minute dance, then an eighty minute match which includes twenty minutes of boring hugging and thirty minutes of tedious kicking it to each other and think "that dance has got to go".

[PaulWinch again]

England just cannot get across the line in this games.