5
OPINION
Thursday, June 15, 2017
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
“
Did you see the fight between
Hunter Strickland and uh,
what’s his name?” my dad asked
me a few weeks ago.
I hadn’t, so when I hung up the
phone, I did a Google search and the
results were instantaneous. During
the game, the San Francisco Giants’
pitcher, Hunter Strickland, hit Bryce
Harper, a batter for the Washington
Nationals, with the ball. A fight
ensued and both teams cleared their
benches to join in the fight. It had
become an all-out brawl of sorts, guys
on each side throwing punches and
pulling players off each other.
The first article I clicked on started
off giving a play-by-play of the fight,
and a few paragraphs in, the author
wrote, “the most entertaining part for
me was…” Then the author went on to
crack a joke about how Harper’s helmet
throw at Strickland was so bad it was
“funny.” I stopped reading. This was
a fight, where people threw punches.
People piled on top of each other, and
without the extra protection provided
by padding and helmets for football
players. Both Strickland and Harper
were suspended for multiple games.
This fight was no joke, and it certainly
didn’t feel like something we could call
“entertaining.”
Don’t get me wrong. I have loved
baseball since I was a little kid. Some
of the most memorable parts of my
childhood were sitting on my dad’s lap
in his tiny home office watching the
game on his fuzzy first-generation TV
and eating hotdogs and popcorn at the
park until I was sick. But as a lifelong
fan, it’s incredibly upsetting to me that
we aren’t treating violence as violence.
It shouldn’t be chalked up to people
simply getting heated, or people who
are passionate about their sport.
I read a few more articles, hoping
for something of substance. And
while some took on a better tone,
there were still far too many articles
that were much of the same. Another
guy weighed in the on the helmet
throw. We should all “appreciate”
the horrible helmet throw, he wrote.
Another article was entitled, “The 5
Best Photos from the Bryce Harper-
Hunter Strickland Brawl.” Then in
one of the videos of the fight that I
clicked on, I could hear one of my
favorite
hometown
announcers
during the fight saying, “this is a good
one folks.”
In fact, just a few days ago, an
article in The Washington Post
described how the MLB was
planning to auction off Strickland’s
jersey from that game, advertising it
as the jersey he wore when he “was
ejected from the game after fighting
with Bryce Harper.” People on the
internet also went wild with memes
of the fight.
And imbedded within these
articles and memes was something I
found equally, if not more upsetting.
People were quick to pounce on the
Giants’ catcher, Buster Posey, who
stayed out of the fight, and MLB
fans were also unnecessarily critical.
Instead of questioning why he didn’t
get involved, instead of roasting him
for not “helping his man,” as one fan
wrote, we should be questioning why
everyone else didn’t stay out of it. We
should be applauding him for not
getting involved, not shaming him
for not putting himself at risk and
adding fuel to the fight. And maybe,
we should be taking a page from
Posey’s book. We need to discourage,
not encourage, this type of violence.
Yes, I know that for these players,
this is their career, and like many
passionate people, they can get
heated
and
sometimes
violent,
especially if they think something big
is on the line. But that isn’t something
we should be comfortable with. And
where else in a professional setting is
violence such as this egged on? How
often do you see a lawyer charging at
the opposing counsel and throwing
punches at them during a trial
treated as entertainment? Sports and
baseball shouldn’t be any different.
Instead of indulging fighting and
violence in sports, as journalists,
citizens, leagues, associations and
fans, we should be working on
sanctions and programs to minimize
it. Journalists, calling the fight
“entertaining,” the internet making
memes of the fight, the MLB for
advertising a jersey for auction as
one that they brawled in, are part of
the larger problem and encourage a
sports culture where violence is not
only acceptable, but a part of what
makes the sport fun.
Furthermore, this culture of
normalized violence in sports has
already made a big impact and will
continue to do so unless something
changes. In response to the fight,
Harper said “sometimes you just
gotta go and get them and can’t
hesitate,” even if you might be
suspended. And Strickland, in an
interview, said he also didn’t regret
the fight. Jake Arrieta of the Chicago
Cubs called the fight “awesome.” But
they should have regretted what they
did; fights aren’t “awesome.”
After all, would this Giants-
Nationals
brawl
be
considered
“funny” if someone was seriously
injured and it ended his season?
Because as far as the game goes,
everyone should realize they have
a stake in making sure athletes are
healthy: teams that want to win, the
players who want to stay in the game,
fans who want to see their favorite
players play, owners who don’t want
to pay a player to sit on the bench, the
list goes on.
And even though sports such as
football involve tackling and other
somewhat dangerous play, there
are still guidelines put in place to
minimize the violence. In football,
there are penalties for punching and
other unsportsmanlike conduct; the
NBA has fouls for excessive or violent
contact that could result in injury. In
the MLB, if you’re a batter hit by a ball
at the plate, in almost every case, you
get to advance to first base.
What’s more, professional sports
are constantly working to make
game play safer. In 2012, MLB
adopted new concussion protocols.
