In 1846, in the midst of his Walden two-year experiment, Henry David Thoreau was arrested for back taxes (specifically poll taxes that he hadn't paid in six years or so. Thank you, Wikipedia). He spent a night in jail rather than pay the fines, though he was released when someone paid them on his behalf. The root of his refusal to pay the taxes was his opposition to slavery and its almost pre-ordained spread thanks to the utterly illegal Mexican War being conducted at the time. Throeau got the essay "Civil Disobedience" out of it, a powerful statement of his unwillingness to go along with laws or governments that he deemed illegal. He died in 1862, just as the Civil War was getting into full swing. It was the conflict that would forever end the injustice of slavery, though certainly our racial history since then hasn't done much to make many think that all our problems ended in 1865.
Throeau's essay lived on, as inspiration to the non-violent movements of Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr. It's not all non-violence (there was certainly enough there to suggest that Thoreau might not have been simply content with non-violent protest, though it's hard to see him as any kind of anarchist). It's up there with the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, and other important documents that try and formulate what kind of nation we are to be.
But Thoreau's protest, his actual arrest, did nothing to prevent the Mexican War from escalating. It did nothing to halt the spread of slavery. In short, while noble, it was at best a gesture. This isn't a criticism, just a statement of fact. It gave birth to a great thing ("Civil Disobedience" the essay, as well as the concept of non-violent resistence), but it didn't impact the immediate situation one lick.
I bring all this up as a way to justify (to myself, if no one else) my decision to refrain from watching any NFL games until Roger Goodell is no longer the commissioner of the league. No, please, hear me out...
Okay, it's a stupid and futile gesture, because professional football is the number one sport in the country, and one guy saying he ain't watching anymore isn't going to mean much to the league. But I'm tired of the way in which Goodell, since the inaugeration of his reign, has been arbitrary in his "punishments" handed out to players, and the way in which he personifies the arrogance of the league.
This has been building up for a while, but what put me over the edge was the Ray Rice "suspension" of two games for domestic abuse. I'm sorry, but when you hit a woman, a slap on the wrist does not begin to cover it. Goodell, like all corporate jackasses, tried to cover himself by saying that the legal process hadn't found enough to convict Rice or even press charges against him. These are fine words coming from the guy notorious for brandishing the suspension baton over his charges even though they've often been cleared or only held briefly for acts and conduct off the field. Goodell has a track record of handing out excessive punishments, often to players of the African-American persuasion. I'm not saying Roger Goodell is a racist, but have you heard his defense of the Washington team nickname (as much a slur on Native Americans as the n-word is for African-Americans)? Give me a break.
And so I am taking a break, from watching the NFL. Whenever it's game day, I'll find something else to watch or just turn off the TV entirely. I won't be immune to the various shows on ESPN that feature highlights, of course (I'm banning the NFL, not sports TV), and I'll hope for my Giants to shock the world and once again stomp them out. But the NFL games themselves, glorifications of the mindset that the NFL is trying to enslave us with (namely "I have to watch this!"), will have no appeal for me, not anymore. Not while Goodell is in charge.
While we're on the subject, why have one commissioner for a sports league? Why not have a panel of more than one person in charge? The whole idea behind sports commissioners was born of the 1919 Black Sox scandal and the subsequent fury of the baseball owners when the players who bet on the World Series that year were acquitted in a court of law. They gave over power to one guy, Kenesaw Mountain Landis, with the understanding that the players would be banned for life. Nowadays, it seems like it's the commissioners who should be banned. Absolute power corrupts absolutely; maybe it's time we said enough with the idea of one man or woman having all the power over the sport. What really makes all this seem ridiculous is that, if you are suspended by the commissioner of a sport, you can always appeal your sentence...to the very commissioner who suspended you in the first place.
Orwell would be proud...
So no, I don't expect too many other people to join me in this, not diehard football fans anyway. I'm willing to abstain from the NFL until some other hairpiece with a suit comes into office (who, I bet, will be even less palatable because he or she will be handpicked by Goodell, who was similarly handpicked by his predecessor Tagliabue). I went most of my life without succumbing to the lure of the NFL; I've only really been following the sport since 2007. Maybe I'm not the guy to be saying "down with Goodell," but I'm one of the ones saying it. And I'll continue to say it until he leaves. It's the absolute least I can do.
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