[warent]

Do people regularly mass murder each other over sports? Because that's the stakes we're talking about here in context.

Brawling and screaming over a sport is much preferred to bombing and poisoning.

[widdershins]

No (though it does happen, see Constantinople's chariot teams). But expansionist and militaristic societies are often obsessed with sport, for example imperial Britain, Germany at the 1936 Olympics, and arguably the modern US.

[rhizome31]

Not to mention Ancient Greece. Sport as a substitute for war is a joke.

[anigbrowl]

Both sports and war leverage the same dynamics, just as individual athleticism improves one's chances in a fight. Neither are ends in themselves.