“Over the course of my life I have met liberals who used to be conservatives and Catholics who used to be Communists, and even women who used to be considered men. But I have never met a Michigan fan who used to be an Ohio State fan or vice versa. Indeed, the very idea seems in some fundamental way absurd.” — Paul Campos, A Fan’s Life
This book is a mix of sports rants, political rants, hobbyhorses, and rabbit holes. The sports content is mostly about college football, which is not my favorite, but I guess I know enough about it to appreciate the stories. Campos walks the fine line between being a hardcore fan and recognizing the absurdity of it all, reminiscent of some clear-eyed writing about religion, love, and other intense yet inherently ridiculous institutions. Oddly enough, you don’t always see this balanced perspective in arts writing, for example those rock critics who take themselves and their topic all too seriously, or at the other extreme the reviewers who make you wonder why they’re writing about the topic at all. I feel that more needs to be written on sports fandom but this is a start. The book also has some economics and politics.
Hmm . . . a quick google of *sports fandom book* turns up this edited volume which I think I’d hate. . . . OK, I take that back. That book is a collection of 34 essays by different authors, and I’d probably get something valuable out of 15 of them, which, if so, is not a bad ratio. I can’t quite bring myself to spend $200 for it but maybe I’ll check it out from the library when I return.
P.S. Also in the area of overlap between sports, politics, and sociology is Frank Guridy’s The Sports Revolution: How Texas Changed the Culture of American Athletics, which contains approximately zero statistics but is full of interesting stories and perspectives; I think many readers of the blog would find it enjoyable and worth reading.
P.P.S. As a special benefit for those of you who have read this far, here’s a post from 2009, “Sports fans as potential Republicans?” The only data I could conveniently get were from the 1990s; sorry:
Some interesting discussion there in comments, too. This all seems related to Campos’s book.
Also we came across this intriguing if slightly mysterious graph from Reid Wilson in 2010:
Along these lines, I’d be interested in people’s reactions (and relevant research, if it exists) regarding the relationship between sports and polarization. I’ve generally believed that sports were an important component of college education – I’ve seen a variety of good traits (dedication, teamwork, learning from mistakes, coaching, etc.) that sports instills which are complements to what takes place in the classroom. However, faced with the inane (or insane) loyalty that many people show in politics now, I have to wonder how this tribal instinct has become so prominent. Tribalism (I believe) is part of human nature, likely with a genetic/biological basis. But humans also have the capacity to think beyond what their genes urge them to do. The tension between our biology and our thoughts has always been there. But it increasingly appears that many people have voluntarily ceased to think and simply follow their “team” – their team is all that matters. Where did this come from?
I can’t blame sports, but I do observe (possibly incorrectly) that tribalism in sports seems to be more entrenched than ever (this is pure speculation on my part and I’m not even sure I believe it). If so, then is there a relationship between sports team loyalty and political devotion? If they are related, is there any cause and effect or are both symptoms of some other causative factors?
I’ve always been a sports fan myself – I still root for the Yankees! But it feels irrational, particularly given the rate at which players switch teams. Similarly, the devotion to football teams seems insanely irrational. But the political party affiliation seems even more irrational to me. I’ve never felt any loyalty to any US political party and yet party affiliation appears to have such strong predictive power for elections. Can anyone shed light on whether or how these two loyalties – sports and politics – are related?
Dale:
There’s this Orwell quote from 1945:
Orwell nails it. As he generally does.
I was going to make the same observation about the direction of causality, in response to Dale’s post.
This phenomenon certainly does seem to happen with sports that compete on a regular basis, where there’s at least one match a year for the “big rivalry”, and the teams have distinctive brands/identities with a narrative arc over the course of a season.
But in the context of the Olympics, as Orwell was commenting on, does that really happen? I don’t see people get as invested in, say, the US Olympics Swimming team as they do the Michigan football team. Of course, there’s a point of pride about the overall medal counts, but the rivalries don’t feel as high stakes.
FI:
Orwell was specifically talking about soccer, which people get pretty hyped up about. I agree that swimming would be less of a big deal.
Dale –
I assume you’re familiar with this classic study – sort of the roots of the study of motivated reasoning/cognitive bias (obviously, closely related to tribalism):
https://www.all-about-psychology.com/selective-perception.html
Dale,
I agree that tribalism is part of human nature; we are social (or herd) animals, after all, and this explains a lot of what is wrong with our politics. By the same token, however, I think that being social animals helps explain why we can be compassionate and ethical, so it is a mixed bag.
“I’ve generally believed that sports were an important component of college education – I’ve seen a variety of good traits (dedication, teamwork, learning from mistakes, coaching, etc.) that sports instills which are complements to what takes place in the classroom. ”
This applies to *participation* in sports. Fandom instills none of the above. At best it is innocent entertainment; at worst it is socially destructive.
Clyde –
> At best it is innocent entertainment;…
Not to detract from your point of distinguishing effect between fandom and participation, but have you studied the issue so as to be able to make such a categorical statement?
Certainly there seem to be some potential harms, but in the very least they’d have to prove significant enough to outsize potential benefits such as economic stimulus.
I know I’m prolly an oddball who’s just too much of a stickler, and too willing to spend time writing comments but I don’t really understand why people make un-caveated proclamations in blog comments. Especially when there’s no follow-on comments when queried, such as here:
https://statmodeling.stat.columbia.edu/2022/08/31/the-course-of-the-pandemic-whats-the-story-with-excess-deaths/#comment-2075569
I don’t see this as an issue that requires a lot of study. You only have to read the newspapers to know of the riots that can follow soccer matches and, less commonly, baseball games. If that doesn’t count as socially destructive, I don’t know what does.
Had I made a claim that on balance sports fandom is a negative, it would be fair to ask me to “show my work” and demonstrate that I had accounted for all aspects of it, including its economic impact. But I didn’t claim that. I pointed out that it has a significant downside. There is no lack of evidence in support of that claim, evidence that is pretty much common knowledge.
Clyde –
> Had I made a claim that on balance sports fandom is a negative […] But I didn’t claim that.
Then apologies, as that’s how I (wrongly) interpreted your comment. Thanks for clarifying.
Jim Sillars, who was a prominent Scottish Nationalist Party politician back in the late 20th century once lamented 90 minute nationalists, those people who are nationalists for a long as a soccer match lasts. Personally I prefer to think that voting for other reasons is better, but many would disagree.
Not a big sports fan or reader, but Nick Hornby’s “Fever Pitch” is a great self-study of being an obsessive sports fan.
Haven’t read the book, so maybe he gets into this. But the experience of being Catholic is different than the experience of being non Catholic and the experience of being a woman is different from the experience of being a man, while the experience of being a team A fan is exactly the same as being a team B fan. What reason could there ever be to change? All it could do is break the illusion.
> Also we came across this intriguing if slightly mysterious graph from Reid Wilson in 2010
Well, here is even more intriguing figure for you:
https://knowingless.com/2021/10/26/political-compass-fetishes/
The people I know who follow their alma matter in college sports do it because they see their former classmates at sports functions. It’s not all raging nuttyness. It’s a chance to reconnect with old friends.
Why use line plots for those graphs?
That implies a continuum, no?
Especially when using the Party ID it seems very weird to assume folks that identify as Independent are between Republican and Democrat.
Jyd:
No, independents really are between Democrats and Republicans in many ways.
That last plot is pretty funny. It’s like a plot of stereotypes.