In 2014, new rules were made up
for home plate collisions. In 2009,
the NFL acknowledged the long-
term effects of concussions for the
first time and since then began
implementing stricter concussion-
prevention measures. Some of these
rules have come after injuries such
as Posey’s home plate collision in
2011, or when journalists and player
advocates have put a spotlight on the
dangers of concussions in all sports,
and especially football.
So, if we are constantly trying to
make the game itself safer, shouldn’t we
also want the same for the moments in
between the plays? The seconds before
two players with a long rivalry seem like
they’re about to charge at each other?
And
masking
violence
as
entertainment and player passion will
have consequences that will carry on
for generations. Young kids who are
watching and taking their cues from
their parents, friends, favorite players
and idolized journalists will grow up
thinking this is acceptable behavior in
sports — and likely in other aspects of
their lives. In fact, in a 2015 Gallup poll,
59 percent of Americans said they were
sports fans. Sports seep into everyday
life and has the power to influence so
many people, even outside of those
who follow or participate in sports.
And thanks to the internet, it’s easy
for anyone to stumble across videos
and memes of these fights. So, it’s up
to everyone, players, coaches, fans and
journalists to change the way we talk
about violence and fighting in sports.
Otherwise, we all pay the price.
—Anna Polumbo-Levy can be
reached at annapl@umich.edu.
Clean up the game
I
n my last column, I mentioned
learning about the Adena
people, who lived on the
land now called Ohio from more
than 2,000 years ago to the first
century A.D., when the Adena
were overcome by and blended into
other tribes. Though some of their
physical traces have been marked
and preserved, much evidence of
the Adena people has disappeared
over the centuries. This is true
throughout central Ohio, including
my hometown of Bexley.
The Adena’s physical legacy
is manifest mostly in the form of
burial mounds filled with tools and
remains of individuals from their
small farming communities. There
are mounds all over central Ohio,
but some are easier to identify
than others because they vary in
size and are seldom marked. Some
Adena mounds are only a couple
feet high and may look like a slight
swell in the ground, while others
are more than 20 feet high, perfect
semicircles sitting atop what was
once flat earth.
Obviously,
these
burial
mounds
were
significant
to
Adena
communities,
but
for
myriad reasons (including federal
regulations) most of the mounds
in central Ohio have no historical
markers identifying them as
significant sites. Even worse,
many have been destroyed in
the process of farming and land
development. This means burial
mounds,
containing
artifacts
and human remains, have been
ploughed, built over or otherwise
demolished in the process of
construction.
The McAlla Mound, named
for the farmer who found it while
ploughing, is located on a strip of
land in the city of Columbus that
abuts Bexley. The site of ancient
Adena settlements and the McAlla
Mound correspond generally to
Wolfe Park, a city park which is
bordered by Alum Creek on one
side and a collection of mansions
on the other. Different maps show
the mound in different places, and
the area is hilly. With no marker
and inconsistent maps, it’s difficult
to tell what could have once been a
mound and what is just the natural
topography. The Adena were there
once, but even a thorough look
around wouldn’t tell you that.
Though there are some efforts
to educate school-aged kids and
the public about local indigenous
people’s histories, in general, it
is difficult to find thorough and
up-to-date information. Most of
the contents of the mound are on
display at the Bexley Historical
Society (I say “most” because
what’s left out is the human skull
allegedly found there, which is
prohibited from being displayed).
The Ohio History Connection
also has an exhibit about the
history of Native Americans
in Ohio more generally. And
a teacher from the Columbus
School for Girls, a private school
in Bexley, successfully helped
her students lobby the Ohio
legislature to make the Adena
pipe the state artifact, which is
commendable for increasing the
Adena tribe’s visibility.
Still, it seems odd to me that I
know so little about the Adena
people and that I’ve had to work
so hard to find the information I
now have. I’ve come to what little
I’ve learned through hours spent
in the Columbus Metropolitan
Library, the Bexley Public Library
and the Bexley Historical Society,
and through contacting people at
various organizations who might
be able to tell me something more.
I wonder what in people’s
minds would change if there was
some kind of historical marker in
the general area where the McAlla
Mound was found. Unfortunately,
in the place where the mound is
or was, I see only colonial revival
style houses and a park named
after one of the first prominent
landowning families in the area.
The story of the Adena people’s
relationship with the Bexley area’s
first white settlers is different
from
the
usual
narrative
of
violence between living bodies of
indigenous people and colonists of
European descent because Adena
communities ceased to exist by
the time colonists arrived to the
United States. Therefore, they
didn’t have to choose to trade,
fight or make what peace they
could with European settlers or
their descendants. But the erasure
of the Adenas’ presence on this
land is demonstrative of wealthy
white America’s attitude toward
indigenous history more broadly
and represents a violence more
difficult to trace.
— Regan Detwiler can be reached
at regandet@umich.edu.
REGAN DETWILER| COLUMN
ANNA POLUMBO-LEVY| COLUMN
The first settlers, part two
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