Why sports fandom is more socially acceptable than media/sf/f fandom

[lazypadawan]

A couple of weeks ago, I posted about Jimmy Mac's reply to Roger Ebert's review of Fanboys (now expanding to 10 more cities this week). I asked the rhetorical question on why sports fans get a pass while we're labelled as geeky, nerdy no-lifers. Remember that Jimmy Fallon movie with Drew Barrymore where he plays a diehard Red Sox fan? Now I know from personal experience that Red Sox fans come in only one flavor: obsessed. The movie reflects that. But in the end, is it Fallon who's expected to grow up and leave the bleachers behind for Barrymore, who plays a hardworking career girl? No, of course not! You know if Fallon was a Trek fan, a SW fan, or a comics fan, he would be the one to surrender his life for a life of proper mundania.

Why is that? I've mentioned some theories to one of the replies. Here they are in greater detail:



So long as sports have existed, their fans have existed as well. People rooted for their favorite athletes at Greece's ancient Olympics. Gladiators had their followers during ancient Rome. Sports have been part of religious and cultural festivals for centuries.

The art of storytelling and drama are also quite ancient but the concept of media fandom is a relatively recent phenomenon. The oldest story I know of about something like media fandom was about fans of Charles Dickens who waited on the docks for the final installment of The Old Curiosity Shop to arrive from across the pond. (Back then, novels were published in serial format instead of a single volume.) People bought the books right as they were unloaded from the ship and started reading on them right there and then. It's the technology of the 20th century that allowed people to obsess over movies and television.

Sports celebrate traditionally manly values like courage, strength, and perseverance. Media is considered intellectual and passive.

Sports fans believe they have a personal stake in the outcome of the games. They are after all real events, not fictional ones. If it's not something material like a monetary bet, it's usually pride: pride in one's team, one's country, one's city, one's school. Media isn't connected with a particular place. Movies and t.v. are everywhere. Media fans can have the same kind of pride in their favorite fandoms that sports fans do but people are less able to understand why because media isn't considered anything personal beyond an individual's investment of an hour or two.

Sports are live events. People become personally involved and emotional at live events. They're participatory by nature and they're fleeting. One lives in the moment for a period of time, then it's over. Watching a movie or t.v. show is considered passive entertainment and unlike a live event, you can watch it at any time over and over. This is why Ebert said in his review of Fanboys that trying to see TPM before everyone else does is like stealing money from the mint to spend it before everyone else.

I've come to believe the ability to relate to media as one would to a sporting event is what defines a media fan. They can live in that moment over and over, or at least try to (costuming, conventions, fan fiction, etc.). It's not a trait everyone has. This is why most people do not understand the kind of devotion we have to SW or Harry Potter or Trek, etc..

Comments

[pronker]

Well, I'm tempted to say snark about Ebert being the one with no life, sitting in the dark all day watching movies. I think he compares with other paid writers, though, and so is on a professional level and the only comparison between sports fans and media fans I can think to add is that neither group is paid. It's as much fun to me to follow a home team as it is to follow a certain writer, rooting them on, 'hey, finish that WIP,' etc.

[krpalmer.livejournal.com]

You make some interesting points here, but I did find myself pondering the "length of history" one. Sports does and no doubt can lay claim to "a long tradition," but it doesn't quite seem to me that there's a link that can be traced year-by-year from the classical world to now; I believe "spectator sports" in the sense of paying money to see people paid for playing only really came together in the latter part of the 19th century. Of course, I also found myself thinking that "waiting for the Dickens boat" shows a great interest in a story, but perhaps doesn't have to mean the kind of "fannish attachment" that treats it as "real on some level," so maybe it's all a wash. (Still, I think that the Sherlock Holmes stories were beginning to attract something recognisable as a "fandom" by the close of the 19th century.)