Comments

1

And still for all the liberal policies and lefty politicians we have a homeless crisis with no end in site and opioid addicts on every street corner taking a shit and pissing everywhere.

I have news for you Katie, ditching the Seahawks, dropping any push to bring the NBA back and an income tax won't fix shit.

2

Seattle is not an island unto itself. It is chained to a State that doesn't want "Progress", or change of any kind. I find this OP sophomoric.

4

what about it's just boring to watch 11 minutes of action in the midst of a 3 hour commercial? who has time for that crap?

7

@6:

Also, "I heard about this thing that happened, therefore it must be happening all the time everywhere."

8

I think the key is in the line "if Seattleites really care about being progressive." I moved to Seattle from Bellingham in about 2004, but I believe "progressive Seattle" is a myth at this point. I believe people are here to make money (as it has always been, at least according to Bill Spiedel) rather than try to establish a comfortable, permanent home here. So, folks will save throughout their their tech career or whatever, with a plan to retire to some small town that has affordable homes and not as many homeless people. Why invest in the social welfare of this city when it's nothing more than a money faucet?

11

The main reason there are so many Seahawk fans in this town is that they had a really good run. They won the Superbowl, lost the Superbowl, and then got into the playoffs two straight years after that. Not quite a dynasty, but still way better than average and way better than the the Mariners (until this year). We don't have an NBA team or a hockey team, either. Our soccer team is ridiculously popular -- that is a much more unusual phenomenon.

As far as the dangers of football go, the big difference between now and twenty years ago are that people are aware. I have less trouble with grown adults taking this mental risk than I do kids. If you are going to ban football, it should be at the high school level. There are other sports that are very dangerous, and have the same sort of risks to mental health. One is high altitude climbing. Spend a bit too much time up there and your brain can get (permanently) foggy. Should we boycott outdoor films that glamorize that sort of climbing, or the companies (like North Face) that support it? Maybe we should just let adults be do adult things. Richard Sherman wants to play football, despite the fact that he is certainly smart enough to get another job. Should we deny him that -- or boycott the game in hopes that the decreased income leads him to choosing a different career (one that he will likely have to take fairly soon anyway).

Hard to say, but that doesn't bother nearly as much as the ignorance surrounding the sport. There are risks in every sport. The same sort of danger that exists for football, exists in soccer (although to a lesser degree). That is why some have called for a ban on heading. Perhaps you should call for the end to the Sounders until they get rid of heading? Good luck with that.

12

Football as a sport is slowly evolving into a less brutal game, with a variety of new rules now in place that are designed to make it significantly less impactful with respect to long-term brain trauma. It will always be a dangerous sport though. Rather than kick the Seahawks out, our bona fides as a progressive town would be better served by putting severe limits on, or even banning outright, little league football and youth teams.

13

BYE, FELICIA

14

Meahwhale, El Prezzo wants to "Fire them [black] Sonsabitches!" who refuse to correctly pose for His National Anthem while Fanatics are busy, using restrooms, getting in that last cigarette, purchasing alcoholic beverages, chatting, etc! like nothing Important is happening.

How can El Prezidente ALLOW this travesty of Justice to continue?
Where's the damn PATRIOTISM?

("And when the band plays, "Hail to the Chief!" oo-ooh,
they're pointing the cannon at you, yeah, yeah." --John Fogerty, 'Fortunate Son.')

Plus, he called them all Pussies, for not wanting to run headlong into each other at tip top speed. Like HE would. (Say, didn't the White House used to be a Plantation? Or is this a much more-recent development....)

15

If Seattle were actually progressive you'd be shutting the state down over your awful tax code.

16

Getting rid of the SeaGals is a good idea.

18

Get rid of corporate tax breaks first. At least those aren't in the state Constitution.

19

Progressives (I consider myself one) don't always think things through. One of the many things that they don't realize is that a pedestrian friendly city (cars stopping for every pedestrian) is also not the "greenest" option. It takes extra fuel and energy for a moving vehicle to come to a stop, not to mention the chain effect if vehicles behind it have to stop. That's why we have designated crosswalks but they mean nothing in Seattle as everything seems to be a designated crosswalk. If you believe in science and understand how energy works and is converted, you cannot dispute this. Sue, I would love to see less cars on the road but that is not our reality.

