Thursday, October 29, 2009

The Revolution’s Homemade Signs Will Not Be Televised


The Washington Redskins - who now have stooped to making up rules as they go along, like the ones stopping fans from bringing signs into FedEx Field - are doing the entire sports-loving world a favor. They’re teaching a long-overdue lesson about what it means to be a good “fan’’ (which is derived from “fanatic’’) and to be a good “customer’’ (derived from “gimme what I’m paying for, dammit’’).

Think about all the times organizations have put lousy products on the field, all the times fans have gotten fed up and stopped showing up – and all the times that someone has chided them for being “bad fans.’’ The times they’ve been called a “bad sports town.’’ The times they’ve been told they don’t “support their team,’’ and that heck, why not, just move them to another city that’ll appreciate that lousy product on the field.

That’s the message: yeah, we don’t have to be any good, but you’d better keep paying for us, because you’re required to be loyal to us, your home team. Or else.

Go ahead, find me one other business with the gall to operate like that – better yet, one that doesn’t need gall because so many buy into it. If you had a supermarket in your neighborhood that constantly sold you overpriced, outdated food that gave you salmonella, would you keep shopping there because it’s your neighborhood store? If the mechanic down the street charged you $1000 for yanking out your carburetor and putting in a new one he made out of Legos, would you keep going to you because his shop is located in the same city you live in?

Can you imagine how you’d react if these crooks told you that yes, you’re obligated to keep dropping off your Lego-filled car and keep projectile-vomiting on the way back to the supermarket, because that’s what real, true, loyal customers do? That if you go to get legitimate engine parts at another garage, or drive five miles further down the road for bacteria-free bacon (or, start biking to work and growing your own food), you’re really a "fair-weather'' shopper?

So, you probably get the point that you don’t have to let anybody shame you into continually cheering for a team that not only stinks (and actually causes vomiting on occasion), but also insults and patronizes you. This is how D.C. football fans are acting. Having already locked themselves into ticket commitments (and also seen what the team does when you aren’t able to meet those commitments), they’ve fought back in the only ways left to them. Plenty stay home, keeping parking and concession money out of the hands of ownership. Those who do go, pledge not to buy the beer and hot dogs or caps and jerseys, again asserting their consumer’s rights.

And they’ve brought signs and banners to show their anger. Oh, it’s beyond frustration; it’s a palpable sense of rage, the kind anyone can relate to if they’ve been sold a lemon of a car or spot a rat in the restaurant kitchen.

Now, as the whole country knows, Redskins officials have banned all signs brought from the outside. You can find the list of irrational reasons, scattershot enforcement, underhanded informing and explanation and hypocritical exceptions at this Washington Post blog. Understand, as well, that company-ordered extinction of angry-fan stadium signs is pretty much the universal symbol of a franchise gone totally off the rails.


The bottom line is that the Redskins are acting like some crazed mutation of the emperor with no clothes and the Wizard of Oz. You’re not seeing what you think you’re seeing, they seem to be telling us, and if you think you are seeing it, it’s because you’re a bad fan, a threat to the franchise and your fellow rooters, and you must be controlled.

The Redskins believe, somehow, that in doing this, they are winning. It’s incomprehensible what they believe they’re winning, though.

The truth is that they’re losing. Beneath that, they’d long ago lost sight of a business basic – the customer is entitled to take his business elsewhere if he’s not getting what he paid for. They’ve instead become convinced that the customer is entitled to sit down, shut up and don’t move until we tell you to.

When they’re begging for fans to come back and forgive them, maybe they’ll learn all the lessons mentioned above. Until then, at least one message might sink in to the people – don’t be afraid to stop being “fans’’ and start being “customers.’’
(Photo: The Washington Post)

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