or search for 'martin cadwell -caldwell' Take note of the position of the minus sign to eliminate caldwell returns or search for 'martin cadwell blog' in your browser.
I am not on YouTube or social media
CadwellNOT Caldwell
Yellow and Pink
[ 5 minute read ]
Weak through Superstition
This is not about football (soccer). I had to look at YouTube videos to see the football shirt colours.
I have noticed that very small countries have been playing Football (soccer) giants in The World Cup. I thought yesterday, that Cape Verde should really have been playing a small country such as Curacao in their opening match just to give one of those teams a real boost if they win. Curacao (population about 560,000 in 2023) lost against Germany, 7 goals to 1. Yet, surprisingly, Cape Verde (population about 490,000 in 2021) managed a draw against one of the favourites to win The World Cup, Spain. How?
I wondered at how a tiny country could field a team that play so effectively against the reigning European Cup winners. The Spain footballers wore dark-red football shirts. Could that be significant? The Cape Verde players must surely have been exposed to how other teams play, and not just from their ten island country. I suggest they have, due to their geographical location off the West African coast, played West African teams. The Ivory Coast (Côte d'Ivoire) is a West African country, surrounded by Liberia, Mali, Ghana, Burkino Faso and Guinea and has a coastline on The Gulf of Guinea. My limited knowledge and understanding leads me to believing that this region still has a lot of superstitious people in it. I wouldn't be at all surprised to find witch-doctors reading the future from chicken entrails in Guinea, for example. Indeed, Wikipedia alludes to the Voodoo or Vodou (sic) practiced in Haiti to be directly connected to the continuance of West African links as new slaves arrived in the Caribbean in the 17th, 18th and early 19th centuries. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haiti
Copeland and Griggs did a study in 1986, and concluded that the universal symbol for mourning is not black; in many Asian countries, it is white; in Brazil, it is purple; yellow in Mexico, and dark-red in the Ivory Coast. Without deep research, that is, quite frankly, beyond my current resources; such as time-constraints and personal contacts, or a plane ticket to wherever the Cape Verde football team is currently staying, I cannot even suggest that any of the Cape Verde players have genetic links to the West African mainland. I strongly suspect though, that they are not entirely ignorant to any superstitions that are held there.
Did Spain play against a team that were superstitiously regarding them as already finished; mourning a loss that occurs in the future simply because the Spanish players were wearing dark red shirts?
Did Germany win 7-1 against Curacao because the colour of the football shirts had no significance on how the players felt, and Germany fielded a far superior team than Curacao? Surely, Spain had far superior players than Cape Verde?
Did The Ivory Coast (Côte d'Ivoire) beat Ecuador 1-0, because the Ecuadorian footballers in their purple football shirts have a similar approach to the people of Brazil, where purple is the colour of mourning? (Copeland and Griggs, 1986). Did Ecuador lose because they saw their loss before they even kicked the ball?
All of this might be a long stretch of imagination to many Europeans, yet, Copeland and Griggs found that in the UK and France, red is the most masculine colour, while for people in the USA it is blue. (Pink is the most feminine in the UK, while for most of the world, it is yellow). The UK has very strong ideas and beliefs that are firmly fixed in our minds.
We know that many people believe that 'thinking you can creates the force that can'. There are thousands of sports psychologists employed across the world, and I suspect there isn't a single gold medal or cup winner in sports that has never met at least one of them.
In a world that is consistently moving towards promoting fairness, should personal belief, including superstition, be considered more often? We know that football teams have both a home and an away football strip and these colours are determined before they all play against one another - You can't have one team playing at home in a white kit against another team also wearing their white away strip. I think there is a third kit of a different colour for those meets.
'Do you, people of Ivory Coast have any objection to your players wearing the colour of mourning, dark-red?'
'No, no. We can put aside our fundamental and deeply held beliefs that are an integral part of our culture!'
'Jolly Good! After all, the machismo Brazilian players are really just weak for wearing the feminine yellow, eh?'
'But they win.' whispered one Ivory Coast player to another.
'Ecuador, you don't speak Portuguese like the Brazilians do, do you?'
'We speak Spanish and so we can understand each other.'
'How do you feel about wearing purple?'
'Well....'
***
I am vegetarian. When I go to job interviews, I, of course, make sure I have bathed soon beforehand and I am wearing clean clothes. I sometimes cycle to the job interviews and get slightly warm. I have two choices if I cycle: coat myself in petroleum jelly to block my pores so no smelly sweat gets out, or make sure my diet for the two days preceding the interview does not include garlic, fish, milk, or meat (especially mutton). I don't ever have a mutton problem. I do, on occasion eat bacon and sausages, albeit rarely.
