Kerry Spot    [ jim geraghty reporting ]
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Somehow I suspect that this NBA fight is going to be one of those stories that lingers in peoples' minds and the public talks about for a long time, like the Columbine shootings or the Super Bowl halftime show. It just seems to have hit a nerve with a lot of folks who aren't NBA fans (and maybe this fight reminds them why) or into sports that much at all.

Kerry Spot reader Matthew finds some predictable responses from the New York Times:

First was Selena Roberts wondering alond if the growing popularity of NASCAR racing would bring about the same problems that were displayed Friday night in Detroit.

The commentator's ignorance is breathtaking, but manages to be exceeded
by her arrogance:

A racial undertone has yet to develop into an unspoken tension between the stars of Nascar and their racing audience because many of the drivers and their fans share a conservative ideology, evangelical roots and white privilege.

She can't only not see self-control and responsibility among fans (who know full well there are lines that must not be crossed — take for example the difference between encouraging a young lady in the infield to take off her top and touching her, let alone assaulting her), she assumes that such self-control is merely the oppressiveness of "white privileged" Jesusland culture.

And in keeping with the fixation on reducing everything to skin color, Harvey Araton claims that public revulsion with the incident and with the behavior of NBA players is the product of racism, since there are occasional player/fan incidents in white-dominated sports like baseball and hockey and they are treated (and punished — emphasis on punished) as isolated cases rather than a sign of broader degeneracy in the sport's culture...

...You can't find many better examples of how the elite media and the cultural bubble it occupies are completely out of touch with normal people.

Kerry Spot reader Bill says the incident ties into the experience of so many parents when teaching their kids sports:

Just about all of the Laura Ingraham (guest host) and Dennis Prager shows were devoted to this.

I'm involved in youth sports. In our organization's most recent newsletter, there were four separate references to inappropriate behavior by parents - in an 8 page newsletter. The problem is that the whole of sports is becoming modeled after pro sports, forgetting that the latter is a commercial entertainment activity, while the former is meant to be educational.

Subsequent to the newsletter was an e-mail from the club president bemoaning a 6% loss in enrollment and mentioning that it's not just our organization that's suffering this sort of loss. It has led me to wonder if the "values issue" that was reflected in the recent election isn't also being seen in enrollment figures for youth sports. People are getting a message that the values in youth sports are as out of kilter as they are in the pro world and are "voting" with their pocketbooks.

Meanwhile, Ed Driscoll has been watching a lot of NFL Films' coverage of games from the 1960s, and observed "how much, much more subdued they were compared to today's fans." The paragraph that nails it:

Somehow, and without really thinking consciously about it, society has created the notion that sports arenas are a place for fans to go almost literally insane, rather than merely observe the hometown team in person and cheer for them. But the Pistons/Pacers rumble gives sports — and the public that watches them in person — a chance to hit the control/alt/delete keys and reset.

[Posted 11/22 04:26 PM]