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I wanted to write something about this, but old dickie Hanania beat me to it.
As a Republican, I’m amused and horrified. One common reaction was summed up by a tweet reading simply “We don’t deserve to win.” Just, what the fuck guys? Can’t we just be the normal ones? It shouldn’t be hard by comparison. But instead we’re attacking normality. We’re doing goofball shit.
Vivek, so recently a Republican candidate for President widely taken seriously, added to this genre tweeting out:
Such Texas Sharpshooter energy. I predict that the team that won last year’s Super Bowl will win this year’s super bowl, and that Taylor Swift will endorse the same person she endorsed in 2020 in the same race. But if the obvious happens, it’s a CONSPIRACY!
The problem is that even if you believe that Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce are artificially propped up, that Taylor is the result of media coverage and that the whole NFL is WWE with end zones, saying it doesn’t actually help you capture the millions of people who are fans of them. “Media Influence” is nearly always a Russell Conjugation: other people’s tastes are the result of media bias, my tastes are pure and formed entirely individually. People will almost never change their tastes as a result of being informed that they were “influenced” by the media, they will get angry. People will easily be convinced that other people are sheeple, they will almost never be convinced that they are. “Pop singers” Swifties will react angrily to this accusation, as will Chiefs fans. Neither will react kindly to the insinuation that their favorite thing is bullshit.
I can’t go through a week without hearing about Kelce from my mother or Swift from my wife. My wife is deep into the swiftie Gaylor conspiracy universe and asks my opinion on them when we’re stoned. My mother listens to every episode of the Kelce Brothers’ podcast, and gives me the highlights. Both are wealthy married white women, who own homes and cars, who value family and capitalism. My mother is not going to be convinced that she likes Travis Kelce because of the deep state and not because he is really good at getting open and he’s funny on mic. My wife is not going to be convinced that she doesn’t really like singing along to I Can See You. It’s a losing strategy to try to convince them that it’s all fake: most people start from the emotional opinion that everything is fake, they aren’t rationally convinced. Just as most atheists turn against the church for personal reasons and then become aware of all the rational arguments and contradictions involved.
The far better strategy by DR types would be to try to unwillingly recruit Swift and Kelce. The old “Aryan Princess” meme. Make them an icon of your side, and you make them problematic. Even when the inevitable Swift endorsement comes, it will feel hollow. Swift will be put in an uncomfortable position, weakened by being forced to deny being a white supremacist. Her fans will be offended by being called racists for liking the music they like, and start to turn against those calling them racists.
Of course, this isn’t happening because I doubt that Trump is declaring “Holy War” on Swift. That’s just a little unsourced TDS tidbit the liberal media couldn’t resist. This is just various hustling influencers seizing on a big name. But if you want to be an insurgent party, discipline is key, and this isn’t it.
AND YET
I find Hanania is being very uncharitable to the right, and buying into an essentially progressive framing of the world. The captured version of the NFL that we watch every week, with “STOP RACISM” written on helmets and in the end zones, with required interviews for minority coaching candidates*, with the mildly absurd farce of wildly-celebrated female coaches in minor functionary roles buried on the staff, with every ad break featuring female athletes (and especially the hypothetical female high school football player featured over and over). Equally, I saw the Eras Tour movie with my wife, and friends of ours went to the concert. It was clear that comparing what was on camera to the crowd at the actual concerts, they went out of their way to make it seem less white than it was. Prominent romantic roles were given to Black Male dancers on stage, despite Taylor herself dating only white men historically, prominent roles were given to flamboyantly gay and trans dancers. Taylor put in the effort in advance to make it a comfortable experience for liberals.
So when Richard says:
He’s ignoring the context. Liberals were “that guy” for years, and they were loudly whiny, and they succeeded. The NFL and pop culture and ordinary speech changed to accommodate liberals. And it seems to be working, with ratings rebounding from 2016 downtrends. But Hanania is praising liberals for being able to watch a football game telecast that has been designed to soothe them, while blaming Conservatives for being unable to watch a telecast that has been designed to soothe their enemies. It’s a trap Conservatives have fallen into, and they should be shamed for it! But it’s also the fruit of the Long March Through the Institutions.
*The Rooney Rule originally struck me as fairly decent, fairly fair: teams must interview one minority candidate for coaching positions. No requirement to hire, but you have to interview. The results have become increasingly absurd. The Eagles had black Offensive and Defensive Coordinators who had a terrible embarrassing end to the season, but had done well before. Both got a few token Head Coach interviews, to satisfy the Rooney Rule, and as a result the Eagles did not fire them, hanging onto them for way longer than anyone believed the Eagles would bring them back. Because if you get a black coach hired away, you get a compensatory draft pick for it. It was a silly spectacle to watch.
Meh, its a thing with football itself. A decent portion of the game clock time is spent not playing the game. Not even counting how often it is paused, or that there are long breaks like half time. Whats the camera gonna do during all that break time? Gotta do something, might as well look at the most famous people at the game. As someone who doesn't really care about football or find it super interesting, this has always been a plus for me. I can go to a party where people care about football and still interact with the people that like football for about half the time, and then be on my phone the other half the time.
I was watching the last Chiefs vs Ravens game with someone that was actively annoyed at Taylor Swift coming on screen. They are a political junkie. They work at a think thank. They've been involved with politics for many years. They could probably come up with a multitude of reasons why this is a political annoyance. Wasn't my impression though. They were eager to see the actual game, and any of the interruptions were annoying to them. There are basically only two outcomes for things between football plays: immediately ignoring the thing, or immediately hating it.
The smart ad money should ironically be on the people that don't care about the games at all.
Think about it. You have a football fanatic that is definitely going to watch the game. The TV will be on in a semi public setting. The non-football fanatics will have lost interest in the game very quickly.
The game stop (like it does every thirty seconds). The football fanatic is on the edge of their seat waiting for more action (which usually happens). Everyone else is bored on their phones. The football fanatic is denied their fix (a commercial, or a cut to some celebrity in the stands). The football fanatic exclaims in anger or frustration built up from watching the game. Everyone else is temporarily jerked out of their phones. Boom! Play the ad, get two audiences instead of just one.
One of my favorite ads in recent football memory is for Tide. A laundry detergent. They basically did an aggressive campaign of being a part of every commercial break, and tricking you into thinking it was an ad for a different product. But Tide isn't really a great product to advertise for men watching football. However, its the perfect product to advertise to wives, mothers, and girlfriends who have men watching football.
That is my pet theory for the Taylor Swift ad spots.
You are right if course, but I'm pretty sure this philosophy is why sports broadcasting have been haemorrhaging money in recent years. Scratch that, why every form of entertainment has gone to shit in recent years. Everyone is so eager to disrupt and get that new audience that we've turned everything into focus grouped bullshit.
I enjoy video games, stand up comedy, podcasts, and youtube videos. Low barriers to entry hasn't stopped enshitification, but new entrants in the art just take over.
I don't understand, what does that mean for sports media?
Emphasis added by me. If you'd left it at the first sentence I would say I don't disagree or have much of an opinion (since I don't watch sports). I just disagree with the stronger claim that all entertainment has gone to shit.
I would not be surprised if sports is extra shitty, partly because they intentionally put up barriers to entry in order to squeeze every penny they can out of the broadcast rights.
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