The best thing about Ultimate Frisbee is that everyone hates it

People rarely ask me why I play ultimate frisbee, but I’ve always felt like they would…if only they cared enough. And still, in the past, I’ve found myself, in the process of advocating for this misunderstood sport of mine, also explaining why I play.

Maybe it’s because I come from the high school that produced Kobe Bryant—since we maintained a relationship with him similar to the relationship between communist China and Mao Zedong, the funding, as well as the size of the fan section, for our basketball program looked very different than that of our frisbee program. Or maybe it’s because I engaged in debates with friends twice daily that questioned the level of competition of the sport. But in any case, I promise you I’m not complaining.

Detailing frisbee’s merits gave me the opportunity for introspection. In constantly using lines like, “It’s self-officiating aspect encourages sportsmanship,” or “the respect players have for each other is unique,” I was convinced that those were the reasons I loved the game.

I thought it was the “spirit”—the thing that forbade players from spiking the disc in celebration of a score, the thing that called for cheers and support of all players—that set high-school frisbee apart from other sports. I thought that’s what made the frisbee community so tight-knit and what made the team feel like family, and I wasn’t exactly wrong.

However, since coming to college I realized that maybe the real reason I play frisbee is actually because it’s a marginalized sport.

There’s not the same kind of “spirit” in college ultimate; teams don’t rate each other’s sportsmanship, nor do they not play zone because the other team hasn’t learned it, and yet I still love the game just as much because the team is just as close and the community is just as tight-knit.

Instead of this idea of “spirit” being conducive to a close frisbee community, I realized that the bond between frisbee people is so much deeper because no one else really understands the sport. In other words, finding someone who plays ultimate frisbee wouldn’t be so special without the fact that you can’t really talk about the sport with anyone else.

Again, this isn’t some bitter grievance against the masses because I understand that ultimate frisbee is a newer sport and, understandably, isn’t as established as sports like football and basketball and soccer. Rather, I’d like to point out that, members of marginalized groups frequently, as they should, find unity in the distance between themselves and the mainstream. That is, they don’t need other peoples’ validation: they, we, all alienated groups should find strength in being misunderstood.

So to those who don’t know what the sport of ultimate frisbee is, learn about it, and to those who don’t think ultimate frisbee is a legitimate sport, I’m glad you think so.