21

Sport is ritualized warfare to ease tensions, both between communities and within communities themselves. That's why you see football, a sport which prides itself on its proximity to open violence, turned into such a powerful symbol of America; it is closest to the source of sport, war. No spectacle is more public and viscerally BIG in nature in America than American football.

Seattle is very proud of itself. Not the most narcissistic city in America, those would both be LA and New York, which are practically states unto themselves, but nevertheless, Seattle prides itself on its civic identity. We can't be so surprised that we love this grand, communal thing. It has all the cultural sanctioning of a church, almost as much violent catharsis and revenge as an open fight (albeit cushioned by extreme stretches of setup and foreplay), and all the communal elements of a mass orgy. You will be very hard-pressed to get us to give up this kind of vice willingly unless you present a suitably colorful and chest-thumping alternative, or distract us enough. We demand distraction as our reason for being, and god help whichever dumb bastard cuts us off from our favorite distractions.

22

Note that I am not insulting the human tendency to distraction, distraction is the root of pleasure. We love it no matter how much we may feel it alienates or demeans us, and we're probably right to. Certainly there's no more value in being serious all the time.

24

Seattle ditched the Sonics and I never even noticed. I could also lose NASCAR (nationally, I know it's not a Seattle-based thing) and rounders-for-boys (baseball).

26

So true it gives me hope.

27

Think of all the homeless who could camp in their playpen if we ditched the football team.

29

As a true progressive, I say the following:

If Seattle were actually progressive, we would ban the Stranger and ditch Katie Herzog.

Who's with me?

30

Also, this image of drunken mobs baying for blood and cheering as guys give each other concussions is pure fiction.

We love it when our defense delivers a powerful hit on the ball carrier or sacks the QB, more as an emphatic defensive play (the equivalent of a slam dunk) than a statement of violence. But the most famous Seahawks plays in history are Marshawn Lynch's ridiculously agile and powerful run against the Saints and Richard Sherman's spectacularly athletic tips against the 49ers and Packers. We go to these games entertained by the image of Russell Wilson weaving and dodging between defenders before making a miraculous throw for a beautiful catch downfield.

Katie clearly doesn't watch football. The game consists of the world's top athletes performing a variety of beautiful physical stunts and has more strategy than any other sport. Just because some dummies watch it doesn't make the game itself dumb.

31

"Before you take to the comments and tell me how much money football brings in: Don't." Katie Herzog, you are my spirit animal. This knee-jerk reaction when you talk about this stuff from allegedly liberal arts educated Seattle residents makes me irrationally mad to the point I want to punch puppies and kick babies.

32

Should be ban everything that is potentially dangerous? Driving? Heating your home with natural gas?
Progressive does not = Nazi Germany

33

If Seattle were a true Scottsman....

34

The Capitol Hill Whisper Network enabler, The Stranger has spoken. Football is bad. Next week child pornogrophers preach about the benefits of being vegan.

35

Should be ban everything that is potentially dangerous? Driving? Heating your home with natural gas?
Progressive does not = Nazi Germany

36

@SirWalterRaleigh - In a city where using the wrong pronoun is considered an act of violence, I think we can certainly entertain the thought of a filthy rich sport creating serious problems including ACTUAL PHYSICAL violence without being just like Nazi Germany. But that was a very expected, and very Seattle, non sequitur.

37

Washington's ban on rent control isn't in the Constitution, it's a state law. A law that could be changed if anyone who lived outside Seattle supported it.

38

MEH, you're using the NFL to grind yer own ax, same as Donny Trumpkins does...

39

I can agree on one point; either properly pay the Seagals or getting rid of them altogether.

40

Well, that was a long and pointless ramble about nothing much in particular. It seems to exist mostly to showcase the author’s ignorance of local history:

The football stadium was not built by Seattle’s City government. Support for building it amongst Seattle’s voters was tepid, at best.

