Let It Hit The Fan

Money.  In America, it's the number one reason why most people will do most things.  If you want to understand why adults are motivated to do things, follow the money.

Attention.  In America, it's the runner-up reason why most people will do most things.  If you want to understand why adults are motivated to do things besides for money, it's for attention, which is often monetized.  (See reason one.)

Is there a way to combine these two powerful motivators to accomplish something larger?  Absolutely.  And one of the main vehicles for this has to be the major organized sports leagues.

We've seen professional sports leagues and players, most notably from the NBA / WNBA, use their platforms to drive political and social change.  Just last year, players in those leagues so far as to boycott games in response to social unrest over the treatment of blacks in America.  It had limited economic impact due to the pandemic, but it got people's attention.

There are much better, broader examples from the past.  In the 1990s, states that didn't recognize MLK Day were eliminated as hosts for crown jewel sporting events.  (The NFL pulled the Super Bowl from Arizona.)  Something similar happened later in North Carolina and Indiana when those states passed anti-LGBTQ laws, and the leagues (along with the NCAA) avoided or pulled out from those states as hosts for events like the NBA All-Star game or the NCAA basketball tournament.

These actions also had a domino effect of making corporations not host conventions in those states.  Suddenly, when states realized the loss of revenue, not to mention the embarrassing attention, they got rid of those laws.

Examples like these highlight why organized sports leagues could be doing more now, as republican-led states pass anti-voting laws, and/or anti-LGBTQ laws.  If the NFL, NBA, NCAA, or Major League Baseball had their act together, they'd simply tell these states that they won't do business there, at least not outside of regular franchise operations.  An even more effective approach would be the players associations of the pro leagues boycotting games, ending the public's great desire to watch them.  Then things would hit the fan (pun intended!) although it would be a monetary sacrifice some players would not want to make.

This year, the Major League Baseball All-Star game is supposed to be in Atlanta, Georgia, the state most actively passing voter suppression laws.  They should move that game, and let the money and attention flow to states with smarter elected officials.  Then let's see what happens -- if the past is prologue, things will change fast.

Dear Graduating Class of 2018

Another school year ends, another commencement-style address begins:

To the college graduates of 2018:

Are you paying attention?

Not to me, not to any words of wisdom you might get from thousands of different college commencement address speakers.  Are you paying attention to what's going on in America?  To what's going on in the world?

Paying attention to civilization is the most important thing you should be doing now.  I know, it wasn't your strong suit the past several years.  You did enough to get your degree, but listening to long, boring lectures doesn't lend itself to paying attention.  For anyone.

If paying attention hasn't been your thing the past four (five? six?) years, it needs to be now.  Bad stuff is happening.  Stuff that has the potential to make your future miserable.  I'm not just referring to your job future, but your future of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

Through a mixture of inattentiveness, conniver-y, and outright lying, certain individuals have been given power that far exceeds their ethical and moral capacity to handle it.  This has led to them placing other ethically- and morally- challenged people in powerful posts.

The not-so-surprising result is a government that isn't actually working for the people.  It's only working for, well, let's just say your chances of success are currently for less dependent on whether you have a college degree and for more on whether you are a white, heterosexual, Christian male.

Are you paying attention now?

The way to fix our broken government is to know what's going on.  The best way to know what's going on is to stay abreast of current events, and I don't mean by keeping up with your Instagram or Twitter feeds.  That isn't nearly good enough.

Watch the news, nationally and locally, and preferably on more than one channel.  Read a bunch of different papers, articles, and books.  Talk to a lot of people, and not just to your friends, who probably already think the same way as you do, or they wouldn't be your friends.

Show a little bit of passion for having a government and political system that works the right way, under the rule of law  -- after all, you're paying for it, even if you don't have a job.  Then, when election day rolls around, vote.

Pay attention!

Oh, and congratulations.