Us and Them

 If you come to Chicago there are three facts you need to know:

• The Lake is always east.
• Never put ketchup on a hot dog.
• You can't be a Cubs fan AND a White Sox fan. *

Last week one of our city's favorite events, the "Crosstown Classic", a series between Chicago's two Major League Baseball teams took place at Rate Field (I think that's what they call it these days), on the South Side. Part two of the series will take place at Wrigley Field, on the North Side in August. From what I could tell, Cubs and Sox fans came together and stayed without their profound differences getting in the way of having a good time for all, although there was one ugly incident involving a player and a fan. The fans even found something they could all agree upon, NFL football and Chicago's team, the Bears.

But they didn't outwardly express their love for the hometown team. Instead of roars of "Bear Down", the chant heard 'round the ballpark was "Green Bay Sucks", referring of course to the Chicago Bear's chief nemesis, the Green Bay Packers. 

Nothing brings people together more than mutual hatred.

The Bears/Packers rivalry goes back to the origins of the NFL as both teams are charter members of the league. It's a heated rivalry as both teams compete against each other in the same division, their two cities are geographically close and their states border each other.

The Cubs and Sox represent the same city, but they compete in different divisions of different leagues, meaning that unless they are playing each other, the fortune of one team does not adversely affect the fortune of the other. However, the two teams can actually help each other in the standings by defeating division rivals, so for example if the Cubs are playing the Tigers who are in the same division as the Sox, or the Sox play say, the Brewers, in the Cubs division, it makes sense for a Chicago fan to root for their hometown rival against one of their teams' own divisional rivals. 

But that doesn't always happen.

Sox fans are fond of saying that their two favorite teams are the White Sox and any team (presumably even a division rival) playing the Cubs. While there is similar animosity on the other side of town, I've never heard a Cubs fan say their second favorite team is any team playing the Sox. The reality is most Cubs fans don't care who's playing the White Sox on any given day unless of course, it's the Cubs. 

What the White Sox and Cubs also represent are two distinct parts of the city, the South and the North Sides respectively. South Siders have a chip on their shoulder when it comes to the North Side, as that part of the city tends to get most of the attention, as does its baseball team. It's much like the rivalry between the old Brooklyn Dodgers and the other New York City teams before the Dodgers and the Giants moved to California in 1958. When the Dodgers were founded, Brooklyn was still an independent city. In 1898 when Greater New York City was established uniting the five boroughs, the team (who wasn't yet known as the Dodgers) proudly kept their association with Brooklyn, which has often been treated as the poor step brother of its swankier neighbor across the East River, similar in a way to the relationship between the South Side of Chicago and the North Side.

My son, a Cubs fan, happens to work at Rate Field (what a silly name). He's told me how on many occasions, late in the season when the Sox are out of contention, which in the last few years has been after the Fourth of July**, the fans in the stands, well some of them anyway, openly root against the Sox if they happen to be playing one of the Cubs' division rivals, just to spite their hometown rival.

What dawned on me when he told me that was that these folks' hatred of the Cubs was greater than their love of the White Sox.

It's an old cliché to say that sports are a microcosm of life, but in this case I have to agree.

To put it simply, hate is a stronger, more easily stoked emotion than love, for some people anyway.

It's true in sports, in our relationships with other people, and especially true these days with political ideology.

I recently read a question and answer in an online site. The question was: "Why are we MAGA folks considered idiots by the other side, after all didn't we win the election?"

The answer I read didn't concern itself with the "considered idiots" part, but directly addressed the "we" part. 

The responder began by saying: "You, (emphasis mine) did not win the election, the candidate(s) you voted for won the election."

His response didn't include a sports analogy but I will. Voters identifying with a political party are much like fans identifying with a sports team. While I contribute nothing of substance to any sports team, except occasionally paying money to see a game, I still identify with the teams I root for. I may not agree with the choices the front office makes, or the way the team is managed, or the way the players perform on the field, but I still root for them as they are my team win or lose. 

While I love my city, from Howard Street on the north to 138th Street on the south, I identify myself as a White Sox fan and not a Cubs fan, thereby declaring my camaraderie with other Sox fans, even though I live a mere three blocks from Howard Street, go figure.

Rivalries are what make sports fandom exciting and fun, and second only to betting, they are the reason why spectator sports exist in the first place.  

It's human nature to associate with people who share our values, who think like us, and are "on the same page" in sports as well as in politics.

So I don't have a problem with folks identifying with a political party or ideology.

The problem begins when the hate part comes in.

In sports, as much as we may claim to "hate" our rivals, any sports fan with half a brain knows that without rivals, there would be no game. Without them, our team would have nobody to play. What would be the point of that?

However in politics, especially in the recent several years, the hate is real for so many of our fellow Americans who believe, (thanks in part to politicians who stoke fear and hatred) that the people on the other side are trying to destroy our country. Therefore they are the enemy, and should be put down by any means possible.

Sports fans who understand the true nature of "hating" a rival team, whether they admit it or not, are fans of the game first, followed by being fans of a particular team. Win or lose we root for them, but if our team does something to hurt the game, as the 1919 Chicago White Sox did by having members of that team throw the World Series for money, it is perfectly reasonable to stop supporting them, at the very least until they clean up their act.

What the responder to that online question was getting at is that in American politics, we may identify with a party, movement or ideology, but it's important to remember that we are Americans first. And when the party or movement you identify with does something to hurt our country such as wage insurrections and illegal wars, making a direct assault of the free press, declaring that everyone on the other side is an "enemy of the republic" just to name a few, it is incumbent on the movement's followers as Americans first, to step back and say no.

There is certainly room for debate on some of the issues I bring up, but for the life of me I can't see how anyone, even the most self-interested voter, could be oblivious to the rampant inflation caused by this president's dubious and illegal war with Iran, never mind the unconscionable suffering this war has brought to so many people. 

If the party and ideology I identify with did all that, I would have gotten off the bus years ago.

To use another metaphor, it would have been enough to make a Cubs fan out of me.

* OK I know some of you will get on me for these "facts" so here are a few clarifications:

• The Lake is always east unless you are in the extreme southeast neighborhoods of Eastside, Hegewisch and South Deering in which case the Lake is north. And also east. 
• Yes it's a free world so you can put whatever you want on a hot dog in Chicago, even ketchup. But local food culture is a serious thing here as it is anywhere in the world. Try ordering a pizza with a topping of ham and pineapple in Naples. 
• There are no exceptions to the third fact. 

 

**But not this year. Go Go White Sox!!!