Over the next 10 days, a substantial portion of the living population of the Earth will have its feelings altered simultaneously by the actions of 22 men chasing a ball around a field in Brazil. Whether you watch alone or in a group or at a stadium, you will know that what you are seeing is being seen by hundreds of millions of people on every corner of the globe, and that your joy, despair, or disbelief is being echoed in incomprehensibly many consciousnesses. Is there anything more ridiculous than this? There is nothing more ridiculous than this, but it’s an extraordinary feeling, too. When something incredible happens — Messi curls a ball around three defenders; Zidane head-butts Materazzi — it’s not just an exciting moment. It’s a bright line connecting you with the human race.
Stop Making Sense (via peterwknox)
a long time ago a woman named Kendra talked to me about Greg Louganis hitting his head on the diving board during the Olympics, and specifically about sympathetic pain in that context. in one direction along media vectors, the millions of people watching felt a tiny bit of pain along with him, his pain was distributed among them by the media. but in the other direction along those same vectors, Greg felt not only his own pain but the collected pain of the millions of people watching.
(via elmerseason)