Chess and mental health - Why the stigma?

Botvinnik was an electrical engineer.

Edit: duchess already pointed that out I see 🤔

Strong chess players are usually weird in one way or another.

@earl-of-trumps said
@moonbus - Capa -- boy genius, the Cuban govt gave him a fake job just to keep him out of penury because he couldn't have supported himself from chess alone then.

News to me!

I always thought Capa was the child of a moderately wealthy Cuban army general.
I also thought he was quite a playboy, who loved his women, cigars, and alcohol. Did not study chess, won his championships on pure genius.

I can find no reference to Capablanca’s family, other than that his father was an officer in the military. Capa’s responsibilities in the diplomatic corps were probably pretty light.

I doubt the percentage of mentally ill chess players is higher than in the population at large. It may merely seem so when the player in question is famous anyway, as was Fischer. Spassky seems quite sane.

@moonbus said
When I think back on my time in high school, the chess club was populated entirely by boys, not one girl, and, yes, we were definitely nerdy. Most of us were interested in chemistry, physics, or IT, not football, and not one of us was likely to get within a football-field-length of a cheerleader.

This is a really well-worded post that should be the start of a novel.

The post that was quoted here has been removed

Given that Chinese culture traditionally places great value on education


It would sure be nice if America ran that way. So many people here would like to go to college, but costs are prohibitive.

Spassky denies he is an anti-Semite, and being that this is just a word used with incredible frequency and rarely does there need to be serious evidence, i am skeptical.

There's a relevant quote on Spassky's wikipedia:

As for my views—I'm a Russian nationalist, and there's nothing scary about it, don't be afraid. Some say that Russian nationalist is a nasty thing, most definitely an antisemite, a racist, a national-Bolshevik. No; for a nationalist God exists and nations that respect each other.

I'm a convinced monarchist, I remained a monarchist during the Soviet years and never tried to hide that. I believe that the greatness of Russia is connected to the activity of the national leaders represented by our tsars.

What really makes me feel happy in modern Russia—churches come back to life.

But there is also an incident where he apaprently referred to Jews as 'big nose people' and wondered why the Russian government allowed so many of them in power...

Yet, just like the Holocaust denying Bobby Fischer...

Spassky was born to a Jewish mother![1]

[1] https://www.jewishpress.com/sections/features/features-on-jewish-world/fischer-and-spassky-two-infamous-jewish-anti-semites/2014/12/26/

@Duchess64

Good post. 😉
The show was cringey at times but I think it is the best chess show so far.

@Duchess64

True.

@vivify said
This is a really well-worded post that should be the start of a novel.

Look for it in the next RHP prose contest.

The post that was quoted here has been removed

Complaining about the lack of realism in a drama completely misses the point of the movie.

Does anyone watch Rocky and complain about the lack of boxing realism? Does anyone watch a martial arts film and complain that the fights aren't realistic?

Dramas based on anything, whether sports, war, etc, have long been lacking in realism. I find it odd that Queens Gambit seems to be singled out and nitpicked for it's details. The point of the movie is about a heroine overcome personal demons and obstacles to pursue and success at her passion.