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PaperclipPerfector  1mo ago (text post)   3164 thread views

Friday Fun Thread for February 20, 2026

Be advised: this thread is not for serious in-depth discussion of weighty topics (we have a link for that), this thread is not for anything Culture War related. This thread is for Fun. You got jokes? Share 'em. You got silly questions? Ask 'em.

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I'm digging women's hockey this olympics, for the obvious patriotic reasons. I'm actually thinking it's a vastly underrated women's sport: the level and pace of play actually makes it more watchable than the men's, the girls are pretty and normal. It's much more entertaining than women's soccer, and the players are much easier to like than women's basketball.

But at any rate, the culture war angle interesting to me: lesbians have fallen off hard as a sexual fantasy, while at the same time homosexual men have surged, compared to when I was young.

At twelve in boy scouts, there was a common dirty joke: Right (index finger inserted into thumb and finger loop), Wrong (two index fingers bumping into each other), Fun to Watch (two thumb and finger loops bumping into each other). This more or less reflected the common understanding of homosexuality at the time (and our painfully stupid understanding of sex): two guys hooking up was disgusting and bad, two women making love was maybe not normal or moral but boy was it hot. This was reflected in media like The L Word (which my painfully square sister loved), episodes of shows like Sex and the City, etc. A woman could dip her toe in gay, or be turned on by lesbians, without it permanently scarring her as a partner, the male gaze was happy to absorb the content. Gay men were almost never eroticized, they were generally treated as jesters or sexless, gay sex took place exclusively off-screen. Lesbians reached acceptance through straight male and female masturbatory fantasies, gay men through pushing what was really happening as far out of mind as possible.

Compare to today, where Heated Rivalry is such a hit that seemingly every woman is flicking the bean to it, and women's hockey appears to be doing it for real and no one cares. Heated Rivalry has a huge following for the fantasy of maybe, what if, somehow, there were two gay guys in the NHL and they were actually good at hockey? Where we have like a dozen confirmed lesbian couples in the olympics playing against each other, and I'm not seeing any dirty fantasies about it. We've lost the raunch culture, the male focused Vulgar Wave of entertainment. There's not the Bulldog Briscoe to bark lasciviously and yell "hot" after every mention. What culture seems to be saying is that we've gone from Right Wrong Fun to Watch, to Right Right Who Cares.

Is this a fall-off in the lesbian fantasy in particular among younger straight men and women? Is it a fall off of male sexual power versus female sexual power? Is it the painful wokism of modernity? Am I just not looking at the right media?

Come on boys, let's get out there and RETVRN to tradition and objectify some female athletes when the pads come off!

The women's figure skating finals yesterday were a ton of fun. We definitely felt the absense of doped-up Russians this year. I'm glad that they raised the minimum age to 17. It no longer feels like you're in the Epstein Files to watch it.

I'm a big fan of Liu winning gold, in that I knew some competitive figure skaters years back and they were just so brutalized by the sport by the time they were 20. She looked a lot more normal than most figure skaters, you can tell she spent a year or two not starving herself.

At the same time, I can't imagine how pissed off the other girls must be that she could just take a break and come back.

Someone said it looked like she was doing TikTok dances on the ice, and now I can't unsee it. I suppose it's well in keeping with the American character.

What is the context of that tweet?

The context is generic culture war slop you’ve heard a million times.

Coming from the other direction as the other commenters, gay men have been a (some-)straight-woman fantasy for some time now, it's just become more visible to the normies for the same reason that social media has made everything more visible to the normies. Mid-2010s Tumblr had big shipping communities devoted to the show Supernatural and its male leads; these were predated by the mid-2000s anime fandoms hyping up pairings such as Naruto/Sasuke or Death Note's L and Light to the point of yaoi paddles being sold at cons. I'm not sure what notable immediate predecessors to that locus of gay-men likers there were, but I do know that the practice goes back at least to the 60s with women putting together mimeographed and hand-stapled magazines with stories about Kirk and Spock getting it on.

