Football, Democracy & Darwin
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manifestly harmonious way of life, however from the view of the ‘democrat’ there is the promise lost of ‘life liberty and happiness’ and to the ‘supra-capitalist, racist, man of self interest’, a happy slave will produce more and buy more which is essential to the ultimate goal and gain of the simply evolutionary benefit of greater good and glory for those who are able, by their wit and cunning, to so benefit.
Peace, within a country is a win-win for all. Not true, necessarily for war with foreigners and all of the benefits which arise from a state of controlled hostilities, but within a country or geopolitic and geographic divide, the cost of uncertainty and distress is far more than the displeasure of those suffering.
If at the beginning of the day, all enslaved have no expectations otherwise and know their purpose, in some form or fashion is to serve, to aggrandize the life, interests wealth or benefits of others; their own interests secondary and subordinate, then there is a de facto diminution of discord and a consequential betterment of the social structure which enhances the rich with the labor of the enslaved.
If we set out truly and forthrightly the facts of societal rule, whatever they be, the right of the might, the inapplicability of the rule of law, and the moral and political correctness of disparate wealth, immobile social class, inequity as a way of life, differential rights and responsibilities based on class or birth or happenstance, then there is less to disconcert those from whatever ilk they arrive or befall from the incessant and debilitating argument over who gets what, where and when.
III
Privatize profits, socialize losses.
In football, one is, by rule, allowed and in fact encouraged to be as mean and tough and cruel, within the bounds of the rules, as one can humanly be, while still, maintaining the overarching promise to adhere to the rules of the game or suffer the consequence.
Whether it is an unjust foreclosure ruining families and whole communities, or a simple hit and run, a betrayal or the unexpected loss of a loved one, there is no place in the little ‘d’ democratic lives where justice is so ready and handy, applicable and appropriate, final and unequivocal as seen on this field of play.
Though one hears and sees daily the now doctrinal rights of the commonwealth, especially in the most advanced western societies, betrayed and portrayed before our eyes on 24/7 cable, one knows, intuitively and factually there are few ways to speak truth to power.Despite the words and accolades of democracy, one also knows that the ruling elite, from royal wealth or the ill-acquired power of the governed, represent a failed political system which cannot impose even the simplest control of term limits upon itself.Daily, Western man sees and feels harshly the impacts of the simple and conflicted interests of opposition of the words of freedom and the factual outcomes.Too often their governments, of, by and for the people are in reality surrogates of special interests, the military industrial complex and the pervasive and often pernicious toy of the ruling class.
In democracy, one can break rules and, as in this last financial crisis, do all the time.
There are banks acting like pirates, politicians like cowboys, and in every twisted fashion and perversion of the rules; while in football and on these fields, all are honor bound to submit to the rule of the ref’ and the whistle that says, ‘oh no’, or ‘just out’, ‘not fair’ or ‘personal foul.’
The national fascination for football is no more or less than it being the absolute embodiment of everything we had thought our society and culture to be, a fair, recognizable life style at once thrilling, fun, demanding of our best and with rules in which every prince and pauper has exactly the same chance, exactly as promised in the democracy earned while pledging allegiance to the flag in their youth.
Rarely if ever has there been a similar and so consequential court of last or first resort in life for the injustices, real or perceived, as they occur and the glory, won or lost on the field of battle and in the days of their lives.
Modern society, the free market capitalistic form of democracy beholden to the oligarchs purports to have the equity and parity, the integrity and moral suasion of sport, but it is a pretense at best and increasingly, in a house as divided as in the US, not even a bad joke when one group or another can, summarily, say this 50 million group of people will or won’t have health insurance or the ability to live in the highest evolutionary state of grace the current science and culture can provide.
The pretense of church, morality, commonwealth, the greater good has slipped away but the shroud and pretense of its occasion, the ‘we the people’ and government ‘of, by and for the people’ notion has persisted and though the dream of democracy has eroded, there is a moment on any Sunday, and for the world in the super bowl or world cup, in which everyone has to play by the rules and it is such a welcome relief more than one in every three men, women and children take part, a greater percent of the populace than those who even vote.
It is true this relief, perhaps a drug, perhaps panacea, perhaps an incredibly complex and well developed artifact of the rulers to give surcease to the reality of slavery and serfdom they have yet to announce or acknowledge publicly, works, but the purpose of this inquiry is to see if, under the circumstances, and knowing the efficacy of this momentary lapse, there isn’t a way, given the plutocratic rule of oligarchs hold on the day, that one cannot better use this panacea to better the good will of good slaves, diminish the rancor and with such sophisticated mechanisms, employ them more widely so to limit the perceived harshness of those, not part of the elite, wanting always a larger share of what may not be culturally and societal theirs to share.
Or alternatively, to recreate the model employing the immediate and unequivocally justiciable ‘rule of law’ as witnessed in the game ‘football’ to the real world of the quasi- democratic, quasi-plutocratic, fundamentally capitalistic society and thereby grant the relief and justice as seems immediately and universally applicable on the field of play.
Football and similarly World Cup Soccer, sports of all kinds offer a fundamental peek into the essential conflict of Democracy and the modern world. Indeed, until we understand and perhaps incorporate these facts of our being, our essential DNA, we are more likely to collapse and fail than not, for have we essentially taken a carnivore, and because of some religious belief or ethos fenced him into a pasture allowing the beast only a diet of greens and grasses while all of it’s adult life, denying it even the hint of fresh meat, less the blood and brains that come from a new kill.
Inherent in a capitalist society is the critical ingredient of simple, amoral greed. It is a way of life as historical and ubiquitous as any Precambrian species learned to satisfy its natural demand for self sustaining perpetuation. It is, factually no different than any self respecting mountain lion or shark going out for the morning to feed to take care of itself or it’s young.
As the Post Office has not yet reckoned with its vestigial and near antiquated value, most transactions now taking the form of electronic digitized paper, there is a lag in our understanding the evolutionary changes to our moral ethos, occasioned perhaps by the pervasiveness of capitalism or the breadth of the internet and this delay has not appropriately contrasted the curious symbiotic nature of an agrarian society where many of the members have relationships built upon the reliance of the others help and mutual aid, the fundamental structure of that patriarchy, has been replaced with a Wall Street mentality that espouses free markets and the ascendency of its associated credos.
Though of habit and perhaps an unnecessary shame arising from the moral nature and ethos through which we passed from agrarian to colonial to capitalistic state, in truth, the reality of capital, like bestial might is the ancient freedom in which ‘might is right’ and all of the innuendo and deceit of god and country, but a sham.
To be sure, this deceit of democracy and commonwealth keeping the common man enslaved, a critter for their prey, a tool for the munificence arising from more sophisticated forms of enslavement in debt or consumerism is effective, on
ly this inquiry posits it would be moreso, if articulated and there is little benefit, and indeed, the seeds of anguish and ultimately collapse if the clarity and ultimate fact of this asymmetric right to benefit is not made public.
In one of its most perfect models, factories are peopled so to continue running, mercenaries are provided for the armies allowing, amongst other benefits, oil or natural resources at a subsidized and unnaturally artificial rate, and a whole panoply of other smaller but still Machiavellian benefits which in the end, though furthering the disparity of a community based wealth, aggrandize always the power and tools of the evolutionary gain of the solitary childless shark.
At the end of this day, the moral structure of the ancient agrarian and family based matriarchy ( patriarchy) has and will continue to fail the free market capitalist style of our now metastasized democracy.
Though we have kept the precepts and freedom sounds better than slavery, as free markets sound better than autocratic control, today’s free markets are a way more sophisticated form of