I cannot know essential information about the job interviewer that may be relevant to my success as a job applicant. How good is their sense of smell; women are considered to have a better sense of smell than men. Are they vegetarian or vegan? A while ago, when I did not eat dairy products, I could smell that other people had. I grew up with cows living next door and dairy herds twice walking through my village. People who eat dairy products smelt like cows to me, when I didn't eat cheese or use cow milk.
I had to spell my surname yesterday, again, after a Chinese receptionist, with a strong Chinese accent I might add, asked me if Cadwell is spelt with a 'K'. Why do people think it might be spelt with a 'K'? Because, I suspect, with a Summer sun-tan, I look like I might be from Asia. Do people think the hard 'C' in Cadwell, is a 'K' as in 'Khan'. Bearing this is mind, I also understand that there may be an element of racism lurking in the shadows; another deep and firm belief that people cannot shake; they were heavily influenced by their parents and culture, or they have empirical bad experiences that they have turned into an heuristic.
We know that our sense of smell is more effective in evoking memories in us than any of our other senses. It is ontological or 'being'. It is so deep within us that we are swerved from completing an action simply due to an attendant smell that we find abhorrent.
Superstition, I suggest, is something that, like our sense of smell, simply cannot be ignored, particularly if we have re-inforced it with confirmation bias.
Should players in all team sports wear colours that have no significance anywhere in the world, in every match they play? Not green (the colour of disease in countries with jungles and forbidden in certain parts of Indonesia); not blue (it favours male players from the USA); Not black, white, purple or dark-red (colours of mourning); not yellow or pink (effeminate colours). I think we can stop there, because I am certain that it is misogyny that makes male players, perhaps, not want to, to them, show a sign of weakness.
I conclude that all teams should wear either yellow or pink when they play. Mexico can always wear pink because yellow is a colour of mourning there. However, I suspect The Netherlands would complain because orange, their national team colour, is known to be a colour that denotes strength and assertion.
Goodbye machismo-ism, goodbye. Your days are numbered. Are The Romans finally about to be defeated? Oh, by the way, thanks for the language.
Yellow and Pink
All my posts: https://learn1.open.ac.uk/mod/oublog/view.php?u=zw219551
or search for 'martin cadwell -caldwell' Take note of the position of the minus sign to eliminate caldwell returns or search for 'martin cadwell blog' in your browser.
I am not on YouTube or social media
Cadwell NOT Caldwell
Yellow and Pink
[ 5 minute read ]
Weak through Superstition
This is not about football (soccer). I had to look at YouTube videos to see the football shirt colours.
I have noticed that very small countries have been playing Football (soccer) giants in The World Cup. I thought yesterday, that Cape Verde should really have been playing a small country such as Curacao in their opening match just to give one of those teams a real boost if they win. Curacao (population about 560,000 in 2023) lost against Germany, 7 goals to 1. Yet, surprisingly, Cape Verde (population about 490,000 in 2021) managed a draw against one of the favourites to win The World Cup, Spain. How?
I wondered at how a tiny country could field a team that play so effectively against the reigning European Cup winners. The Spain footballers wore dark-red football shirts. Could that be significant? The Cape Verde players must surely have been exposed to how other teams play, and not just from their ten island country. I suggest they have, due to their geographical location off the West African coast, played West African teams. The Ivory Coast (Côte d'Ivoire) is a West African country, surrounded by Liberia, Mali, Ghana, Burkino Faso and Guinea and has a coastline on The Gulf of Guinea. My limited knowledge and understanding leads me to believing that this region still has a lot of superstitious people in it. I wouldn't be at all surprised to find witch-doctors reading the future from chicken entrails in Guinea, for example. Indeed, Wikipedia alludes to the Voodoo or Vodou (sic) practiced in Haiti to be directly connected to the continuance of West African links as new slaves arrived in the Caribbean in the 17th, 18th and early 19th centuries. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haiti
Copeland and Griggs did a study in 1986, and concluded that the universal symbol for mourning is not black; in many Asian countries, it is white; in Brazil, it is purple; yellow in Mexico, and dark-red in the Ivory Coast. Without deep research, that is, quite frankly, beyond my current resources; such as time-constraints and personal contacts, or a plane ticket to wherever the Cape Verde football team is currently staying, I cannot even suggest that any of the Cape Verde players have genetic links to the West African mainland. I strongly suspect though, that they are not entirely ignorant to any superstitions that are held there.