the level and pace of play actually makes it more watchable than the men's

I've been unable to watch it because I'm used to men's hockey, but I guess it might be a good on-ramp for people not already into hockey. It is overall the world's best professional sport for spectators, but the fact that somehow other sports are more popular show that there might be an issue of easing people into it. It's fast, it's strategic, it's robust, it highlights personal courage and grit, it requires its athletes to be complete well-rounded athletes instead of min-maxxing specific traits, it's exciting with games (at the pro level, not as much in the Olympics) usually ending with a close score. It hits the perfect balance of personal and team effort in success. Goals are neither infrequent (soccer) nor too frequent (basketball). The flow of the game feels mostly natural, less artificial stop and go (football, baseball). The only thing I'll grant other sports over hockey is that hockey is perhaps less relatable especially in places with less ice rinks; any kid on the planet can play pickup soccer, you just need a ball and a big enough field. Basketball you just need a ball and a court. Hockey needs a bit more than that.

Problems for Hockey that hold it down:

-- You can't see the puck on TV. The author in the linked article defends that you don't need to, but that's kinda goofy, and also pretty telling that he isn't saying "yes you can," he admits it is a problem even if he claims that it shouldn't keep you from liking hockey. Not being able to see the ball in any other sport is an immediate crisis.

-- It's freakishly expensive for kids in the USA. Travel team hockey costs around $7-15k/yr and some higher than $20k. That's crazy numbers. Competitive youth golf is cheaper than that. That's getting into "cost to keep a horse" territory in a lot of places. While travel teams are a problem in all sports, the rest of the big team sports in America still have a viable path for a kid who joins rec league teams and then makes the high school team. In hockey there's very little pipeline to the NHL other than through elite youth programs. It's a rich kid sport.

-- The population center of gravity in the US keeps shifting south, and even the northeast has had mild winters preventing ponds from freezing to safe levels in recent years, so nobody is playing hockey outside the way it was meant to be played.

Not being able to see the puck to me is a weird complaint although I guess it might be valid for people not used to hockey. It's not so much that nuh-huh, you can see it, but that with a bit of awareness of the game and a decent sportscast, it's obvious where the puck is whether you see it or not. The player with the puck moves differently, other players move differently with regards to him and the camera usually follows the puck.

Sure, but at that point I'm not really watching the game of Hockey, I'm watching the reactions of the players to the game of Hockey. Yes, I can pretty much follow who has possession of the puck, but I can't really see the puck being shot or going into the net in real time. For Larkin's goal against Slovakia I can't process the movement of the puck during the shot to know whether the shot went in or not prior to seeing the player reactions. I don't actually know what is going on if the broadcast cut off before the reaction. Where I can see that Devonta Smith caught the dagger, or a VJ Edgecome put back, or a penalty kick. I suppose if I spent 10,000 hours watching hockey, I might acquire the perception "at the level of baseline skill" to pick up the puck going into the net, but like, why? To impress rich kid Canadians?

Due to the pace of hockey, one pretty much has to be glued to the screen to get anything out of it in real time. I have to be watching and focusing to perceive what's going on, not chatting with guests or cooking dinner. Where baseball and football (both, in their own unique ways) are so slow that I can mostly just look up every now and then and not miss anything important; and also enjoy them audio only, where hockey audio just sounds like a random listing of mixed English and slavic names.

I actually think one of the downsides, or overapplications, of instant replay has been that increasingly I can't see live whether something is a "catch" or a "foul ball" or a "goaltend." Instant replay should mostly be for situations where the ref had a bad angle on it and the whole world can see he was wrong, not for Zapruder film style breakdowns looking for whether a single toe touched the line, or talmudic interpretations of what constitutes a "football move."

FWIW, I don't think the problem of the inferior product being more watchable is limited to hockey. MMA, depending on the meta of the time and styles making fights, has often suffered from lay'n'pray championship bouts that were like watching paint dry; while undercard fights between two bar bums can be exciting as hell. March Madness is a strictly superior entertainment product to the NBA, pound for pound, despite the fact that even a poverty franchise like the Sacramento Kings would rip through every college team like butter.