The ban on rent control is at the state level, as is the ban on income taxes. Seattle advocating for changing either of these simply gives Washington state’s Republican Party ready-made advertising slogans for statewide elections.

Meanwhile, all of the progressive aspects of Seattle she blithely takes for granted took years or decades of hard work to accomplish. (Chemical companies poured money into our election to defeat an early attempt at a ban on plastic bags, for example.)

At least she wasn’t slagging on Amazon, beyond the usual Bezos-bashing.

41

“In reality very little was known about the proles.* It was not necessary to know much. So long as they continued to work and breed, their other activities were without importance. Left to themselves, like cattle turned loose upon the plains of Argentina, they had reverted to a style of life that appeared to be natural to them, a sort of ancestral pattern.

They were born, they grew up in the gutters, they went to work at twelve, they passed through a brief blossoming-period of beauty and sexual desire, they married at twenty, they were middle-aged at thirty, they died, for the most part, at sixty. Heavy physical work, the care of home and children, petty quarrels with neighbors, films, football, beer, and above all, gambling, filled up the horizon of their minds. To keep them in control was not difficult.

A few agents of the Thought Police moved always among them, spreading false rumors and marking down and eliminating the few individuals who were judged capable of becoming dangerous; but no attempt was made to indoctrinate them with the ideology of the Party. It was not desirable that the proles should have strong political feelings.

All that was required of them was a primitive patriotism which could be appealed to whenever it was necessary to make them accept longer working-hours or shorter rations. And even when they became discontented, as they sometimes did, their discontent led nowhere, because being without general ideas, they could only focus it on petty specific grievances.”—George Orwell, ‘1984.’

*”the ‘proletariat’ is the class of wage-earners in a capitalist society whose only possession of significant material value is their labor-power (how much work they can do).”

Well, folks, you heard the man -- looks like Pro Football is here to stay.
(I surely do miss Marshawn Lynch however.) (GO, Beacon Plumbing!)

42

"The football stadium was not built by Seattle’s City government. Support for building it amongst Seattle’s voters was tepid, at best." -- Tenser, @40

“The Sea Gals might not be making any money, but other people sure are. Take Paul Allen. The Microsoft co-founder and Seahawks owner is the 44th richest person in the world. And yet, the team he owns plays in a $430 million stadium that was largely funded by taxpayers. Allen put up $130 million; Washington taxpayers put the other $300 million. It’s hard to see how this is a good deal for taxpayers. It’s not like we own a part of the team or even get cheap tickets.” –Katie Herzog

Do they even ALLOW us to watch the games on loco TeeVee anymore?
Without paying $20+/game?

43

Dear Katie, do you really need to use people's sexuality as an insult? See your second sentence and the word "gaywad".
If you want to talk about being progressive, just start with that.

44

"We have a bunch of gaywads in office"

Nice progressive language you have there.

45

@33 Hah, my thoughts exactly. I mean, I -am- one of those progressive vegans who owns an electric car... but I also don't need as big a house as I have, or that second car (an SUV even). While I totally agree that Football is not progressive, I also think that there is some space between "being against" and "being for" something. I am not for pro football (or really pro sports in general), but I also think that, racist and violent though it may be, it's probably not as important as slowing global warming or even just getting out of the way of people using the bathroom without having to have a discussion about what their pants are actually covering.

That said, as a former high school football player, that whole system, all the way through college ball (especially college ball in some ways) is Messed Up. The fact that we use a major cause of CTE to subsidize education could not be more messed up. Oh, it could if we specifically targeted vulnerable minorities with misleading or simply false promises while intentionally hiding not only the risks of the profession but also of training for the profession that you probably will never actually get any return on.

If you like the Seahawks, meh. But for the love of progressiveness, stop going to Huskies games!

46

It wasn't always this way. The first time the Seahawks went to the super bowl (2006, I think?), no one in this town paid much attention. The national news media even ran "can you believe it" stories about how little interest or enthusiasm there was in Seattle (especially in comparison with Pittsburgh, the opposing team). I was rather proud of Seattle back then.

49

The SeaGals make plenty of money. If it truly was sub-minimum wage, why would people do it?

