Friday, January 20, 2006
Professional Sports
The world of professional sports boggles me. Maybe it is the state of our society that bothers me more, but because professional sports is the perfect example of what is wrong with society, they are the perfect thing to lash out at. Professional athletes get paid an outrageous amount of money to play a sport. I understand that at times it can be difficult, you can even get seriously injured doing your job. Many professional athletes are A-holes who cant manage their money and usually screw their lives up with it. I work in a field that is extremely underpaid, all the while meeting people who work in different agencies that are trying to shape and change our future. These organizations are usually understaffed and underpaid. Society makes shelters for abused and neglected children to feel better about themselves and yet dont pay attention when these shelters close because of lack of funding or the people who work there are not committed to it in the first place and are only working there to get a pay check. The people who have the experience and patience to work with this population are out trying to find the higher paying jobs so these CPS workers, shelter workers, Case management positions are being filled by inexperienced workers (mostly) just trying to get the next paycheck. If our society cared as much about its future as it did about its entertainment, then the people who are trying to save the future should be valued more that the people who just entertain us. I cannot sit in front of a TV and watch these bafoons tramp around in an arena or on a field the same way anymore. By supporting it I feel like I am saying it is ok. It is not ok for children to fall through the cracks of a system that no one is paying attention to. These shelters never have enough beds. Workers have to fight to get referals from the money-source to get kids out of abusive home and into shelters because they dont want to pay the prices of puting this kid up in a shelter. Most atheletes will make more than I could even dream about this year and I work in a system that has to fight for funding to get a child into a safe place. Because these places pay so pathetically, these places arent even really safe anymore. Take a kid out of an abusive home so they can go to an abusive shelter? What is wrong????
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7 comments:
Hey 80.
Nice post. I agree, the problem however (in my opinion of course) is not with the athelete, it is with us. Sports is like any other product...supply and demand. Those atheletes are only paid that much because we pay for tickets, merchandise, etc. to facilitate this.
Unfortunately, we see this in corporate America as well. Bottom lines are getting bigger and bigger (profit margins) and the small people are getting neglected. CEO's and the such need to be held accountable...but who do they answer to? Us. The shareholder (like Berger outlined in his blog). We need our IRA's and 401'k,etc. etc. to do well so corporations need to do well so the share price drives up on Wall Street and WE make money.
So, in my opinion, it all comes back to us. Things need to change here, but it will only start when Christians make stands against these things and help out directly, and I think it can be done.
For example, I use this just to illustrate a point (not to be conceited)...I learned that the amount of money Americans spend annually on golf is so high that if everyone stopped you could feed every person who is starving in this world for a year. So, I quit golfing the day I read that. My mom said it was stupid. That I enjoy golfing and that you could apply that scenario with any type of entertainment (like movies, going out to eat, bowling, etc), and I understood her point, however, I know that I needed to start somewhere. We all need to start somewhere....
g- i completely agree that it is us. i agree it is not the athletes fault. we are not forcing them to take those high salaries, for me it is like the golf scenario. knowing that i am feeding this entertainment cycle, all i can do is start with me.
Hey, what was that thing Donald Miller was talking about when he said we ought to was around with a sign board that says "I Am The Problem" in Blue Like Jazz? It's not the athlete, it's not corporate America, repeat after me, "I Am The Problem". Keep reminding me and maybe I'll do something.
I share your frustration. I agree with Grant that we as the consumers have the power. We make daily decisions of where our time and money will be spent. I don't buy professional sports tickets for this reason. But I'll find hypocrisy in my spending habits somewhere. Like Grant said, "You got to start somewhere."
There is a lot of ugly in professional sports, but there is a lot that is beautiful in there, too. It gets buried sometimes.
I love sports. I love professional sports. Being a sports fan is about being part of something bigger - part of a group that hopes for achievement. It's about competition. It's about loyalty. It's about celebrating success. Most of all it's about merit - regardless of your background, race or personality - you can be successful at sports if you have enough talent and work hard enough. That's why Jackie Robinson's story is a great American story - not just a great sports story. The same with Muhammad Ali, Joe DiMagio, Arthur Ashe, Serena Williams, James Braddock or a thousand more.
I can't make the argument that no athletes are jerks - some are. Or that no athlete wastes his money. Some do. Anyone at any job can be a jerk, especially if you're rich. I can't make the argument that being an athlete is more noble than being a social worker or teacher or construction worker - it's not. I can't make the argument that it's a mistake to take the forty dollars you were going to spend on the game and give it to a more noble cause - it's not. But sports is not the cause of evil in our society.
There is no correlation between what professional athletes get paid and what teachers, social workers or firemen get paid. No teacher is underpaid because an athlete is overpaid. We underpay teachers because we undervalue teachers. You can cancel the upcoming seasons of MLB, the NFL, NASCAR, the NBA and whatever other leagues you want and it won't lead to more money for any of those things. I don't think much positive would come from it at all. The huge numbers that athletes make is result of a simple equation: free-market plus prosperity. We live in an incredibly prosperous society-Americans donated almost 250 billion dollars to non-profits last year (compared to an estimated pro AND amateur sports industry of 213 billion a year). You can't just take that 213 billion from the sports category and give it to the non-profit category. Sports isn't an example of what is wrong with our society - it's one example of what is right . And the amount athletes get paid is a result of prosperity that allows us to do very much more than some societies that have no sports.
I have a REAL PROBLEM with this post! Namely... that it is the LAST ONE you've written since JANUARY. What does it take to get some new Adrienne-ish genius on this here world wide web? =)
Sure, perhaps the pay is sickening. I'm going into education and I know what I'm going to make. Then again, I didn't start playing ball when I was four, practicing day and night, learning to ply my trade so that I could play in college, and then get drafted. I don't have a skill that one in a million people have. I also agree with Tug's post, if we stopped paying athletes, professions such as Teachers, Social Workers, and Police Officers would still be scraping the bottom of the pay scale.
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