Cut to 2012. I am in Oakland. Driving down I-880. Was late…not sure how late, but no one was on the road. I was on one of those gigs where I was beating myself down every single day.
At that time in my life, I was really into Facebook. I didn’t have a great way of keeping in touch with people otherwise back then, so Facebook was it (2015-2016 broke me of that).
For the weeks leading up to the 2012 college football championship, all I heard all day from most everyone I knew was LSU shit. I already fucking hated football, and I especially hated this shit. So I kept my trap shut.
I’m driving along, and I see an electronic billboard with the final score. LSU fucking loses. Shut out.
I was ecstatic. I hit a little traffic, wrote mad shit. Ended my rant with a signature “Where is your god now?” Continued my drive on home.
The next morning I get pings from all kinds of people. Some laughing, some furious with me. One person did ask me how the hell do I hate LSU… well…
Growing up in South Louisiana, the guaranteed event that the entire year circled around is football season. Not Mardi Gras, not church, football. You couldn’t interrupt football. You couldn’t do anything when football was on but watch the football.
And I tried. I tried to care. But from like age 6, I just remember watching it and being fucking bored. It was boring. I didn’t understand why anyone could care about this and not like…I don’t know…reading. Doing anything else?
As I got older, the more animus I had toward it. I would be dragged to live football games. I brought a book. I just didn’t want to be there, and I wasn’t interested in what in the world was going on.
And this is blasphemy as far as anyone down there was concerned. Especially…especially LSU football.
I was surrounded by non-graduates of this university who had a much more severe devotion to this team than to their chosen god. More energy spent on it. More care. More time.
I just saw it all as a waste. A grift. A distraction from getting of this planet.
That’s about when I realized people don’t want off this planet. They just want more boring ass hell. Something to drink their (now not-) Bud Light to.
But, what could I do about it? Just me not caring. So I just ignored it. And by the time I made it to college, I could ignore it completely. Back then, the college’s football games wasn’t anywhere near campus. So I didn’t have to think about football ever. Never watched a game. Filled my life consuming the types of things I give a shit about.
Football became the symbol for me. A symbol of everything that is wrong with the world. Everything that I thought my friends and I were fighting against. The reason we created anything. The reason we had bands. Doing something different. ANYTHING different.
But of course, time marches on, and the inevitability of certain institutions become apparent.
I have friends who were huge into Magic the Gathering, could tell you everything about Radiohead’s back catalogue, can build a computer blindfolded, made movies, wrote songs. And they now all have fantasy teams. They do sports betting. They take their kids to games.
And its a fucking shame.
So what is there to do. How does one even fight back against the cultural juggernaut.
The same way you fight back against anything. Shame.
We have a good model of how to handle this kind of worship. Stephen A. Smith, a big expensive commentator on ESPN is a great role model for this. His target is a different football team… My dad worships the cowboys, and I was looking for shame. That’s how I found this greatness.
You see it doesn’t take much effort to find the space inbetween the ribs to put in the knife. These fans were there hearts on their sleeves. So, I follow the LSU schedule. No effort. 20 min a week tops to keep track of it.
And I just wait. It doesn’t take much education to do what I do. Just the occasional perusing of the sports periodicals.
I am a patient man. And shame, as we all know dear congregation, springs eternal.
I wait till the lights are brightest. When the expectations are the highest. When they think they have the world on a string. And when it comes crashing down. There I am. To remind them of all their mistakes in this world.
You see, every single time the cowboys lose, every time, he sends this kind of tweet:
If I had enough courage and wherewithal, I would be Stephen A Smith that LSU so desperately needs.
In fact, I told my family, you will fucking know I hit the powerball when I buy that giant billboard off of Essen, convert it to video, and just broadcast LSU shame 24/7.
Till then, I follow in Stephen A.’s steps, doing my equivalent to the people I know. Just reminding them…LSU is an accident waiting to happen to.
If everyone continues to worship the god that failed, I will continue to spread the shame. Shame both them and their state. Shame. Cause it’s the only equalizer I have.
And I fucking love every second of it.