Violence and the Western Taste

I can't help but be annoyed at our American worship of sports. It's a shame that we, as Americans, celebrate violence, in the name of entertainment, e.g., full contact sports like boxing, or mma. I wonder if we'd consider violence romantic if we lived in Syria, or other countries were violence isn't a spectacle, but a reality. I can see that the spectacle of people beating each other for money could be exciting, but so are so many wrongs. The sadist finds thrills in perversion, and that doesn't justify his actions. Sometimes, I feel that our fascination with violence is part of our gluttonous tendencies. Could a people who have been beaten, raped, harmed or have lost their children to an oppressive hand, find entertainment in the submission of competitors by affliction of pain? I suspect that they won't. I believe that our disassociation with the real cruelties that happen in the world leave us unrealistically hungry to see someone in pain. This, I suspect, is a result of the superfluities of our modern western securities.
-Steven C.