The Relief Valve

Guest Post by Eric Peters

Strong passions can erupt in unpredictable ways.

The government understands this – and desires that strong passions be diverted in a harmless – to the government – way.

Enter the cultivated, culturally and socially enforced obsession with organized, mass spectacle sports.

Fuuhhhhhtttttball especially but also the others.

These games – a new one to keep people busy almost every day, year-round –  are not so much “bread and circuses,” as they are often called. They are the vivification of the fictional Two Minutes’ Hate in Orwell’s 1984. A means by which the passions – the frustrations and anger of men in particular – are diverted and dissipated.

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In order that they aren’t directed at anything important. 

Such as the ever-increasing control exercised over men by the state.

In red giant stage America, the average man has little meaningful control over his life. He does as he’s told – from driving the speed limit to paying “his” taxes. In the land of individuality, collectivism and conformity is the rule.

He must Submit and Obey. He must never raise his voice to question authority.

This stifling of independent action, punishment of deviation from any official orthodoxy and relentless suppression of independent judgment and self-reliance… this systematic thwarting of a normal man’s inclination to be a man. . .  well, the pressure builds.

The movie, Falling Down, captured this brilliantly. Unfortunately for Michael Douglas’ character, he wasn’t interested in “the game.”

The demand that men submit and obey is also hammered into today’s boys – usually by women.

Orwell got one thing wrong. It is not Big Brother.

It is Big Sister.

Everywhere, there are short-haired, pants-suited termagants vested with power; the sort who in a better time would have been spinster librarians and generally harmless. Today they infect bureaucracies such as EPA and DOJ and many others besides.

We encounter them at the doctor’s office and DMV.

The beetle-like little men that Orwell described abound, too. But they tyranny of our times is not a masculine tyranny such as Stalin’s. Note that in the Soviet Union, people were still largely free to partake of petty vices such as booze and cigarettes. Soviet power didn’t limit the size of sodas or force people to wear seat belts. It enforced political conformity only.

Maybe that’s why fuhhhhhhttttttball was never a big deal in the Soviet Union.

America’s tyranny is the tyranny of the elementary school marm over grown up men.

These days, a man can’t even paint his own house without first begging permission from the local Gertrud Schlotz-Klink. . . and if he doesn’t cut his grass when ordered or erects a shed unapproved…

Threatening letters.

Then a lien or some other encumbrance. Eventually, the thug scrum will come. So he learns to do what he’s told.

The rage boils but silently; it must have an outlet.

Enter the game.

He is empowered! On Sunday, he can be bellow like a rutting Cape Buffalo as his team takes the field. He basks in the reflected glory of their victory. He merges with the crowd, it overtakes him. Becomes him.

He is a member of the community of men once more.

Garish flappy pennants festoon his vehicles.

This, of course, being not only allowed but encouraged by the government.

And when “we” lose the game, our cuckolded American sports worshipper is demoralized and dejected – sometimes, for days on end. He feels great disappointment.

He is angry.

But in a way utterly harmless to the government.

He seethes, he yells, he shakes his fist . . . at the enemy team on the screen.

Never at the true enemy. . .  .

Axiom: The more hopeless a society is, the more under the thumb of the government-corporate nexus, the greater the adulation of professional sports teams and the deification of athletes. It is a kind of sweaty lottery – a means of dangling desperate hopes before hopeless people who might become dangerous if it ever occurred to them that there is no hope for them.

But hey – did you see that tackle?

The most loathsome dog torturing thug, outright rapists and murderers… beloved and forgiven, so long as they can run and throw or catch.

Always “the game.” Tonight’s. Yesterday’s. Tomorrow’s. An endless obsession with irrelevance.

Enstupidation accelerates.

It has been said that religion is the opiate of the masses. But religions center on values – and so, upon philosophy.

In other words, on things that matter.

The game does not matter.

All the natural, healthy emotions – including most especially anger – are adroitly redirected. Instead of being furious about constantly being required to disprove his alleged guilt, about having to submit to random, probable cause-free searches and such like by an increasingly tyrannical state, about being micromanaged and taxed and never, ever left in peace . . . the gelded, stoop-shouldered creature sitting in front of his TeeVeee is apopletic  about that “bad call,” that the “we” weren’t able to convert on third and long.

He is a fan – truly, in the actual derivation of that word. A fanatic  – about things properly the concern of children and the feeble minded.

Just what’s needed, from a certain point of view.

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tbone
tbone

Ernest Hemingway:
There are only three sports: bullfighting, motor racing, and mountaineering; all the rest are merely games.”
great article

Francis Marion

Bravo.

pyrrhus
pyrrhus

Roman charioteers were the highest paid athletes in history…..pannum et circenses

Gator
Gator

Great article, Eric. I’m sure I’m not the only TBPers that’s forgoing this spectacle tonight. i can understand why even thinking, awake white men still value the occasional football game as a welcome, if temporary, distraction from everything, but I’m kind of beyond that at this point. Once you see it for what it is, it loses its appeal. The ONLY reason I was a little interested is just to see just how propaganda laden it becomes in the age of Trump. Gaga and her ilk can’t help themselves.

