Comments on: In Defence Of Elitism In Chess: 7 Reasons Why Elitism Accusations In Chess Are Vastly Exaggerated

By: Shawn

Shawn — Sun, 28 Feb 2021 08:06:58 +0000

In reply to bruh. No they're saying that most of the attacks at chess elitism is exaggerated and many times untrue. Exaggeration is a form of aggression and purposeful misinformation. The author is trying to clear the misinformation in the drama against chess elitism. Thereby defending it. And I'm pretty sure chess elitism is a stab by itself.

By: bruh

bruh — Sun, 15 Nov 2020 06:33:28 +0000

You didn’t defend elitism, you said it was being exaggerated

By: Ankush

Ankush — Fri, 07 Aug 2020 17:44:49 +0000

Hey. It’s not been around for “thousands of years” but what was there was taken over by a variant called Shatranj with stalemate and checkmate and then later castling and pieces moving the full length of the board in one turn. In Europe we got pawns moving two squares on the first turn and en passant and finally the latest variant, Chess. We’ve had this variant for more than three hundred years but it’s a fun variant and I hope it stays and names like Morphy and Tal don’t die. In its favour, we have top ten players hailing from all over the world for many years now.

I also think the point on being shy, etc. in elitism is very real and there is a lot of projection that goes on by newer players. If you walk into a random chess club, just for fun as a 2300, you can get a lot of negative vibes from strangers who are lower-rated. I remember once doing this and playing a game and at the end when i started talking variations my opponent drew back and was suddenly distant. I got the feeling that he thought i was making things up actually, lol. Then it became a mutual biography, how long have you played for, etc. After walking around I saw that the general approach to analysis was reflecting on how the positions “feel” and no one was too fluent in notation or remembered the games, so I realized people must find me pretty obnoxious when i blurt out a “forced” idea. The highest rating i think was around 1750. This was years ago when i was still a teenager and I didn’t mind much but i’m sure experts and above who are a little more sensitive than i would not like to relive the experience. It happens sometimes that a strong friend will ask me to come along when he’s going to the club, i never ask or think twice about his motives.
I honestly think the higher up you go the more generous the players get with their chess knowledge, but if you get a bored response it’s probably because they think you aren’t really listening. Like that CM who asked Kožul a question just to prove something. Or they’re tired.

By: Mistreaver

Mistreaver — Mon, 03 Aug 2020 10:07:17 +0000

In reply to Mirko.

Hi Mirko!
Glad you like the article! I am also glad you like my book reviews – unfortunately I don’t have time to write them as much as I would like today :D.
All the best to you too hope we will keep reading each other 🙂

By: Mirko

Mirko — Thu, 30 Jul 2020 07:34:21 +0000

Thx for this article. I like how you try to look at all this unecessary drama from different perspectives. Our chess club was always welcoming to new players. Of course there were some bad situations were one player looked down on weaker players because of the moves they made, but these people are in the minority. I also liked your other articles. Very detailed, helpful (thx for your article on the book “the art of checkmate”) and entertaining 🙂 (I hate the london system, too haha. It’s a good opening, but I’m tired of seeing players playing all their plans/moves on autopilot, whether they are appropiate for the current position or not. There were games where I could predict like 30 moves of my opponent. :))) Keep up the good work and all the best:)

By: Mistreaver

Mistreaver — Sat, 11 Jul 2020 23:00:10 +0000

In reply to MordimerChess. No problem, my friend! Glad you liked the article! Cheers Vjeko