Poll: do you concider cheerleading a sport

[Ziggy the wolf]

i love sports and while i dont play them all, i give respect to anyone who goes out and train to get good. in conn. a university was planning to cut a women's volleyball team that and replace it with a competitive cheer squad for budget reasons. the judge said no but people protest that it is a real sport with training and hard work. while all that it is true i dont think it is.

 

[Free Thinker]

I will admit it isn't a sport, but I also will admit I enjoy watching.

 

[Fuloqwam]

Ummm... how is it not a sport? The girls need to be insanely flexible, strong and conditioned. The men even more so. I used to date a college cheerleader, she trained 3 hours a day, then hit the gym to train some more. Not to mention needing a background in gymnastics and dance. If competitive cheerleading isn't a sport, what is? Golf? Poker? Starcraft?

 

[Eliam_Dar]

I dont consider it a sport. Why, because if I did then I should also consider Ballet a sport. I'll admit though that it requires a lot of training.

 

[Raikov]

Any competitive activity that requires any form of training to do well in qualifies as a sport.

This includes gaming. Even if you do not make any money on it.

 

[Mesca]

I do. One of my roommates was a male cheerleader, and he was constantly practicing or training. I was personally surprised, how much effort does it take? Turns out, a lot. When you've gotta get out there and hoist women and catch flipping ninjas and whatnot, you're working your ass off.

 

[tomtom94]

Cheerleading is not in itself a sport. However the training does mean the cheerleaders deserve credit.
On the plus side...yeah.
On the down side - the exact same thing. Let's be honest, it's probably one of the most objectifying activities in the world. Football and all the sports derived from it (Rugby, American football etc) are incredibly and inherently sexist, which is a real shame.

 

[Dags90]

It's extremely athletic, and it has arbitrary rules. I would probably consider it to be a bit of a subset of gymnastics.

 

[Broady Brio]

I would.
Do they train? Yes.
Do they compete? Yes.
Do they win stuff? Yes.

I think it is a sport.

 

[Colour Scientist]

its not competitive so no.

Have you not seen the 'Bring it On' films?!

 

[megs1120]

Of course it's a sport, especially when people consider golf or stock car racing to be sports.

Simply put, if guys don't dominate, people don't consider it a sport.

 

[TheRightToArmBears]

It's more a kind of over-the-top, vulgar dance than a sport, to be honest.

 

[Jonluw]

I guess it is a sport when they have competitions in it, but I think it is sort of weird with a sport with the main purpose of cheering on the players of another sport.

 

[Ironic Pirate]

The ones that cheer other teams? No. Then you'd consider stunts in movies a sport.

The ones that have competitions and such? Yes, it's like gymnastic.

 

[gamerguyal]

I don't see it as a sport, but I also don't think that just because something isn't a sport that means it's unimportant. Think of it this way: would you consider competitive weightlifting a sport? It takes a lot of work and effort, but a sport it is not. I've heard the same argument over bowling, which I can actually relate to because I'm on my high school's bowling team. Despite this, I don't think that bowling is a sport either, it's more of a game, like darts or billiards. I don't need to call it a sport to make myself feel better about participating in it.

Don't even get me started on racing. Nascar is to the US what Starcraft is to Korea.