Did Spain play against a team that were superstitiously regarding them as already finished; mourning a loss that occurs in the future simply because the Spanish players were wearing dark red shirts?
Did Germany win 7-1 against Curacao because the colour of the football shirts had no significance on how the players felt, and Germany fielded a far superior team than Curacao? Surely, Spain had far superior players than Cape Verde?
Did The Ivory Coast (Côte d'Ivoire) beat Ecuador 1-0, because the Ecuadorian footballers in their purple football shirts have a similar approach to the people of Brazil, where purple is the colour of mourning? (Copeland and Griggs, 1986). Did Ecuador lose because they saw their loss before they even kicked the ball?
All of this might be a long stretch of imagination to many Europeans, yet, Copeland and Griggs found that in the UK and France, red is the most masculine colour, while for people in the USA it is blue. (Pink is the most feminine in the UK, while for most of the world, it is yellow). The UK has very strong ideas and beliefs that are firmly fixed in our minds.
We know that many people believe that 'thinking you can creates the force that can'. There are thousands of sports psychologists employed across the world, and I suspect there isn't a single gold medal or cup winner in sports that has never met at least one of them.
In a world that is consistently moving towards promoting fairness, should personal belief, including superstition, be considered more often? We know that football teams have both a home and an away football strip and these colours are determined before they all play against one another - You can't have one team playing at home in a white kit against another team also wearing their white away strip. I think there is a third kit of a different colour for those meets.
'Do you, people of Ivory Coast have any objection to your players wearing the colour of mourning, dark-red?'
'No, no. We can put aside our fundamental and deeply held beliefs that are an integral part of our culture!'
'Jolly Good! After all, the machismo Brazilian players are really just weak for wearing the feminine yellow, eh?'
'But they win.' whispered one Ivory Coast player to another.
'Ecuador, you don't speak Portuguese like the Brazilians do, do you?'
'We speak Spanish and so we can understand each other.'
'How do you feel about wearing purple?'
'Well....'
***
I am vegetarian. When I go to job interviews, I, of course, make sure I have bathed soon beforehand and I am wearing clean clothes. I sometimes cycle to the job interviews and get slightly warm. I have two choices if I cycle: coat myself in petroleum jelly to block my pores so no smelly sweat gets out, or make sure my diet for the two days preceding the interview does not include garlic, fish, milk, or meat (especially mutton). I don't ever have a mutton problem. I do, on occasion eat bacon and sausages, albeit rarely.
I cannot know essential information about the job interviewer that may be relevant to my success as a job applicant. How good is their sense of smell; women are considered to have a better sense of smell than men. Are they vegetarian or vegan? A while ago, when I did not eat dairy products, I could smell that other people had. I grew up with cows living next door and dairy herds twice walking through my village. People who eat dairy products smelt like cows to me, when I didn't eat cheese or use cow milk.
I had to spell my surname yesterday, again, after a Chinese receptionist, with a strong Chinese accent I might add, asked me if Cadwell is spelt with a 'K'. Why do people think it might be spelt with a 'K'? Because, I suspect, with a Summer sun-tan, I look like I might be from Asia. Do people think the hard 'C' in Cadwell, is a 'K' as in 'Khan'. Bearing this is mind, I also understand that there may be an element of racism lurking in the shadows; another deep and firm belief that people cannot shake; they were heavily influenced by their parents and culture, or they have empirical bad experiences that they have turned into an heuristic.
We know that our sense of smell is more effective in evoking memories in us than any of our other senses. It is ontological or 'being'. It is so deep within us that we are swerved from completing an action simply due to an attendant smell that we find abhorrent.
Superstition, I suggest, is something that, like our sense of smell, simply cannot be ignored, particularly if we have re-inforced it with confirmation bias.
Should players in all team sports wear colours that have no significance anywhere in the world, in every match they play? Not green (the colour of disease in countries with jungles and forbidden in certain parts of Indonesia); not blue (it favours male players from the USA); Not black, white, purple or dark-red (colours of mourning); not yellow or pink (effeminate colours). I think we can stop there, because I am certain that it is misogyny that makes male players, perhaps, not want to, to them, show a sign of weakness.
I conclude that all teams should wear either yellow or pink when they play. Mexico can always wear pink because yellow is a colour of mourning there. However, I suspect The Netherlands would complain because orange, their national team colour, is known to be a colour that denotes strength and assertion.
Goodbye machismo-ism, goodbye. Your days are numbered. Are The Romans finally about to be defeated? Oh, by the way, thanks for the language.