turtles

I went to a football game today. I can’t tell if I enjoyed it or not–I felt really ambivalent about it as I was leaving. I had always known that football was popular, but I didn’t know just how popular it was.

There was a little over 62,000 people in the stadium tonight. With a max capacity of 67,000, that’s pretty good.  Especially considering that tickets were around $100 each.

That’s six million dollars. They made six million dollars in one night. 62,000 people came together to watch grown men chase each other and fight over a little ball while wearing tights. And when the dudes aren’t running, there’s a troupe of girls wearing tight, revealing clothing dancing on the sidelines. I questioned, why? Then I realized that a lot of the six million would be going to each of them. So much that they don’t have to find other jobs.

I was shocked. The behavior I saw was so….. primitive. We come together to watch feats of brute strength, and when we aren’t we’re just satisfying the lustful parts of our brains. All the while, we’re drinking beer and making raucous noises at the players. There’s no thought. There’s no respect. The behavior doesn’t suggest intelligent life. There could be gorillas in the stands and we wouldn’t be able to tell the difference.

That’s the other thing, too. The sportsmanship wasn’t bad. It was nonexistent. Every time the Visitor team (in this case it was the Eagles) had the ball, everybody in the crowd would jeer in a seemingly total drop of sportsmanship.

I think I now understand why football is so popular. Because it’s exciting, sure, but it also allows you to act like a caveman without people giving you weird looks. Because they’re also doing it.

Put 62,000 cavemen in a stadium and have them watch a bunch of guys tackle each other. What’s the product?

$6,000,000.