Here my Euro background comes through, but focusing at the ball is very amateur level of watching soccer, too. Like, my dad used more unkind words when I said stuff like, I am looking at the ball. Yes, certainly be aware of the ball, but you don't focus at the ball. Watching the players' reactions is bit better as it is the losers' game, kids who only react to other players don't make it to a farm league. You are supposed to watch what they all are doing in anticipation where the ball and other players will be.

Concerning penalty shots: He was disappointed every time a game ended with a penalty shootout. Goalkeeper has only very few indications to go by, he is mostly guessing where the kicker will aim and if he gets it right, the goal is huge compared to dimensions of average human being on purpose. Every pro player knows how to kick the ball into one of the top corners where the keeper can't catch it. Mostly it is about whether the kicker loses their nerve or not. No longer about football, my father would say.

Looking at the puck is same in the hockey. But I though the complaint of not seeing the puck was about old 480p anolog tv tech. I can see the puck most of the time in the Youtube video you linked, except for the subsecond moments when it is flying. And when it is flying, it is about to get where its going before I can react, feels petty to complain about that. What I dislike the MMA part of the hockey (legal checking and sometimes tactical illegal checks).

but focusing at the ball is very amateur level of watching soccer, too.

The original question here was not "how does a true genius-level connoisseur watch sports" but "why isn't Hockey more popular?" The answer: because you can't see the puck. Saying "Well if you really knew hockey you'd know that watching the puck is for fools and amateurs..." doesn't really help when the audience we're discussing, the casual fans that make the NFL and NBA bigger than the NHL, are by definition fools and amateurs. All else being equal a sport that takes dedication to understand how to watch on TV is going to be less popular than a sport like basketball, which takes about five minutes to explain to an immigrant.

Like yeah, serious NFL fans know the right tackle is more important than the running back, but the NFL wouldn't be more popular if it was just a camera focused on Penei Sewell.

but I can't really see the puck being shot or going into the net in real time.

I'll put in a "nuh-uh" on that -- maybe only Canadians can see the puck? Certainly you lose track of it at times when they're fighting for it in the corners or whatnot, but out in the open being passed or shot it's just, like -- not hard to see? Easier than, say, a baseball in flight I'd say?

The "i know where the puck is even if I can't see it" thing is not that you never see it -- it's that you know where it is, so when it pops out onto open ice that's where you're looking. Maybe your TV is too big?

Watching that goal, I see him shoot it, I track it briefly in flight, I don't really see it going in just bouncing out after. Absent the commentary and player reactions, they could just keep playing and I'd assume it didn't go in. In baseball I can easily track flyballs, so a lot of it is probably that baseline skill/experience issue. But that does serve to make the game less accessible, for the vast majority of people who aren't already hockey fans or former players.

Sick final though. Trading two teeth for the gold medal in OT is legendary.

Sick final though. Trading two teeth for the gold medal in OT is legendary.

I'm watching it right now -- yes I know what happens, I'm watching it anyways!

NBC doesn't serve hockey to Canadians apparently, but looking at footage elsewhere it's a hard shot that bounces out -- this is hard to be sure about sometimes even for the refs and players! That's why there's a goal judge sitting behind the net. In this case it looks like it might have bounced off some of the crap they've got stationed inside the net; in the past you'd mostly see the impact on the netting, but there's still the rear bars -- normally there's a noise though.

If you think hockey is bad you should try watching lacrosse -- crowd injuries used to be a major problem there for people who didn't follow the action. Now I think there is dumb netting all over the place so people can safely focus on their beer.

I'm watching it right now -- yes I know what happens, I'm watching it anyways!

Cheers, I got up at 5 to get through my morning chores, mass, and get a little toasted for the final. Fantastic game. Absolutely heartbreaking olympics for Canadian hockey.

it's a hard shot that bounces out -- this is hard to be sure about sometimes even for the refs and players! That's why there's a goal judge sitting behind the net. In this case it looks like it might have bounced off some of the crap they've got stationed inside the net; in the past you'd mostly see the impact on the netting, but there's still the rear bars -- normally there's a noise though.

