redfishingboat

The professional football team I’ve rooted for in the past has just agreed to pay one million six-hundred thousand dollars to Michael Vick, a man convicted of raising dogs for the purpose of torturing and killing those dogs as entertainment.

I love to watch sports, despite certain problems I have with the value system that professional sports represent.  I am now faced with the question if this employment of Michael Vick is something that I ignore,  or is there a line where enough is enough.

There is a line. On one side of the line here is the situation:

I really do love sports as a diversion from the mundane. I try to ignore the unbalanced compensation for these athletes and instead revel in their physical accomplishments. The beauty of sports is that doing a better job results in a victory. And, often that plays out in dramatic, surprising, and entertaining fashion.

The compensation and reward for athletic feats indicates a problem in our society.  It is a free market, and they are entitled to whatever we are willing to pay them.  The unbalanced compensation itself is not the problem. The willingness on our behalf to participate and encourage the imbalance it is the problem.

I believe the reason we are willing to compensate celebrities beyond their value is because we’ve willingly failed to educate ourselves about how a functioning society of millions of people must work over hundreds of years.  On some level, we understand that giving millions of dollars to a physically gifted man while laying teachers off their jobs is wrong, but we don’t fully understand the long-term effects on our collective well-being. We believe that’s just how things work in a democracy, and so far it hasn’t really made all our lives the poorer – just a few people not worth mentioning.  Of course, this was similar to the prevailing social view before the fall of the Roman Empire.

And, being a dutiful citizen-consumer, I’ve been able to ignore the millions of dollars given to athletes and the ways they dispose of that money; the incredible castles they build, the chariots they ride in.  They are just humans like you and me. It’s not their fault.  They got lucky. Good for them, in a way. I see the issue, but feel powerless to effect change. Bring me bread and a circus!

And here is the other side of that line:

Here is a man, Michael Vick, whom we know has done pure evil. We know exactly what he did. It has been proven, and the details we know are evil. If you believe anything in the world can be called evil, this man has done that thing.

In his words, he made “a mistake.”  But, four years of meticulously planned activity, with custom built facilities is more than a mistake.  It is a lifestyle.

It has been said that with his prison term he has paid his debt, and that he deserves a second chance.  I wholeheartedly agree with this. Except, a second chance means he should be able to remain free of prison in a three-bedroom house while he pours concrete for a living, clips coupons, buys the cheap beer, and volunteers at animal shelters.  That’s the same “chance” the rest of us have.  If he is a changed man, he is entitled to work hard as a free man. There is no duty to restore him to a highly-compensated life of protected privilege, there is only the choice to willingly bestow upon him those things if you believe he,  as a member of society, deserves better compensation than the average teacher, nurse, or physical therapist.

So, for the owners and management of the Philadelphia Eagles to willingly give the man one million six hundred thousand dollars is an unequivocal statement. It is a statement that they believe there is nothing they would not ignore in their selfish pursuits for enrichment. There is no value they will not willingly undermine in an attempt to get even richer than they already are.

I’m following the “national debate” on what this all means with a morbid resignation.   No one understands the deeper level of how uneducated we are. The most vocal opinions are often the least educated.  Brains are getting a workout only as far as they can be used to craft sharper attacks on the opposite viewpoint.  Any nuanced view gets obliterated, as we all dutifully take opposite positions, ignoring the underlying issues and problems that are too shockingly intractable to acknowledge. In this way, it is exactly like politics.

As I sat down to write about this, I wondered why I would even bother.  But, then I heard anecdotes about families selling their Eagles season tickets. I heard a report of fans in tears at the Eagles stadium.  Could it be that this line exists for others too? I wondered what it would be like if the public finally rose up and refused to continue to support “their team” no matter what indecency is promoted by that organization?  Could this be a “teachable moment” that future humans can look back at in pride and say, “Enough was enough.”?

Well, not likely. But, maybe.

I can’t support this sports team after their decision to employ Michael Vick.