(hot tip: they get paid a bunch more to do appearances at other events, commercials, calendars, etc. ain't no one starving on the squad).

50

Katie, please ignore the strident whines of whataboutism in this comments section, and accept my thanks for a well-written and much-needed article.

The only key argument I think you missed is how rooting for "your" team often implies xenophobia and taking credit for other people's accomplishments.

51

OK, I admit it. The headline was almost dumb enough to get me to not read the article. But then I thought "Catalina, if you are going to be bitchy about this, you need to have a reason other than the annoying headline." So I scanned it, and it was everything I thought it would be: A sophomoric essay pointing out everything that everyone already knows about what I regard as a totally mystifying sport.

Progressive purity tests are one of the main reasons that progressives are about as popular as a chronic rectal itch (despite the fact that most of their policy positions being almost universally desired). Yes, there's a lot of problems with the NFL and football in general. I personally don't get it, and I never will. Yes, Seattle isn't the bastion of liberalism that some people want it to be (newsflash: it never was)

But there's also good people, who do good things every day of the year, who know about its faults but still enjoy it. Don't talk down to them. Don't be a be a tedious scold. Leave that to The Green Party.

52

If one happened to be a Gaywad, would it be alright to use the term gaywad? I mean, if you're a (N-word!) you can SAY the N-word -- you can call others the N-word too, if I'm not mistaken, and I hear there are seldom repercussions.

Reclaiming the Lingo -- what's wrong with that?

53

"The fact that we use a major cause of CTE*
to subsidize education could not be more messed up."
--Phyzzi @45

SO well put. Thank you.

"Oh, it could if we specifically targeted vulnerable minorities with misleading or simply false promises while intentionally hiding not only the risks of the profession but also of training for the profession that you probably will never actually get any return on."

Where there's a Will there's a Way....

Just say NO to destroying one's body.

*"Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE) is a degenerative brain disease found in athletes, military veterans, and others with a history of repetitive brain trauma. In CTE, a protein called Tau forms clumps that slowly spread throughout the brain, killing brain cells."

Thanks, NFL.
And sayonara.

54

I've always told people that if I had a son, I have 2 daughters, I would never have let him play football. Just too much severe injury risk, even before the CTE knowledge. So, how about "sports" where the objective is to induce severe blackout concusssions, Boxing and that cage fighting that's popular now...…...

55

Another slow news day at the stranger, the commie rag publication that lacks in all around inclusivity and diversity

Herzog.. rich, white, german surname with aristocratic origins and is most likely a direct descendant of high ranking nazi party officials

Columinst who uses phrases like "gaywad"

Wants to ban predominantly black NFL team plus philanthropic franchise, players, and owner that make enormous charitiable contributions to the community

Doesn't understand the potential damaging loss of tax revenue resulting from her progressive ban hammer... can't do math

Virtue signals white people who sport dreadlocks... has clearly never heard of the nords, gauls, or celts

Also doesn't understand how hair grows

Is an obvious troll

56

Katie you took the words right out of my mouth! I always felt like the fact that we were paying money to watch mostly black men beat each other literally to death while the majority of the owners are white was a bit reminiscent of gladiator days. My dad died of CTE from boxing another sport we could do without in my opinion. The last 10 years of his life were awful and we lost him at 69. Sometimes the money and the thought it won’t be happen to me gets in the way of reality. Let’s say we let people make their own choices what about the victims of CTE? The people that get killed by someone not in their right mind? We don’t let people drive drunk so should we let people do something potentionally dangerous to themselves and others? I really think if the NFL was making billions of dollars off the brain health of mostly white people and this might cause some uproar. I for one don’t get enjoyment knowing how they men are going to end up and how it will affect their families. I don’t wish my experience of having a dad slowly lose his mind on anyone.

57

"There’s nothing we can do about an income tax." Incorrect. You can mail a check for any percentage of your income anytime you wish to:
Washington State Treasury
PO Box 40200
Olympia, WA 98504-0200

58

Mr Farian - But she isn't. Still, the gratuitous crack will be helpful to the G separatists leaving the LVBT+ behind.


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