My first rant
First of all, damn bots. I will delete any comment made by a bot that asks me to check out their website on how to make money from blogging. I'm not averse to making money, but I'm not going to let somebody advertise on my blog unless I get a cut. That being said, I would like to go off on a polemic about some of America's most valued institutions: professional sports.
What function do pro sports serve in our society? I contend that they act as simulacra for combat, allowing the dormant masculine tendency (which is increasingly present in the fairer sex - I characterize it as masculine only in a traditionalist sense) to fight to be expressed vicariously. The underlying violence which usually remains just under the surface all too often rears its ugly head in the form of bench-clearing brawls, drunken fistfights in the stands, and confrontations between members of rival schools. Assume for a moment that there is only a limited amount of outrage which a person can feel - only so much vested interest is available to focus on the things that an individual cares about. What could this wasted effort be expended upon, if not for the ultimately meaningless contests in arbitrary physical abilities? It is interesting to consider this question, in light of the relative numbers of people who closely follow the World Series or the Superbowl as opposed to elections.
Even disregarding the admittedly subtle and perhaps questionable notion of the psychological distraction effect of professional sports, the issue of the diversion of otherwise useful funds is immediately apparent. Cities give tax breaks to sports teams and stadiums which could have instead gone to schools or public services. Recently, the NFL tentatively agreed to allow Kansas City to host a Superbowl, if they addeda 200 million dollar retractable roof to their stadium. Plans to put a tax increase on the ballot to finance just such an improvement were quickly being discussed. The rationale, supposedly, is that the local government gets more back in sales tax on tickets and memorabilia then they spend to keep a team in town. In some cities, this may in fact be the case. I believe that in the majority, it is not. In the example mentioned above, it is impossible to even consider that hosting one Superbowl will return 200 million dollars to the city's coffers.
Now then, I recognize that a similar argument could be made for the same status of the film industry: that they are bloated money vacuums which allow for the visceral pleasure of experiencing the titillation of base emotional impulses without having to undergo the requisite activities oneself. I contend that much film occupies a similar vein to the pointlessness of sports, but they are also partially redeemable for the sake of social reflection and message conveyance - that is, a movie has the capability to mean something while a particular sports game can never have any significance greater than the value of teamwork, practice, physical health, fair play, etc. It is also worth noting that the top movie producers are the recipients of significantly less taxpayer money than sports franchises.
I do not disagree that pro sports represent an important facet of U.S. ideology and modern culture, but I add that U.S. ideology consists of surreptitiously distracting people who are in a position to be taken advantage of, so that they don't notice their economical rape at the hands of the ruling classes. This is another example of the 'American nightmare' which is the inherent falsity of the American dream. For some people their only imaginable way to break into the upper classes is this type of physical performance. Imagine the number of kids in little league baseball or on high school teams that intend to go pro. Unfortunately for them, even if they should manage to be one of the very, very few to make it into the big leagues, there is less guarantee that a successful athlete will have the necessary financial cleverness, shrewdness, and savvy to be able to employ their wealth in such a way as to make their transition into the elite a permanent one. A person who makes his money on the stock market is more likely - just by the nature of what he had to do in order to obtain his money - to have the necessary knowledge to stay at a comparatively comfortable level of society and that his children will be able to share in his wealth.
What is to be done? I do not take a hard-line, moralist position that pro sports are necessarily bad. They are, however, contingently bad. To be more precise, the entities that many professional sports have become are contributing a net negative effect on the nation as a whole. Player, manager, owner salaries are all too high by at least a factor of ten. I attribute this tendency of higher and higher salaries to the free market, which in this case can be approximated by a goldfish analogy. Fans will continue to pay the exorbitant ticket prices until the goldfish becomes too big for the bowl. At this point, there is no indication that there is a limit that the average American will invest in being a sports spectator.
What function do pro sports serve in our society? I contend that they act as simulacra for combat, allowing the dormant masculine tendency (which is increasingly present in the fairer sex - I characterize it as masculine only in a traditionalist sense) to fight to be expressed vicariously. The underlying violence which usually remains just under the surface all too often rears its ugly head in the form of bench-clearing brawls, drunken fistfights in the stands, and confrontations between members of rival schools. Assume for a moment that there is only a limited amount of outrage which a person can feel - only so much vested interest is available to focus on the things that an individual cares about. What could this wasted effort be expended upon, if not for the ultimately meaningless contests in arbitrary physical abilities? It is interesting to consider this question, in light of the relative numbers of people who closely follow the World Series or the Superbowl as opposed to elections.
Even disregarding the admittedly subtle and perhaps questionable notion of the psychological distraction effect of professional sports, the issue of the diversion of otherwise useful funds is immediately apparent. Cities give tax breaks to sports teams and stadiums which could have instead gone to schools or public services. Recently, the NFL tentatively agreed to allow Kansas City to host a Superbowl, if they addeda 200 million dollar retractable roof to their stadium. Plans to put a tax increase on the ballot to finance just such an improvement were quickly being discussed. The rationale, supposedly, is that the local government gets more back in sales tax on tickets and memorabilia then they spend to keep a team in town. In some cities, this may in fact be the case. I believe that in the majority, it is not. In the example mentioned above, it is impossible to even consider that hosting one Superbowl will return 200 million dollars to the city's coffers.
Now then, I recognize that a similar argument could be made for the same status of the film industry: that they are bloated money vacuums which allow for the visceral pleasure of experiencing the titillation of base emotional impulses without having to undergo the requisite activities oneself. I contend that much film occupies a similar vein to the pointlessness of sports, but they are also partially redeemable for the sake of social reflection and message conveyance - that is, a movie has the capability to mean something while a particular sports game can never have any significance greater than the value of teamwork, practice, physical health, fair play, etc. It is also worth noting that the top movie producers are the recipients of significantly less taxpayer money than sports franchises.
I do not disagree that pro sports represent an important facet of U.S. ideology and modern culture, but I add that U.S. ideology consists of surreptitiously distracting people who are in a position to be taken advantage of, so that they don't notice their economical rape at the hands of the ruling classes. This is another example of the 'American nightmare' which is the inherent falsity of the American dream. For some people their only imaginable way to break into the upper classes is this type of physical performance. Imagine the number of kids in little league baseball or on high school teams that intend to go pro. Unfortunately for them, even if they should manage to be one of the very, very few to make it into the big leagues, there is less guarantee that a successful athlete will have the necessary financial cleverness, shrewdness, and savvy to be able to employ their wealth in such a way as to make their transition into the elite a permanent one. A person who makes his money on the stock market is more likely - just by the nature of what he had to do in order to obtain his money - to have the necessary knowledge to stay at a comparatively comfortable level of society and that his children will be able to share in his wealth.
What is to be done? I do not take a hard-line, moralist position that pro sports are necessarily bad. They are, however, contingently bad. To be more precise, the entities that many professional sports have become are contributing a net negative effect on the nation as a whole. Player, manager, owner salaries are all too high by at least a factor of ten. I attribute this tendency of higher and higher salaries to the free market, which in this case can be approximated by a goldfish analogy. Fans will continue to pay the exorbitant ticket prices until the goldfish becomes too big for the bowl. At this point, there is no indication that there is a limit that the average American will invest in being a sports spectator.
posted by Matthew at 11:47 AM
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