True Colors

Last week I went to a football game with Greta and my father-in-law, Robert.  In Australia, there are four different kinds of football and each of them is shortened to 'footy.'  Only two of them use their feet extensively: soccer and Australian Rules Football (AFL) where as the two types of rugby, league and union, or under the same misnomer as American gridiron which the foot is mostly used for locomotion.

I enjoy the AFL; some who are die-hard rugby fans (of one or the other kinds - it's difficult to find someone who professes love for both, kind of like the mythological creature the Yankees/Mets fan), call the AFL 'aerial pinball' with the activity looking like men bouncing around in the air being thrust by the flippers of a pinball machine.  AFL players have to be some of the most athletic, agile and fit professionals in the world of sports.  On average they sprint over ten miles per game and can contort their bodies to catch a football ten feet in the air, while at the same time absorb full contact tackling without pads.

It's insane, but it takes your breath away when it is done well.

We went to see the Brisbane Lions play the Adelaide Crows.  I may have written this before, but choice of mascots sometimes makes me laugh.  Unless my assumptions are incorrect, a mascot should be bold and tough; a character one might be afraid of in real life.  Here are some of the team mascots that I'm sure instill fear in all who hear them:

Yankees.
Dodgers.
Cardinals
Metropolitans (I hate to say it, but what kind of mascot is that?)
Nationals
Marlins:


And some from here in Australia

Crows
Magpies
Kangaroos
Blues
Dockers
Swans (I'm quaking with fear! The Swans are coming!)

Intimidation factor- negative

But as with each team, the collective fan base has colors associated with it.  The followers are identified by the colors they wear and their support is outwardly obvious - any other fan can sidle close if they are in need of commiseration or community.

Even though we live near Brisbane, the Lions are not my team, but Greta is interested in the game and I like live events, so Robert gave me one of his season passes and Christine dropped us off at the game.  Like all sporting events, there is a buzz - a low level hum that surrounds the stadium.  The smells of deep fat fried things, beer, cigarette smoke and body odor hung like a fog around the exits of the stadium.  Robert arrived via the train and as we approached our own entrance, number five, Robert bought a program for the week's game against the mighty Adelaide Crows.  Robert was dressed in blue jeans and a scarf - he wore a shirt too, but scarves are, for AFL fans, the real source of identifiable pride in a team.  The Lions' colors are maroon and gold, while those from Adelaide are strangely not black, but navy blue, red and yellow.  The two sides are close enough in hue that it is disconcertingly difficult to see which person is on your 'team' unless you get quite close.

But that's the thing about sporting your team's colors: once you get close to someone, it is a logical next step to see the other color as the opponent (I'm talking about the fans here).  Once one recognizes the true colors of the other, one can make all sorts of non-reality inferences about them - in order to support the team, we good-naturedly rib the opposing side, or in some circumstances avoid them all together.  But the more I thought about the Brisbane/Adelaide match, I realized that even though I am not a fan of either, I found myself inching away from Crows fans because I was in the pride of Lions fans.  It wasn't until after the match, while standing with the milling crowd at the bus stop, that it hit home.

Directly in front of us were two Crows fanatics sporting the red, yellow and navy blue scarves.  The woman nodded at me first - she was in her early fifties (my best guess), with red lipstick and dangly gold loops hanging from her ears.  Her partner was standing close to her, in protection mode, I would guess, and Lions' fans had drawn back a little bit.  She looked a little worried and when she saw that I was wearing no team color, she approached and asked a question about city bus schedules.  I helped her as much as I could, but as we carried on a brief conversation, I got to know a little bit about them, why they were in Brisbane, what they were doing next, why her oldest son was struggling, (once a pastor always a pastor).  Then, the buses came and we were whisked away to our destinations.

But both teams colors stuck with me all of this week. 

They both looked like rainbows.

It's been a week of rainbows.  After the American Supreme Court's decision, at last count twenty-six million people flocked to their Facebook pages to change their profile pictures.  Seven colored stripes overlapped faces and pets and whatever else is used as a profile picture identifying them as a person who supports the decision.

Two things struck me when I first saw the rainbows popping up on FB profiles:

1. Identification with colors is a good thing.  It offers invaluable and invariable support to those who are looking for commiseration or community.  Just like in the football game, the Crows' supporters, small in number, huddled (or should I say flocked?) together behind the poles at the north end of the field.  Together they vociferously cheered their team to victory.  Identification with color plays itself out every where whether national (flags - I was raised the red, white and blue "these colors don't run."), institutional (corporate logos are full of symbolism and meaning including the colors) family (think of the Scottish tartans) and even personal (tattoos and even melanin).  We find comfort in those that sport the same colors.

2.  I felt uncomfortable, though, with the rainbow profile transformations on Facebook - not that people stating their opinion through symbolistic colorful metamorphosis, but when one displays their colors, it seems like it immediately creates a sense of antagonism against those who aren't showing the same 'team' colors.  As more and more of my FB friends' profiles turned seven hued, I thought to myself, "Does this mean that I am now seen as an enemy?  Does this mean that we aren't able to communicate in the same way?  Am I now judged because I haven't changed my FB profile?"

As I viewed some of the conversations occurring regarding the Supreme Court's decision, I was dismayed to see terms like 'bigot,' 'homophobe,' 'intolerant,' 'damned,' 'non-Christian,' come flowing from discussions and genuine friendships were strained by on-line discussions.  Some of those who profess to be Christian were offering invectives to others making it difficult to hear Jesus' words to love your neighbor as yourself.  (even your 'enemy' if you hear the others' colors loud enough.)

Is Facebook the best place to stage active, engaged dialogue on a topic that affects so many people?  Does social media encourage the 'drawing of battle lines' where contemporary ethical blitzkrieg is the soup d' jour?  Does changing our profile colors do anything?  I'm not talking just about rainbows, but I saw a few 'anti-rainbow' people change their pictures to some other color.  How can we engage in the lives of all people who look the same and feel the same if we are establishing them and us by our outward appearance?  I'd love to dialogue with so many people about marriage but social media isn't the best place for me.  I hope that I'm standing in the queue of a bus line with a whole group of people that isn't wearing any other color than the one God gave them and the one God can see. 

Much more to write about this.  I'll have to wait for tomorrow. 

Let me know what you think.