This time of year always makes me physically ill. Right as school starts back up, sports are everywhere. The baseball season is drawing toward its celebrated conclusion, football is picking up serious steam, basketball season is but a short month from tip-off and those stupid stock cars are still pointlessly zooming around in circles.
With the Ducks’ recent win against Michigan and their subsequent appearance on the cover of Sports Illustrated, I’ve found all the sports hubbub to be too much. Lately I’ve taken to distracting myself with visions of sugarplums and a world in which people actually give a damn.
Join me now as we pretend we live in a country where its citizens are engaged and motivated to take part in the decisions affecting their daily lives. Imagine, for a moment, a system of politics modeled after our major sports leagues.
Instead of using precious tax dollars to build athletic arenas — which the National Center for Policy Analysis has shown to be of no great benefit to the venues’ communities — we would construct great stadiums that house professional political matches.
Every Sunday, hundreds of thousands of spectators would flock to these magnificent structures to cheer on their favorite politicians, pundits and policies — occasionally they might even want to throw a random beer bottle.
Kids would collect and trade politician cards. Dozens of channels, with their glitzy production capabilities, would broadcast the events with all-star color commentators and sideline reporters.
In-depth analysis, instant replay, pregame statistics, field microphones and a nifty pen that highlights key plays for the viewing audience would accompany all broadcasts and add to viewers’ comprehension of the many complexities and nuances of the competition.
Yes, politicians and lobbyists will get the most scrutiny in my little reality. The paparazzi would chase them all over, exposing their secret meetings and other professional improprieties. Entire sections of newspapers would be dedicated solely to politics, and the participants’ statistics would be posted daily for all to see.
But my world will never exist, and part of the reason is we’re all so damn distracted by stardom and entertainment. Society and the well-being of the people sitting next to you are of much lesser importance than how fast Rusty Wallace tore through 20 tires and several tanks of gas or how many RBIs Alex Rodriguez hits in nine innings. According to Knight Ridder, the five major professional sports leagues — hockey, NASCAR, basketball, baseball and football — will see revenues increase by more than 50 percent from 2001 to 2006. All the money, work and mental capacity that went into these leagues is wasted on something that matters little in the big picture of life.
How often do you have to listen to some guy spit sports statistics or see someone wearing officially licensed merchandise? How many people do you notice turning straight to the sports pages of their newspaper?
I’m not saying sports are inherently evil, but they are the perfect springboard for advertisers and those who wish to distract the common man’s attention from other, more important goings-on.
The Heritage Foundation last year quoted Baltimore Ravens owner Art Modell saying: “The pride and presence of a professional football team is far more important than 30 libraries, and I say that with all due respect to the learning process.”
If we valued more humanistic endeavors and scrutinized our politicians the way we do athletes and superstars, this country would be much better off.