I hope they go over the top with the anti-white, anti-trump nonsense tonight. Maybe it’s just the kick in the nuts other regular folks need to see through the nonsense. Let’s see the NFL survive in anything resembling its present form once millions of white men decide to stop giving them their eyeballs.

javelin
javelin

I was a regular Sunday afternoon and Monday night football viewer. Over the past 2 or 3 seasons I just have not watched. No conscious decision or grand epiphany–I simply have grown bored with sports viewing.
It is like watching repeats of your favorite show or movie–the plot and outcomes are the same. I don’t like or care for the pampered and over-paid players. There is no “great underdog” story….ho hum, the billionaire owned Patriots again playing some other billionaires team…..yawn.
I think I’ll setup some trays with the spring veggies and get the lettuce, broccoli, cauliflower and cabbages started…. a little grocery shopping, laundry and try a new recipe which I can use in my lunches for the week.
Where do people get the time to watch all of these ballgames?

Fiatman60
Fiatman60

Until the team loss, erupts into the streets after the game, and all hell breaks loose.
Vancouver Canucks Stanley cup game June 15, 2011………

Fighting Dove
Fighting Dove

Mr. Peters’s insightful point is that professional sports are not just bread and circuses, a diversion from serious matters. We all need diversions from time to time, and there’s nothing wrong with that. But sports fanaticism is a safety valve that releases pressure that might otherwise be directed at the rulers. The more the state tightens the screws, the more the peons want to lash out — but at the wrong target.

Their ire is directed at the other team, or their own team’s quarterback who makes too many incomplete passes, or the referees. Sports mania is a lightning rod that catches the dangerous current and grounds it. Super Bowl parties have the quality of religious ritual, with even the commercials being “voted” on and critiqued in the media.

Big-league sports have long transcended the game category. They are a tool of repression.

Barney
Barney

I question authority 24/7-365 so thanks Eric.

nkit
nkit

Budweiser, owned by the Belgian conglomerate, InBev has a special Super Bowl commercial for tonight that is decidedly pro immigration. Imagine that; a Belgian company trying to further indoctrinate Western nations on the virtues of open borders and unlimited immigration.

Gator
Gator

Wow. Fuck Budweiser. I’m NEVER buying that shit again. The others may be no better, but at least in this instance, I know where they stand.

Chubby Bubbles
Chubby Bubbles

Ha! Probably figuring they can embiggen their market by taking Islamic hordes from “dry” countries where the most folks can get is home-made rakia or similar… and introducing them to the refreshing enticements to be conveniently found at their now-local 7-11.

Iska Waran
Iska Waran

They’d probably make more money selling scimitars.

nkit
nkit

And not to be out done, 84 Lumber is also getting on the anti-Trump pro-immigration train. Can’t waste a great opportunity, such as millions of people entranced by a football game, to sow the seeds of further discord.

Personally, I enjoy watching sports, but not with a side of right or left wing ideology to go with it. This is the problem with my local paper, and many others perhaps; they can’t keep politics out of the sports pages. I suppose it is a big reason for declining viewers and revenue for the NFL and ESPN.

javelin
javelin

Yes–and I believe these types of ads are directed toward women with the emotional effect.
Screw the reality–that it is not well spoken, polite and clean little girls and women illegally running across our borders–when it is vastly the young, loud, and often violent males.
The power of these commercials is that the viewer is captivated by the story of the arduous trek of the downtrodden and defenseless females ( naturally bringing out the protection response of many males and the emotional/empathetic response of females)–in lieu of the fact that the premise is BULLSHIP.
Just like the media plastering pictures of women holding babies when discussing Islamic immigrants, when the reality is truckloads of angry, horny teens and twenties screaming across into the country or across the European continent as invaders/conquerers and ZERO intent of becoming European or American.

Gator
Gator

Fact – all these adds you mention are nothing but an emotional appeal to white women. Javelin touched on this above, but Ill expand a bit. I don’t know about you guys, but almost every woman in my immediate family, and some of my good friends wives, all watch the Super Bowl, even if they don’t care one bit about either of the teams playing, or football in general. So why do they watch a 4 hour long game that they don’t care about? THE COMMERCIALS. Every. single. one.of. them. Ask the women around you, see what they say. So if you KNOW you have a bunch of voting age white women, who are already more susceptable to this type of propaganda anyway, do to their being more emotional and sensitive, you have a perfect, captured audience for your bullshit, the biggest one in the entire country.

THAT, my friends, is the primary reason I am not, and will not, watch the Super Bowl. Fuck every single one of those companies and the people who run them. They are literally using your won money against you, and you help them doing it by watching these pampered, negro felons chase each other around.

Dennis Roe
Dennis Roe

You smacked that nail right on the head Eric. May the sheeple come together and rejoice at the Holy Spectacle of Oblivion! A half naked dimwit with pork chops earrings shall enlighten and entertain you midway! Hail Caesar!