Ok, I think we're on the same page here, you agree that there are some plays that are basically impossible to perceive directly for a casual audience. I think there are more plays in hockey where I have a distinct lag in perceiving what is happening than there are in other major team sports, and that this holds it back in ease of spectator interest compared to the other major team sports.

I like hockey well enough, but I think tv content and youth costs are the biggest things hurting hockey's mainstream popularity.

If you think hockey is bad you should try watching lacrosse -- crowd injuries used to be a major problem there for people who didn't follow the action. Now I think there is dumb netting all over the place so people can safely focus on their beer.

I wonder if professional lacrosse ever makes it big, if I'm capable of forming team loyalties anymore.

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Not being able to see the ball in any other sport is an immediate crisis.

Someone once very kindly took me to the most important cricket field in the UK to see a game. Cricket balls are red. I am red/green colourblind.

It was very awkward making sure they didn't catch on.

It's 2026. Can't we just have a neon green simulpuck indicating where the puck is for those following along at home?

Exactly. The NFL became a dominant TV product in no small part thanks to animating the first down marker on the field. When I watch football at home, I have strictly more information more easily than I have watching in person (where I'm mostly just yelling obscure taunts about the opposing team).

We had it 30 years ago.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FoxTrax

the concept was criticized (especially by Canadian critics) for being a gimmick that distracted from the game.

Seeing the puck distracts from the game, folks.

I wasn't ever into hockey and still am not, but I do recall the controversy vaguely from that time. As a non-fan, it seemed silly to me to complain about seeing the puck, even if it was some bright color that distracted from the athletes, but since I wasn't a fan anyway, I figured if the fans didn't like it, then removing it is fine.

What's exciting is the idea of AI-based smart TVs in the (hopefully near-) future where you could just tell it to add on the glowing dot to the hockey puck in real-time while you're watching any random broadcast (or even VHS recording of a game from the 90s or earlier). So watchers who want the UI element could get it, and those who don't could avoid it.

I imagine that such tech could be applied to other professional sports in similar contexts. Or, to get back to women's hockey, what if the tech could, in real-time, depict the athletes as if not wearing padding but just their form-fitting sweat-wicking tights, and also with the helmet off so we could see their faces well? The Smart TV would probably need to have internet access to cross-reference official photos of players with their jersey numbers, for generating video of their faces, but it doesn't seem impossible, and it could be greatly beneficial for individual stars in the league to build their popularity.

I remember early experiments with that, but it wasn't simulated so much as tracked. Threw off the puck balance or something?

That's what I wanted to ask. Give it a cool trail, too, so its speed and direction are even more legible.

It would turn off the purists. It's an indictment of our society that we haven't developed technology that allows the TV viewer to select whether they want a neon green simulpuck or not on their own TV. This is truly the most important technological challenge of our time.

Hypothesis: greater visibility of openly gay women has made the lesbian fantasy seem less appealing.

I believe lesbian porn is still being produced at the same rate as always. It usually stars heterosexual women, many of whom also shoot boy/girl scenes, and who look just as conventionally feminine as you would expect any heterosexual female porn star to look. (I once saw a YouTube clip in which actual lesbians watched lesbian porn intended to appeal to a heterosexual male audience and ridiculed how silly it was: for obvious reasons, no actual lesbian has long fingernails.) For heterosexual males, the essence of the lesbian fantasy lies in watching two hot, conventionally feminine women with high sex drives have sex with one another. No straight man wants "realistic" lesbian porn i.e. two butch women with crew- or pixie-cuts, both dressed like lumberjacks, neither wearing any makeup, having sex less frequently than even straight couples do.

