Of all the
absurd and questionable behaviors that people partake in, sports fandom has to
be among the frontrunners for deeper examination. Individuals develop
incredible devotion to professional and collegiate teams very early on in their
lives, and they are doomed to live through a lifetime of incredible peaks and
valleys in terms of the team’s success. That’s if you’re lucky. Fans of certain
organizations have gone their whole lives without ever seeing their team win a
championship. I don’t think I could take the agony if I was a Red Sox fan born
around 1920 and I had to hear about the curse of the Bambino my whole life without
ever getting any redemption. The question I pose to the class is this: do you
think being a sports fan is a mostly good thing or bad thing? Arthur Raney and
Daniel Wann propose many theories about both the positive and negative impacts
that sports can have on people’s lives and what causes people to live and die
by the teams they identify with.
On the positive side, Raney suggests
that sports offer us an all-important escape from our work-intensive lives. He
quotes Smith who once noted, “While engrossed in the sporting event a fan’s mood
may fluctuate, but any pain is temporary and minor compared to the relief of
gaining a respite from a wearisome existence” (320). If you think of the life
of the average 9-to-5 worker, it is very convenient that practically all
professional sports games start at 7 pm.
After eating dinner, watching a sports game allows people to unwind for
a few hours before bed. I can’t say I use sports as much of an escape right
now, but that’s because I don’t have that much to escape. I’m sure I will once
I’m financially independent and in the real world.
The most overarching thing sports
offer fans is psychological health by providing them with a means of connecting
with people socially. Sports probably account for half of what I talk to people
about. They are my go-to topic whenever I need a conversation starter with
someone I’m not close with. Sid Kirchheimer touched upon the benefits
of this phenomenon in the article Are
Sports Fans Happier? Kirchenheimer writes, “People who identify themselves
as sports fans tend to have lower rates of depression and higher self-esteem
than those who don’t. Blame it on our primal nature.” Wann adds, “We’ve known
for decades that social support—our tribal network—is largely responsible for
keeping people mentally sound. We really do have a need to connect with others
in some way.” In a society where the motto often seems to be every man for themselves, being a sports
fan gives us a sense of belonging. There’s something comforting about sitting
in a stadium full of people where everyone is pulling for the same team.
There is also a dark side to sports
fandom that makes headlines every now and then for the wrong reasons. Certain fans get too emotionally involved in
the game which spawns the issue of fan aggression. Wann suggests that it is
caused by high levels of team identification by the fan. That was certainly the
case last year when a Giants fan brutally beat a Dodgers fan at Dodgers
stadium, sending the Dodgers fan into a coma. This is hardly a new trend though.
Throughout the decades, the taunting of fans has induced players to leave the
field of play and brawl in the stands. The 1979 Bruins at MSG and Ron Artest’s scuffle
are two of the most notable instances.
Some fans suffer internally due to
stress and anxiety and that’s when being a fan can become a health hazard. Kirchenheimer
alludes to a 2008 article published in the New England Journal of Medicine
which reported there being three times as many cardiac emergencies among German
men and twice as many among women on days which Germany’s national soccer team
played in the World Cup. Granted European soccer fans are a little more extreme
than your average American sports fan, the example illustrates the kind of
emotional and physiological toll sports fandom takes on people.
With these positive and negative
aspects of being a sports fan, the question becomes whether or not this hobby
is worth it in the end. As a Boston sports fan, I’ve been privileged in my
lifetime to see one of my teams host a victory parade practically every other
year, but I’ve still had my heart torn out in the last two Super Bowls the Pats
played in. After those games, I found myself wishing I wasn’t so emotionally
invested in sports teams, so that I wouldn’t be so devastated when things don’t
go my team’s way. Or when the players just drink beer in the clubhouse without
a care in the world towards winning. Being a casual fan might be the way to go,
but that’s just not in my blood. I
rationalize that experiencing those lowest lows will make it even sweeter when
my teams reach the mountain top again. It also depresses me to think what my
social life would crumble to if I couldn’t talk sports with people, so I will
continue to take the good with the bad. What do you all think? Are sports fans
totally irrational for what they put themselves through?
Kirchheimer, Sid. "Are Sports Fans Happier?" The
Saturday Evening Post. Mar. 2012. Web. 25 Mar. 2012. <http://www.saturdayeveningpost.com/2012/03/13/in-the-magazine/features/sports-fans-happier.html>
Wann, Daniel L. “The Causes and
Consequences of Sport Team Identification.” Handbook of Sports and Media
(2006): 331-52. Print.
Raney, Arthur A. "Why We
Watch and Enjoy Mediated Sports." Handbook of Sports and Media
(2006): 313-29. Print.
