Sports: An Antidote to Apathy

Bananas + Sports

I’m a sports fan.  And to different people this means different things. For me it means wearing t-shirts, checking scores, getting anxious, group-texting, and organizing watch parties (aka dragging reluctant friends and colleagues to nearby bars).  I’m realizing that in a lot of social circles, being a sports fan, especially a female sports fan, carries a certain stigma.  As someone who’s attentive to sexism in all forms, I find that when people see a girl sports fan they assume one or more of the following: she knows less about the game than the males she’s sitting by, she would rather be doing something else, she’s trying to impress her current flame. Another stigma sports fans are burdened with—one that is less gender specific-- is that they are embodying escapism; they’re being shallow, trivial and apathetic towards actual issues plaguing our world.  

It’s one of the more fertile sports periods of the year, so it’s a proper time to post this overly long blog entry to say: broaden your minds, people.  Investing time in sports is not just for boys, and it’s not a hedonistic alternative to caring about real-world events.   Moreover, being a fan is a means of connecting with people and strengthening communities you care about.  Here’s some reasoning behind my impassioned assertions:

1. Gender equality, ya’ll.  Last I checked, both men and women have a nervous system and some number of limbs to flail around in exultation or protest.  And last I checked, that’s all you physiologically need to be a sports fan.  Despite this, male sports fans are definitely more culturally accepted than females, who fall victim to the aforementioned assumptions.  This female sports fan stigma is certainly not the biggest problem the feminist movement is facing, but I think it’s one manifestation of more deeply ingrained sexist mentalities that are harmful. 
2. It’s the one thing that unites my family in conversation.  Ever since my 7-yo grandfather was promised a new suit of clothes if the Pittsburgh Pirates (a team from a city he never in his life visited....¯\_(ツ)_/¯) won the 1927 NL pennant, my family has been sports fans.  Irrational, sentimental, geographical, illogical sports fans, but fans nonetheless.  However, we live far apart. Therefore like so many others who live away from the ones they [at least sort of] care about, we keep in touch via the little blue screens that are our smart phones. And we do a pretty mediocre job of it at best.  However, our communication skyrockets when there is a major sporting event involving our favorite teams.  During these sporting events, do we say anything particularly meaningful, like about large personal life events? Nah.  Do we collectively vocalize emoji-laden praise for our most beloved players and trash talk the other team, coaches included? Absolutely.  In this day and age where communication is so ubiquitous yet often still sparse, I value sports as a vehicle for maintaining my family ties.
3. It’s an outlet for all the caring.  Sometimes I feel like my amount of care for things in this world is like that ice cream from Coldstone, mediocre in quality but so abundant and overflowing that someone has to constantly smush it with a spatula so it stays in the confines of the too small container society wants it to fit inside.  Sports provide a wonderful outlet for someone like me who has a lot of emotional energy.  But that’s not to say they’re my only outlet.  I know that while sports can be an antidote to apathy, they can also be a drug of the masses; they can draw you in and quite bluntly, make you lose your freaking mind.  Alternatively, they can compliment the important things you simultaneously care about in the world.  I make sure my devotion to teams is directly correlated with my devotion to the communities those teams come from, and all the things and people and lives going on within them. 
4. It supports communities.  Sports have a lot of issues: dramatic income inflation, persistent sexism, domestic violence and sexual assault, doping scandals, and long-term physical ramifications that we’re still elucidating, to name a few.  I get that, and I don’t want to gloss over those.  Instead, I’m choosing to focus on what I see as one positive thing to come out of them: they empower communities.  Take Portland, OR, a city I have a lot of love for.   It's not a huge city, thus not a huge sports market, and for that reason we have one team: the Blazers.  But by God, do we love that one team.  And it loves Portland.  My rudimentary Instagram research shows me that the Blazer players, though being mostly from out-of-state, give back to the community their team represents.  They visit hospitals, and volunteer in schools, and they even star in weird Portlandia episodes and go to the South Waterfront Subway (miss you Rolo).  Sure, they’re probably obligated or paid to do some of those things, but I don’t really care, they still do them.  What’s more is that a lot of those NBA players, Blazers and otherwise, are not just supporting the communities of the team they represent, they’re carrying a whole bunch of people from their own hometowns along with their success.  It was rumored that Lamar Odom was paying for over 100 cell phone bills at one point in his career.  There’s another conversation to be had about race and inequality and the role sports play in that, but I applaud the players who spread the wealth they have, in the form of time or in the form of dollars, to the places they live in or care about most.  

I wrote a lot of words so if you’re still with me, bless your heart.  If not, here’s my TL;DR: I’m a sports fan, but not because I am trying to impress someone.  I’m a fan because sports serve as a common language among my family, a personal antidote to apathy, and a way to support communities I care about.  And I think you should be one too.  I mean, at least it makes for good conversation.  With that said, Hey Blazers--Let’s go annihilate those overrated, over-talented, self-centered Warriors so they won’t even know what hit ‘em, alright?