"What I Wouldn't Do"

So apparently the Yankees choked last night like a toddler on adult aspirin, and the Red Sox won the American League. Now, I'm a Yankees fan myself (no puns necessary, I've made them all myself already, thank you--including the one that comment just potentially created), and have been ever since I was a small child. I rooted for them when they were sucking in the '80s, rocking hard in the mid-'90s, and even now, when apparently it is very fashionable to hate them with a passion not often encountered in life. I think part of the reason so many people hate the Yankees is that we are all, by our very natures, inclined towards disliking and distrusting those who succeed. We say we like to see people win, but what we really like is to see someone who wins get the crap knocked out of them. You can say it's because we like to see the underdog win, but that's just wrapping it up in a semantical argument and masks the truth--we hate seeing winners continuing to win.

It's a common-enough thing across the board, not just with professional sports. Folks like to deride the winners of life, say that they can't stay on top forever, cheer when they do fall. Folks can't wait to tear into people who win. It's not noble, it's not rooting for the underdog, it's simple hatred of the success of others, that's all.

All that said, I really can't bring myself to care too much about professional baseball, and the Yankees' loss really means very little to me. It means a lot to Scott, because he hates the Yankees more than you'd think humanly possible ('cause Dad likes 'em), but as I pointed out to Scott last night, at least the Yankees made it to the playoffs, which is more than you can say about his crappy team (the Rangers, FYI).

~chuck

Song of the Moment: Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers, "Even the Losers"