If you taunt, berate, out belittle athletes in games, it says a lot about how you view them. To you, they're not people. They're chattel. Hired entertainment. Dancing monkeys. They don't become real until they come onto the stands. Like Mos Def said, "The hardheaded always gotta feel it to believe it."
A thorough, well-earned, ass-whooping will end a lot of this. The average fan really doesn't wanna risk the possibility that security will get there before they eat that two-piece. It's all fun and games until that ass is getting tenderized. I think we all understand that most fans are pussy, even in this shit-talking, rude, and insulting environment we call "America in 2014." Everybody talks, but almost nobody really wants to back it up, which is part of the reason why gun sales are up. The threat of backing up shit-talk without a gun would eliminate all but the most "bout that life" fans from getting disrespectful. The people who want to fight would just have to become the hazard of doing business, I guess.
Still, we can't have that. Letting players to go after pieces of shit in the stands is a horrible business plan, because unlicensed dentistry in a public place isn't really a selling point. No matter how right the player may be (I still think that Dikembe should have been allowed to punch that dude for calling him a monkey), that kind of stuff has to be deterred. Otherwise, players will think that it's normal to run in the stands and people will stop coming to games. This isn't wrestling, where the fight coming into the stands is a good thing. Patting the participants on the back will just make you part of the fight. And the first time a totally innocent fan gets hit by a player, that fan will suddenly own a piece of the team and start making all the stupid trades that you and your friends talk about during flag football. So what's the solution, then?
There isn't one. I think we all understand that human beings are terrible creatures, most of which don't deserve the basic decency that they think they're entitled to. I work in a field where all I do is deal with entitled, shitty, people who think they're better than me because I have on work boots. I see it all the time. You're condescending, arrogant, and rude. Just look at how you act when you go to a restaurant, or heaven forbid, Wal-Mart. You don't deserve any kindness, especially after you answered your phone in the movie theater. Dear People of America: Generally speaking, you're pieces of shit. Okay, you might not set car bombs, kick puppies, or use the n-word, but those aren't the only things you can do to be considered a terrible person.
So expecting the paying customer to improve his own behavior is a fool's errand. The leagues still need to get something in place to deal with this, because it's gotten ridiculous. Basically, the leagues (Really, just the NBA and college basketball, because it's no coincidence that the leagues where the players have weapons also have barriers between players and fans) need to empower players to get fans ejected.
Tell the players that if someone is getting out of line, they can pull a ref to the side, point the person out, the ref will eject the fan, and security will throw him out on his ass. It should be that simple. I doubt the players would lie on fans, because they've got out things going on, like the game happening around them. They don't have time to pick out fans to eject so you can confirm your victimization bias. Truth is, do you know how big of an asshole you have to be to get the attention of someone on the court, let alone make them try to come after you? And while the players run the risk of identifying the wrong person, after throwing down $1,000 on courtside tickets, the fans standing around the right person will make sure that they stand out. Watching everybody turn into snitches will be part of the fun of a program like this.
And to get an athlete in the middle of a game so upset that they want to put their hands on you is hard to do. I know, because I've tried, and I assure you, it takes more than effort and a big mouth. When I was in college, my friend Mike and I used to sit courtside at our team's basketball games and go in on people. To us, it was all in fun, but we were assholes, plain and simple. It got to the point where it was secondary to the game. We just wanted to insult people. We felt like we were creating the homecourt advantage that Jackson State desperately needed (because we weren't getting better players any time soon). And to show how stupid our asses were, we yelled at the referees more than anyone else. The same referees that could have put us out at any time, and here we are, making fun of their shoes and pants. To their credit, they never reacted, and I know they heard us.
They should have put us out. I would have. If it had been me, i would have tried to get is banned from the building. What we did was uncalled for. Fun at the time, because we were stupid 20 year olds, but uncalled for.
So I get why people do it when they're young. I wouldn't do that now, because I'm mentally well-adjusted. You're supposed to grow out of this kind of shit, but the people who seem to wind up in these incidents now are all 40 and 50 year old men. I guess it's empowering to feel like you can yell at these people and they can't do shit, but how emasculated do you have to be in your personal life to think that insulting rich athletes is a healthy outlet? Who told you your dick was small, Jeff Orr?
Because it isn't about the money that they paid for tickets that makes people feel empowered to act like that. Hell, we got in free to our games and we were practically standing on the court. I think that making it about the money paid just gives them an excuse. No, they're just shitty people. I bet they treat wait staff at restaurants the same way. It has nothing to do with the tickets. There are hundreds of other people in that same section who paid just as much who didn't incite a player to jeopardize his paycheck, scholarship, or legal freedom just for the chance to crack them across the jaw.
Knowing that, I won't blame Marcus Smart for shoving that asshole, because I've been that asshole. Jeff Orr had that coming, and probably more, just like i did. We can't keep going through life thinking that, just because someone is doing something for us, be it entertaining us or working on our behalf, rich or poor, that we can just treat them with disrespect. You might think you're above them in that instance, but a fist to the face will put you on the same level real quick.
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