Akhilleus I Is Responsible for NFL Protests
By Akhilleus II
Politicizing sports? Nothing new there...
I've been running across (wish I could say that was literal) a slew of whiny wingers complaining that the NFL (blahs and blah supporters) are "politicizing" a "great American" sport. Something that's NEVER been done.
Oh, please.
Grow up. And go to the library, if you know where it is, and grab a couple of history books.
Sports and politics have always been intertwined.
The first recorded sports event had a political caste to them. After Patroclus is killed in battle, as Homer recounts in grisly detail in Book 16 of the Iliad (and Book 17, in the fight over his body), Akhilleus decrees that funeral games will be held in honor of his friend. The games, which include archery, wrestling, boxing, races, and a chariot contest, could easily have passed for the first Olympic games. These games become a point of solidarity for the Achaeans whose ranks had become splintered. The tide of battle turns dramatically after the funeral games. After killing Hector, champion of the Trojans, Akhilleus allows Priam's people nine days to prepare his funeral rites (another political event). The sporting events in the wake of these deaths are inextricably tied to the politics of both camps.
In recent decades, we've seen a long list of politically charged connections with sports. John Carlos and Tommie Smith's Black Power salutes at the '68 Olympics in Mexico City. The Battle of the Sexes between Billie Jean King and Bobby Riggs in '73 (watched it with my roommates in college). The entrance of Jackie Robinson into Major League Baseball. The stripping of Muhammad Ali of his boxing crown and his banishment from the sport for years because he was black, Muslim, and anti-war. Jesse Owens' feats at the 1936 Olympics in Munich. Babe Didrikson's breakthroughs against misogynistic rules in professional golf. And amazingly, even though Babe was a star in the thirties, it's only very recently that girls were allowed to compete with boys in football and baseball.
This weekend I attended an MLB game. I noted, once again, that there is not just one, but two built-in segments of the game in which nationalistic sentiment predominates. We're all familiar with the singing of the national anthem--which, of course, is fine--but if you haven't been at a professional baseball game for a while (since Dubya made not saluting the flag--and himself--tantamount to treason, after the 9/11 attack, a tragedy that his insouciance and stupidity allowed), the seventh inning stretch has been co-opted, from a friendly and slightly goofy time for standing, stretching, and crooning "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" into a second rigid kowtowing to the xenophobic concept of America First, when a stodgy, religious singing of "God Bless America"is required. Everyone is instructed to rise, doff their caps, and demonstrate, without fail, their eternal patriotism.
Professional football games are even more overtly politicized. And not by Colin Kaepernick neither. Every single game in the NFL has an overt military presence, including things like flyovers by military jets.
The only people who don't think that's a political statement are those who fully agree with it.
Why can't they ever "Honor America" by bringing out teachers, or moms and dads, or nurses, or writers, or painters, or community organizers? Or blog editors?
And who can forget the YOU-ESS-AY cheers by American nationalists at Olympic games? There is nothing wrong with cheering on your team and your country. I do it too. But when it becomes xenophobic, the change in tenor is noticeable and angry.
In 1980, Jimmy Carter banned American athletes from competing in the Olympics to stick it to the Soviet Union.
That wasn't political?
Sports, especially in America, have become a primary venue for politicization, it's impossible to deny the connection, whether you agree with the leanings or not. For some, like the Trumpbots, it's all fine, as long as the leanings are in the direction of Whites First, America First, Blow up the Browns and non-Christians.
But as soon as the political wind blows from a non-white part of the field....Oh christ...these people are politicizing sports! Call out the fucking National Guard!
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Reader Comments (4)
@Akhilleus II: According to this story by Keith Hopkins in History Today, the Romans -- who of course borrowed much of their own culture from the Greeks -- also took up the Greek tradition of funereal games.
"In 65 BC, for example, Julius Caesar gave elaborate funeral games for his father involving 640 gladiators and condemned criminals who were forced to fight with wild beasts. At his next games in 46 BC, in memory of his dead daughter and, let it be said, in celebration of his recent triumphs in Gaul and Egypt, Caesar presented not only the customary fights between individual gladiators, but also fights between whole detachments of infantry and between squadrons of cavalry...."
You can see here how Julius morphed the memorial tradition into a celebration of his military (and political) power. It's so ... Trumpian.
Many thanks to both of you!
@Akhilleus II and @Mrs. Bea McCrabbie: I wish each of you had been history teachers ~ and political science teachers ~ in my school. Almost your every posts brings new insight for me in both of those topics and then, how they are intermingled with current events. Thank you!
I am probably the only person in America that is pissed off at having to pledge allegiance at every meeting I attend. Summer soldiers think they are doing something patriotic and I guess this pious activity makes them feel good.
I pledged allegiance back in '52 and then ended up on a troop ship. That should be adequate.