Bernstein: Stop Burning Jerseys
By Dan Bernstein--
It's nice to know I'm not the only person around who has been left a little sickened by the events of the last three days in Chicago sports. The intensity and volume of discourse on every available platform has been astonishing, as everyone feels strongly.
The Bears' poor play and the outcome of the NFC title game were only the beginning, unfortunately, as the time since has seen fiction win out over truth, even in the minds of those trusted to know better.
We're all a little worn out, now.
As the Jay Cutler storm passes into the gray of winter, I cannot shake the video images of those irate fans burning their #6 jerseys.
"Say goodbye to Jay Cutler," one man said in a clip posted online. He held the gasoline-doused jersey up on a stick and torched it. He did so in front of two kids.
Must we?
It's one thing to scream something in the heat of the moment, overcome with anger at an athlete for a bad pass, missed shot, or free-agent departure. Feelings get exaggerated all the time, since that's part of what attracts us to a healthy relationship with sports.
Jersey-burning is different. The malice aforethought is troubling, since there must be enough sustained anger throughout the process. Rash decision to do it, figuring out where would be best, rummaging through closets or garages for an accelerant, finding a lighter – at some point during all that, you'd hope the fan stops and wonders "Why the hell am I doing this?"
Usually, he is grandstanding for the TV cameras in the parking lot of the stadium or outside the bar. That's why the cretin on his back porch stands out so starkly to me: he's at home, with children watching, he's having someone record him, and he's oddly calm. Scary stuff.
Don't try to argue for your constitutional right to do this. Of course you have the right, just as your right to burn the American flag should be protected, repulsive as that may be. This is not an issue of free expression, but rather one of taste, judgment and perspective.
Burning effigies are powerful images – eliminationist rhetoric made most visceral short of actual harm. To employ them for social and political purpose, even, is for shock value. While writers and talk-show hosts traffic in wild rants and inflated emotions, words are still words. Actually lighting something on fire goes beyond that.
To do it because a team lost a game is just unnecessary.
Whether it's Cutler leaving Denver, Cutler getting hurt on Sunday, or LeBron James relocating his "talents," the literal embodiment of inflamed passion is on display all too readily with a Google videos search, and my wish that this ends may be granted by the natural evolution of such things.
Shocking becomes mundane faster than we think. What was once thought of as overreaction becomes everyday behavior.
(Think about college basketball fans "storming the court," for example. A phenomenon that used to be reserved for championships and impossible upsets is now routine. Students mob the floor after a preseason rout of Texas A&M Kingsville or Athletes in Action)
As soon as jersey-burning is cliché, it'll end. Maybe it already is.
My worry, then, is what replaces it. The anger isn't going anywhere, and the amount of stupid and crazy appears to be growing.
Dan Bernstein has been the co-host of "Boers and Bernstein" since 1999. He joined the station as a reporter/anchor in 1995. The Boers and Bernstein Show airs every weekday from 1PM to 6PM on The Score, 670AM.
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