On the Contrary: Don’t Kick Steeler Nation While We’re Down
So that was it. NFL football is no more, possibly for much longer than the scheduled seven months if the probable lockout happens. It was not a happy note to end on for a Steelers fan like myself, watching the team lose while a cheering national media favored the Packers. There was the sense that the once-respected Steelers were the villains of the game. After the game it didn’t take long for me to start receiving gloating messages informing me that I deserved this disappointment since I was “cheering for a rapist.” Which is, of course ridiculous. I was cheering for a team, not for a rapist. He’s just a player on that team.
For any non-sports fan that spent the last year on Mars, the quarterback for the Pittsburgh Steelers, Ben Roethlisberger, was accused of sexually assaulting a 20-year-old college student in a small town Georgia bar last May. No charges were filed, but Big Ben’s image went into the toilet, culminating in a four game suspension for violating the personal conduct policy of the NFL.
Soon after this happened, non-Steeler friends of mine started jumping all over me, wondering how I could continue to support such a despicable human being. This was really disturbing, because I didn’t want to support a rapist, but I still was behind my Steelers. What a conundrum. Thankfully, it all went away once the games started. This is as it should be.
For the sake of this argument, let’s assume that Roethlisberger is guilty, putting aside the fact that charges were never filed (based on the accuser’s wishes), the police report makes everything seem a lot more complicated than it was reported, and none of us were actually there to confirm what happened. At the very least, Big Ben seems to have a reputation for being an arrogant, unlikable boor. Sure, he seems to have rehabilitated himself throughout the season—primarily through taking his team to the Super Bowl and smiling while talking to reporters—but this smacks of effort on his part. Whatever the case I never cared much for him as a person in the first place, and that was only cemented by this controversy.
But should that effect how I feel about the Steelers? Maybe a little. But when you think about it, it’s kind of ridiculous that we pretend what athletes are like personally has any bearing on our rooting interests for teams. Since we don’t really know any of them, what does it matter? I probably would not like 99% of professional athletes if I actually knew them. Most would be very boring. They spend most of their lives and energies exercising and thinking about playing games. For taking this narrow focus to life, they are rewarded with more money in a year than I am likely to see in my lifetime. Many are arrogant, intellectually incurious Republicans (not that there’s anything wrong with that) who think Jesus helps them win when they play well but never hold the Man Upstairs responsible for their failures (with the notable of exception of Steve Johnson). These are not really people I have any interest in knowing or becoming friends with.
Nor should it matter, really. I don’t cheer for the people on a team. I cheer for the colors. I cheer for the place the team plays for. I cheer for all of those people back in Western Pennsylvania who I know are watching along with me. I hate teams like the New England Patriots and their quarterback Tom Brady, but I would love him if he were wearing black and gold and playing in Pittsburgh. I don’t care what he’s like as a person—I hate him because he plays for another team. And I think most sports fans, if they would be completely honest, would have to admit the same thing.
A game is in its way like a work of art. I’m not trying to extol the beauty of sport here, but we watch a sporting event for the same reasons we read a novel, go to a movie, or listen to music. We want an emotional experience. The background of the people creating that experience really does not come into the emotional equation. Director Roman Polanski drugged and raped a 13-year-old girl, but that does not influence my appreciation of CHINATOWN. Record producer Phil Spector is a convicted murderer, but that doesn’t affect my feelings when I listen to The Ronettes.
I’m not absolving people of their crimes. But at the same time, appreciating their work or cheering for a team the play on is not the same thing as endorsing them as people or their behavior. Sporting events, like works of art, should be allowed to stand on their own, apart from the outside antics of their players.
All of this is really just a long way of me pleading for people to give Steeler Nation a break. We lost the Super Bowl. Can we stop being villains now?
I’m totally with you. I neither like Roethlisberger nor approve of his actions, however I do consider myself to be a part of Steeler nation. Just like I didn’t feel that George W. defined our nation when he was in the White House, I don’t feel that Ben R defines our team b/c he’s the quarterback.
I think it’s easier for us as workers in the entertainment business to divorce the person from the product. I happily watch Woody Allen movies and stayed on the edge of my seat during THE PIANO. Would I ever want to have dinner with either of these directors? No.
Though, I would put part of the blame as to how the male-led MSM has spun this story. So many announcers talked about Ben R in terms of making a comeback from sexual assault accusations — as if he were blameless, and as if the dropped charges surely meant the accuser had been lying in the first place. I think we all know that these charges could have been perfectly valid and that the accuser might have been pressured into dropping them.
Women make up half this country and rape is a very serious crime, but wit often doesn’t get reported and the MSM tends to spin all women that accuse players of rape as opportunists looking for attention — because really so many women want the attention that comes with rape charges. Right.
Though I support the Steelers, I am enraged that so many announcers chose to paint him as a victim, someone who had overcome charges as opposed to walked away from them with a slap on the hand.
But once again, I feel that many Americans have missed the point with this situation. While Pittsburgh fans have been made to feel that they are supporting a rapist, many Pittsburgh fans have responded with “well, the charges were dropped, leave us alone.” Not enough people are acknowledging, in my opinion, that the way we handle rape charges in this country is often deplorable and that while we support the Steelers, we in no way condone rape.
I think just taking a moment of pause to decide that you do not like Roethlisberger, but that you will continue to support the team is more than most people have done. I’m very concerned with the level of discourse surrounding the situation, with so many Pittsburgh fans clumsily slut-shaming the accuser, and so many non-Steelers fans acting as if they’ve never been associated with any team or product touched by sexual assault.
Jeremy Stevens is a disgusting human being and I HATED having to root that asshole just because he wore Seahawks’ blue.
I think we should focus on the positive here, let’s be “Glass Half Full” people and think about how the Packers won…
*kidding dig ;)~ tee hee
After ranting about how the level of discourse has gone down in this country all week, I think I’m going to have to reverse myself and say, “You suck.”
LOL
Joe, I feel your pain as my beloved Eagles are led by a dog torturing murderer, Michael Vick. I will root for the Eagles until my dying day, but I’m not afraid to slam them publicly and express how mad I am at them for making this asshole our quarterback.
I totally understand the difference between a team and it’s players. But I find there to be something so completely fundamentally wrong with rewarding bad people with millions of dollars, fame, and most disgustingly, the role of role model for so many children.
I think the reason people like Vick and Rothlisburger are kept on their teams is because of people like you who say let’s separate the person from the sport. As long as the teams are winning games, no one cares. If everyone would stand up and instead say let’s not have rapists and murderers running our teams, maybe the team owners would start to listen.
I really do empathize with your conundrum as I’m in the same boat with my team, but at the end of the day when the Eagles lost, I honestly wasn’t nearly as sad as I would have been had it been McNabb playing. And at the end of the day, I’m hardly feeling bad Rothlisburger didn’t pull out a win for the super bowl – even though I’m from Pennsylvania.
I agree and I think you summed this up perfectly! I am not a fan of Big Ben (I did not care much for him before the allegations), but I am definitely a member of the Steeler Nation!