Norman Franklin

I was able to have some good laughs from your article. It is actually sad how pathetic our once great country has become.We will have a few friends over to the doomstead but if the past is any indication I imagine by halftime we will all be out under the stars, by a fire Smoking, drinking, and telling stories.

Trapped in Portlandia
Trapped in Portlandia

One of Eric’s best articles. And I like most of his writings.

IndenturedServant

I’m 50. I’ve never watched an entire NFL game from start to finish. This article makes that seem like an accomplishment.

The only sport I’ve watched in the last decade is MMA fighting and that is always recorded so that I only watch the actual 15-25 minutes of each fight. I don’t even bother to watch “the decision” when both fighters go the distance. I know what I saw and I have my own opinion of who won.

TampaRed
TampaRed

Good article with lots of truth but how many people will see it?
I’ve seen variations of it for years but it only seems to get thru to a few.
Though I enjoy sports I’ve never been a hardcore fan of any team & I’ve never understood men over a certain age being so hardcore.

One thing I would add-if you are watching the game tonight,pull for the Patriots.Love them or hate them,Belichick & Brady have a commitment to winning that is second to none.
No matter what situation they are in,they find a way to win.

Iska Waran
Iska Waran

My problem is that all the companies I should boycott because of their leftist slant (including having a devil-worshipper perform at the super bowl halftime), I already don’t buy from. Starbucks? It’d be cheaper to pick up a heroin addiction. MSNBC & CNN? I don’t have cable, so I can’t cancel it. Budweiser? Nope. NFL? I watch about 20 minutes a year. My local “red” Star-Tribune newspaper? Haven’t bought it for years. If Silver Wolf vodka goes libtard, I can switch over to Kamchatka brand. The fucken Beef Council better stay out of politics or I’ll have a crisis of conscience.

Rojam
Rojam

I too will not be watching The Super Bowl tonight. Don’t care about commercials and care even less about amoral celebrities.

Haven’t watched a complete baseball game in several years (people who knew me growing up would be aghast) and have not watched more than a minute or two of Hockey Night in Canada, a weekly ritual for decades, in just as long of a time as baseball. I have lost all interest in sports. Maybe it’s the politics that have taken over. Maybe it’s the thugs disguised as athletes who dance around, wearing gold necklaces and act like they have never in their lives caught a football, scored a goal or hit a home run. Maybe it’s just me growing into a cynical, cranky old man who cares more about economics and the cost of war than a ball or a stick.

What I do know is that a fundamental change has come over me from the young man (and even the mid 50 year old man) who would have given anything for the chance to field one ground ball at third base, or have one at bat at a Tiger game to a man who no longer cares about any of it. Tonight I will sit with my wife (who has never cared for sports) and while she is watching Masterpiece Theatre or knitting, I will be listening to Bach with my headphones. My own private relief valve. Light years removed from millionaire pampered Gladiators, the announcers who worship them and the masses going Gaga over complete and utter nonsense.

Anonymous
Anonymous

I lost what little interest in football I had when the NFL decided to become a political party.

lmorris
lmorris

hate the govt, hate football all want your money. me lock and loaded

Tom
Tom

Refreshing to read your article and the following responses on this day in particular. Ferguson is what did it for me. I’m in my late sixties and haven’t been watching football that much for years. Bread and circus is exactly right. I started getting sick of it back in the seventies when they started doing those stupid end-zone dances and printing their names on the jerseys. No, I’m with all of you guys. Enough is enough. Those dumb asses watching the game tonight don’t even realize they haven’t country anymore. Unbelievable. It’s pathetic. Think I’ll continue to exercise my white privilege and not watch a sport that is predominently played by black criminals and ingrates.

James the Wanderer

I was working last night, and the call room is wall to wall monitors (they usually show network status, which nodes are down / impaired / overloaded, what the utilization rate / efficiency ratio / system loads are, and so forth); last night, the corner one was on the game. I was handling calls, watching Japanese anime (cartoons) and generally ignoring the game even though it was on. I looked up for the last five minutes plus overtime, and called the scripted resurgence before the end of regulation; the Falcons played it safe from before the time I started watching and lost their lead and then the game. It had all the usual scripted elements (longer than normal game, more ad revenue, check; Patriots were behind the whole game and pulled back even then won, check; a defense that shut the Patriots down gradually lost all energy / competence, check; and so on). I didn’t watch more than 30 seconds of the halftime or any commercials, so I kept my blood pressure down.
NFL is a waste of time and energy now. I used to like the Cowboys, back in the Staubach / Landry era; now it’s all pre-arranged and predictable, and BORING. I’d rather watch a sunset than the typical NFL game now, and if they all go bankrupt and quit using taxpayer bonds to build new stadiums I wouldn’t care in the least.
It’s hell getting older and more jaded / cynical, but at least I know a con game now when I see one.

Philip Arlington
Philip Arlington

You are taking something that is convenient for government for something that was created by government for its own end. Modern sport is simply a natural result of increased leisure time and electronic media.

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