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The Forum > Article Comments > Racism makes monkey of 'gentleman's game' > Comments

Racism makes monkey of 'gentleman's game' : Comments

By Irfan Yusuf, published 11/1/2008

Cricket worship: over the past week or so, Aussies have learned an important lesson in Indian religion.

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Your notion that cricket is an all-consuming issue in India, or a religion in India, is outmoded and a tad colonial in thinking.
An Indian writer in a New York magazine last week outlined the poor reportage of modern India by writers in the west.
He pointed out that one of several cliches is that Indian is overwhelmingly besotted by cricket. He pointed out that many stadiums are now almost empty for domestic games.
Yesterday the Indian media news outlet Exchange4Media pointed out that TV ratings for the test in India have been well down, but may now ramp up in the wake of the controversy.
The Perth game will probably have better ratings because of this and because of the time factor: most Indians haven't bothered slavishly sitting up all night to watch cricket. They seem to be preferring sleep.
Both reports I emntioned can ba eccesed via my site, www.watchingthemedia.com.
Peter Olszewski MediaBlab
Posted by piotr, Friday, 11 January 2008 9:18:44 AM
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Your notion that cricket is an all-consuming issue in India, or a religion in India, is outmoded and a tad colonial in thinking.
An Indian writer in a New York magazine last week outlined the poor reportage of modern India by writers in the west.
He pointed out that one of several cliches is that Indian is overwhelmingly besotted by cricket. He pointed out that many stadiums are now almost empty for domestic games.
Yesterday the Indian media news outlet Exchange4Media pointed out that TV ratings for the test in India have been well down, but may now ramp up in the wake of the controversy.
The Perth game will probably have better ratings because of this and because of the time factor: most Indians haven't bothered slavishly sitting up all night to watch cricket. They seem to be preferring sleep.
Both reports I mentioned can be accessed via my site, www.watchingthemedia.com.
Peter Olszewski MediaBlab
Posted by piotr, Friday, 11 January 2008 9:19:29 AM
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A good and amusing article. The only thing Irfun overlooks is that the 'racism' occurred between between two dark skinned people.

For once, we whiteys didn't get the blame. The offended reaction of one high poobah of Indian cricket to the very idea that an Indian could be guilty of 'racism' was quite funny.
Posted by Leigh, Friday, 11 January 2008 9:27:13 AM
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I don't see this as a racism issue. Yes, the comment was rude and offensive, but given the variety of people that have been taunted for looking like a primate, I don't think it has much to do with race.

I have been disappointed with the attitude of the Australian team. They appear obsessed with winning at all costs and achieving some sort of glorious set of winning statistics. I think if they want to go down in history as a truly memorable team, they need to focus less on winning and more on sportsmanship. That are in a position where they can do such and still manage an significant number of victories. I think a single sportsmanly win is much grander than a collection of victories won at the cost of the games image.
Posted by Desipis, Friday, 11 January 2008 11:58:25 AM
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Far be it from me to doubt your word piotr, but you made such a fascinating claim - that India isn't really that mad on cricket - I thought I'd follow up on the articles.

The only one of the two that I could find was that of Exchange4Media, which did indeed attribute the low ratings on the first two to the time difference. No mention of a general downturn or lack of interest though.

But I couldn't find the one from New York, however many combinations I used in their search field - could you perhaps supply the URL?

It did lead me to this blog entry though, which I found interesting.

http://www.orble.com/in-india-cricket-rules/2/

>>Your notion that cricket is an all-consuming issue in India, or a religion in India, is outmoded and a tad colonial in thinking.<<

At least we know that Irfan isn't entirely alone in his outmoded and colomial view.
Posted by Pericles, Friday, 11 January 2008 12:24:48 PM
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Since this issue popped up I've been somewhat bemused at the hypocritical preciousness of Australian claims of racism at the insults levelled at Andrew Symonds. It only seems like yesterday that we were the world masters at what is euphemistically called "sledging", particularly when we were regularly being flogged by the West Indies.

Besides which, I've heard numerous references to George W. Bush as a "smirking chimp". Are they racist too?
Posted by CJ Morgan, Friday, 11 January 2008 12:43:13 PM
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