I recently cut out support for a sports media outlet that exclusively covered my favorite college sports team. The luxury of being able to throw $20 a month at the site to help them through the constraints placed upon them by the policies enacted in response to a mostly benign virus was nice. I appreciated the content and they even offered a few behind the scenes nuggets that were valuable.
The problem I ran into is the same reason I can no longer watch sports shows that just discuss sports topics. I used to love them.
What most hosts do, though, is they smuggle in their own biases and politics. This group I was supporting were not free from this. From their take on the virus and the overt acquiescence to the lockdown measures, they would frequently demean the character of anyone that might disagree with them, with at best a subtle acknowledgement that there were some who thought differently than the prescribed, Fauci-approved message that weren’t complete idiots.
The point was that they never allowed anyone who held that view on to discuss the topic. While our favorite athletes were missing games, or sitting on the sidelines of a basketball court spread 10 feet apart from each other wearing those stupid masks, and then 5 seconds later be maskless and breathing heavily in the face of their opponents and swapping sweat, we were supposed to just sit there and say it made sense?
It was stupid, but they adopted it wholesale.
Then we all remember the riots after George Floyd was killed. Garbage takes from the several hosts across different podcasts on this sports platform would talk about how they could empathize with people of color and would drone on for hours over several podcasts about how difficult it must be for them and how we need to address real issues like institutional racism and police violence. Fine, but they didn’t talk about the real issues of police violence on everyone, or the idea of government policing being questionable. They were completely ignorant to alternative views on this very hot topic, and instead just wholesale adopted the talking points of the left.
Then there was subtle election talk. Never would they stoop to overtly endorse a candidate, but aspersions cast at the then sitting president were never based on substance, and were instead character attacks. Fair enough, as he was an inherently flawed character to a very great degree, but they took a very obvious political stance with only one member of the entire team even open to the idea of someone to the right of Tulsi Gabbard.
Do you remember the noose at the NASCAR race? They botched that one too, without even a word about how it was false. They didn’t hesitate to jump on the bandwagon claiming racism, and adopt the driver as their own, but not even a peep when the investigation showed it had been tied like that, a loop and not a noose, for years and was used to open and close the garage door.
For a couple years I continued to support them. I started replying to some of their posts or responding to their podcasts, and would be blocked or told to just stop listening. I could do that. I knew that then and I still do, but I had invested myself in it. I felt like I was part of the family and cared about the product.
The main host also frequently posts content that he doesn’t put on the actual site from his personal accounts. So I had followed them as well to see some of the stuff being shared. He wasn’t ignorant. He has done this intentionally to leverage the sports media brand he helped build into a personal following and even has his own podcast he does separately as he continues to grow his personal brand. I’m not offended, but it just needs to be known that he took advantage of the fans of the school we cheer for to grow his own accounts, and yet he never fails to post garbage takes about trans-athletes or voting for women being ways to make our world better.
It is completely ignorant of those who disagree with him. Either that or arrogance that they don’t matter. Still, I wasn’t quite ready to cut away. The school I cheer for benefits from having an engaged and passionate fan base, and this media site keeps them engaged, giving them content to keep them actively cheering for and engaged with the school’s athletics department all year long.
I couldn’t fathom why one of their podcasts, explicitly geared towards female sports and willing to talk about issues at large surrounding women’s athletics, wouldn’t address the idea of trans-women, taking scholarship opportunities away from women. Or how they’ll rail against the injustice if unequal pay while admitting that the product they are selling is simply different, meaning the comparisons to their male athlete counterparts are simply different. Even basketball, which has the same rules, is simply a different game in the two sports. Men play the game differently than women, and women admittedly bring a unique aspect to their game which men don’t, but because of that it is not the same product. Using the men’s game as a standard by which to assess what the women’s game can do is simply false.
Don’t mention that, though, even in a civil tone with kindness trying to provoke the conversation. It is their show, their bias, and the audience simply has to take it.
I’m a Trumper because I didn’t vote for Biden. I’m transphobic because I don’t think biological men should be allowed to play sports allocated specifically for the purpose of allowing women equal opportunity. I’m racist because I think police are violent with everyone, and that no violence, even in protest, is justified. Also, despite being a 4 sport varsity letter winner in high school, I was informed that I never competed in any sport because I don’t think money in an athletic department should be reallocated from a football program, which drives revenue, to a softball program, which loses money.
No matter what I did, or how much money I would have paid, I would always be evil in their eyes.
Still, I felt compelled to support simply to help the athletic programs I love to watch. Then it dawned on me. Even the school I cheer for is cranking out leftist ideologues without any ability to apply information in a research paper, discern the quality of the information from their own reading of the methods and controls, and who are so ignorant of history that they’ll adopt all of the immoral and failed centrist policies from decades past simply because some politician who accused their opposition of racism labeled it better and smiles when they talk about it.
They are barely learning at that school anyway. The vast majority will earn a worthless degree and repeat talking points or regurgitate a few memorized details without even a hint at any ability to think for themselves or to challenge the narrative they were fed.
It was only $20, but I’m going to get a lot more satisfaction from that money than I was getting by continuing to pay people who absolutely hate me, and yet know absolutely nothing about me. I’ll get more satisfaction out of it if I just give it to someone better, who appreciates me and gives me the benefit of the doubt, assuming they would like me if they did know me. Why would I ever want to support someone who didn’t at least try to like me?
So that burden is off my list of concerns. I already feel better. I think they actually broke me, though. Even the idea of supporting the school is starting to make me sick. I still want them to win, but only because all the other schools suck too.
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I quit subscribing to cable as soon as I left home in 1981. I have never missed anything as far as I can tell. I’m one of the weird ones I do pull for different people at different times depending on the game I’m at but I’ve never understood the fanatical loyalty towards any sports team anyway. I actually enjoy children sports Way more, especially when I have the kids on the field. I never really care who wins so I’m not really a good sports buddy. And I’ve never understood supporting the whole crazy sports universe and rivalries and intense who likes who. I do like several outstanding athletes and I love to watch them excel at what they do but I’ve been so far outside of the kind of intense sports love that I don’t even understand ever watching a sports commentary. I barely watch sports why would I watch a bunch of Talking Heads. However I do sympathize with the desire not to be influenced by propaganda. I feel it every time I go to a movie where they try to influence me with their political ideas. I feel it every time I watch some TV show and they try to influence me or a play where they try to influence me. Typically I leave if this gets overwhelming. And many times I just refuse to go or watch the show
I just saw this comment.
I wish I could explain the sports fever. I think it arises from some tribalism, and the competitive spirit. For me, the team I cheered for also happened to be the school my grandfather graduated from and had season tickets to watch for years. Some of my earliest memories of events, outside of holiday family reunions, were college football games with grandpa or watching some of the greats on the basketball court.
Since coming to faith, the passion for athletics has continually dwindled, but only recently did I realize that I was experiencing actual stress from continuing to support people who actually think I’m evil. That is no longer the case, thankfully. I’m just glad that my faith continues to work on me in so many ways.
Thank you for reading, David.