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Resolved: Football Protects the World from Fascist Politics.
It's easy to compare football and other organized sports with facist propaganda events like the Nuremburg Rallies. A superficial analysis often leads one to assume that football is our generation's equivilant of these rallies, and that organized sporting events dangerously mimic the right-wing politics of fascism. And sure, on the surface, there's a lot in common: chanting, cheering, singing songs of loyalty, bravado, matching outfits, common symbols. But to compare football to fascism is to confuse the medium with the message.
Football, in fact is the antidote to fascim. Fascism was successful in part because it tapped into people's inherent need to belong. Man wants to feel a part of something bigger; it wants to be part of a group that's unified both in favor of one group and against another; it wants to be on a winning team. Football allows people to satisfy those instincts, while channeling the energy created into something totally meaningless.
It's exhilarating to be surrounded by people who all believe and support the same thing; it's fun to sing the same songs and clap and cheer with hundreds of your closest friends. Fascism didn't create this; it co-opted it and used this instinct to promote an insidious agenda. Just as most Americans went to the Lincoln Douglas debates for entertainment and social purposes, most participants attended the Nuremburg rallies for the spectacle of it all. They went to the rallies because they were fun, because it was An Event, and because it gave them a reason to clap and cheer. Hitler and other fascist leaders captured and directed that energy towards evil.
In football, you get all the trappings of fascist rallies without any of the dangerous consequences. The sense of belonging that comes with identifying as an "us" versus a "them" is satisfied through cheering for your home team against it's various opponents. Wearing jerseys, waving flags, and buying a Redskins bumper sticker lets you affiliate yourself with a movement without having to do anything more than root for Washington on Sunday. The cheers, songs, and chants performed at the game add to the sense of togetherness. However, As soon as you step out of the stadium - even as soon as the game ends - the emotion and energy dissipates. Sure, you're upset for a few days after your team misses a shot at the playoffs, but you don't take it out on the fans of the opposite team; while you may "hate" Steelers fans, you don't spend your week actively plotting their demise - or standing idly by while the leaders of your football team does.
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4 comments:
Let the record show that I was JUST trying to explain this phenomenon to someone.
A point that needs to be made here, without getting all Daniel Goldhagen on you (because there are few people on earth outside the Bush administration with whom I disagree more), is that practical manifestations of fascism are a rather unique marriage of fervor, social community and understated complacency. Part of the reason fascist regimes exist for as long as they do is that, in addition to a sense of belonging, the notion that a government is looking out for the best interest of its citizens by managing their macro affairs as effectively as possible is also very appealing. Clearly people are not as trusting of the coaching staff/personnel departments of their favorite football teams. Put another way, there will always be more monday morning quarterbacking in the Reid or Shanahan regimes than there ever would have been in the Chilavert or Mussolini regime.
For some reason I had a brain fart and said Chilavert when I meant to say Pinochet. Something tells me this statement shouldn't apply to world-class goalies.
Completely harmless? I guess you've never witnessed fans screaming at each other. Calling the other obscenities? Family get-togethers morphed into screaming matches about statistics and other factual non-sense. I think the sports fanatic experience is practice for a larger, more dangerous, political or religious fanatical experience. And, if you check, most religious fanactics (and those who argue about politics as if they're blinding defending their 'team') are also avid sports fans. There is more of a connection between the two than simply parallel action and symbol.
One is practice for the other.
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