As I watched NFL football yesterday, I noticed coaches on the sidelines wearing “salute to service” fatigue-like hoodies. The NFL does this every year to celebrate the military and to “support our troops.” It’s popular and lucrative to boot, since you can buy this gear on nflshop.com (a hoody will set you back a cool $115).
For $115, you too can own a team hoodie in military olive drab. Hooah!
Sports, especially NFL football, are incredibly powerful and influential within American society.
Back in 2018, I was briefly involved in discussions, associated with the 9/11 Memorial & Museum in New York City, about the role sports played in the aftermath of the attacks in 2001. The general subject was how sports brought the nation together after those attacks. I shared the following comments below with two likeminded colleagues who were involved in the initial discussions, after which I never heard anything from the museum.
I think sports did help to bring the nation together after 9/11. The return of the games showed a return to normalcy. They were a chance for patriotic display and also an opportunity to forget, perhaps for just a moment, the losses America suffered in those attacks.
But they arguably set a precedent. In the aftermath of 9/11, patriotic displays took on a military flavor that has only grown more powerful over the years. My memory is of spontaneous displays that, over time, grew increasingly organized, exaggerated, and linked to corporate and commercial agendas, while retaining a strong military presence.
Anti-war demonstrations failed as the nation mobilized for war against Iraq in 2003. That war proved disastrous. The Bush/Cheney administration hid the costs of war from us (not even allowing us to see flag-draped caskets) and suppressed criticism of a disastrous war by telling us we needed to “support our troops.”
Not to be cynical, but how much of this sports/military/patriotism blending is done, not just for recruiting purposes, but to inhibit any kind of serious (and populist) movement against the “forever” wars we’re waging?
In other words, the post-9/11 sports/military nexus, while it may have soothed the country in the aftermath of 9/11, came with a high price tag: the lack of any serious questions about why we were attacked, and also the discouragement of anti-war protests as both divisive and disrespectful.
To me the high price is reflected in the life of Pat Tillman. He patriotically sacrificed a lucrative NFL career to fight the war on terror. It appears he came to question that war. He was killed by friendly fire [in 2004], which the Army hushed up, giving him a false narrative and a Silver Star under false pretenses. One man’s selfless patriotic act became twisted into a feel-good heroic moment that betrayed the ideals of the Army and of the country (and devastated his family as well).
Does the 9/11 museum really want to tackle tough issues like this? The appropriation of patriotism by the powerful as a way of silencing dissent? The betrayal of ideals we hold dear?
I added the following comment on “camouflage” sports uniforms being marketed around Independence Day in 2018:
I was talking with my wife yesterday. She, like me, hates the camouflage swag that’s been incorporated into sports uniforms. This is not “military appreciation.” It’s more military indoctrination and idolization.
We wear camouflage when we’re in deadly combat. It’s totally inappropriate for games that are supposed to be entertaining and fun, not a matter of life-and-death.
The Romans used gladiatorial games to accustom the mob to violence; to inure them to murder and killing; to train them to support the worst of Rome’s imperial policies. Are we using our games to accustom Americans to incessant warfare and surging military budgets and the “wonders” of our own empire?
I wrote something about this here: As America’s games are becoming more militarized, America’s wars are becoming more game-like, a form of infotainment, at least in the way they’re packaged and sold by the media:
So I think some of this macho militarism is being promoted as a counter to this “feminized society.” Trump tapped this sentiment, calling for protesters to be punched, for the NFL to allow more violent hits, etc.
We’re all supposed to be “real men” again: sort of like the Reagan years. Remember the book, “Real Men Don’t Eat Quiche”? Now it’s real men punch protesters, wear camouflage, and …
I didn’t finish my list of “real men” activities in 2018. Today, we hear even more about “warrior ethos” and the like, about the need to show toughness, e.g. by summarily murdering people on speedboats in the Caribbean who may, or may not, be drug-runners, or by dragging young teenagers off the streets and shipping them hundreds of miles to detention centers because their papers aren’t in order, and so on.
So, as the NFL persists in wearing pseudo-military gear, perhaps they might consider a new rule that would make every player a member of the reserves or national guard, subject to military recall and service from the months of March to August. If they want to salute military service so vigorously, why not just serve in uniform?
Bracing Views 