In the past, when homosexuality was more stigmatised, a typical straight man might legitimately not know any out lesbians (sure, he knew tomboys, but he probably just assumed they were all straight, as indeed most of them probably were). With no real life examples to compare it to, he was free to imagine the lesbian fantasy as he wished, and perhaps even believed that the modal lesbian couple really did consist of two conventionally feminine women in a relationship with one another. (This even makes sense from an experiential perspective: if you've been told that lesbians are just like every other woman with the idiosyncrasy that they are exclusively attracted to other women, it's reasonable to assume that lesbians look and behave like the modal woman, this idiosyncrasy aside.) Outside of porn, this belief might have been reinforced by representations of lesbianism in popular culture: the depiction of a lesbian wedding in Friends was seen as groundbreaking at the time, but nowadays they'd probably catch flak for casting two straight women in these roles (both of whom were attractive in very conventionally feminine ways). Thus, when the typical straight male in the 90s heard about two women having sex with one another, he would either picture a) two average straight women; or (depending how much of a fantasist he was) b) two very attractive, conventionally feminine women. Either way, this mental image is going to be very far removed from what the typical lesbian relationship really looks like, and a lot more appealing to the modal straight man.

But with the greater visibility of out lesbians in popular culture, even a straight man who doesn't personally have any lesbian friends is far better acquainted with what the typical lesbian looks and behaves like than his equivalent in the 90s would be, which is bound to colour the fantasy. A straight man in the 90s would hear about two women having sex with each other, envision two attractive, conventionally feminine women having sex, and think "wow, hot". A straight man in 2026 hears about two women having sex with each other, his brain immediately goes to Ellen DeGeneres or Megan Rapinoe, and he thinks "ew". Knowing what the real thing looks like destroys the fantasy.

For heterosexual males, the essence of the lesbian fantasy lies in watching two hot, conventionally feminine women with high sex drives have sex with one another.

I think part of the appeal, that has become mostly obsolete with the broadening of the porn offering online and with better handheld cameras, is the "implied threesome". The camera, in "straight lesbian porn", is meant to make you think it's you the viewer, you're there next to these two girls, watching them warm themselves up. You could and will join in at any moment you wish, whenever you're ready your penis is going to be a welcome addition to the fun the two girls are having. They're not gonna go "Ew, what the fuck are you doing in our bedroom naked!?" they'd go "Yay! Penis!"

Now though, with the explosion of the internet, amateur porn and amateur-inspired professional porn (stuff like camera in hand POV "gonzo" porn), you can find a lot actual threesomes which on top of the same things you see in lesbian porn and straight porn will also include acts like double blowjobs. It's not like threesomes were impossible before, but you have to take into account the difficulties of filming porn in a professional way were only increased by adding another person.

This analysis is obviously correct, but in addition to the surface-level unattractiveness of the common lesbian gender presentation, I would add that you cannot cleanly separate sexually-motivated lesbianism from politically-motivated lesbianism. Accordingly, a woman avowing lesbianism is a pretty strong signal that she isn't merely unattracted to men, but is instinctually and ideologically misandrist. Some guys are actually into that on some level or another, but it certainly complicates the naive "two women, twice as hot" interpretation. It is extremely likely that a lesbian would not merely be unattainable to a straight man, but would be interpersonally unpleasant towards him in a platonic context.

Apparently there's a complaint among actual lesbians that their dating market is flooded with self-described queer women, whom they quickly find aren't actually particularly attracted to women or interested in sex with them, they just want to cuddle, do girly stuff, and talk about how much they hate men.

Yes, I was tempted to mention something about how some of the most prominent American lesbians are joyless, humorless scolds (Rapinoe in particular). There's nothing fun or sexy about being told off or urged to check one's privilege.

And a lesbian Heated Rivalry tv series would be unthinkable (maybe as japanese anime?). The plot for a western tv series would need to be political/feminist with any male gaze avoided. The asshole-antagonists would be men who get their comeuppance. But the gays don't care to serve as fantasy for the female gaze as long as they can watch hot guys get naked too.

Yeah I feel like you pretty much just said it all.

Back when I was a teen, I had a shitty Nokia feature phone (a 5233). The one time I actually tried to watch video porn on the 2g connection, I racked up a 2000 INR bill that month. My parents were pissed.

I quickly learned to stick to still images, and found out that lesbian porn had twice the women per picture, or unit of data. It just made sense. I don't care for it these days, my tastes just changed with time.

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