Uh, the fans are the ones who MAKE it a billion dollar enterprise. Why else do you think the league is wetting itself over the prospect of suburban moms not letting their sons play Pop Warner?
As for your point in the following paragraph, I’m puzzled why you think human nature should change depending on the seriousness of the topic.
What hypocrisy do you think you see? Where is my contradictory thought that’s motivated entirely by tribalism?
It’s stupid that the NFL tests people for pot. It’s even stupider that they use a strict testing standard that’s far stricter than what airline pilots are tested for. Such a stringent standard that the false positive rate is pretty high. They even contradict themselves when they claim that they aren’t going to punish secondhand smoke, but then design their tests so that it could be triggered by a secondhand smoke. There are stupid aspects of their testing procedure.
Would I care as much if it were some random receiver from some team I didn’t care about that got busted for it? No. I’d still think it was stupid, but it wouldn’t affect me very much so it would interest me less.
Spell this one out for me, because I didn’t do what you seem to lazily assume I did. If some other guy in the NFL got suspended for pot, and I said “damn right, the NFL was right to suspend that guy for smoking pot!” I’d be a hypocrite. But I didn’t do anything like that. I just detailed why the NFL’s testing policy and specifically their treatment of Josh Gordon was stupid.
Likewise, am I allowed to look down suspiciously on the foaming at the mouth witch hunt mentality that had regularly issued forth from other quarters (when hard evidence was in very short supply) without being thought of as being a Pats fan or apologist?
Heh, I don’t know shit about NFL or this debate but reading this thread gives me flashbacks. I follow cycling not NFL. The dance goes like this:
Sceptics: “Mr Sportsguy does X and he’s a cheat”
Fanboy: “Mr Sportsguy does not do X. Nope. No way. You’re all assholes and haters for even suggesting it. Mr Sportsguy is the cleanest and the greatest! Not like all his competitors who are all cheaters and losers.”
Sportsguy: “I cheated”
Sceptics: “Toldya so”
Fanboy: “Uh, yeah, well, ummm, look, doing X isn’t really ‘cheating’ as such. And anyway everybody else did it too. Or if they didn’t they are just losers who should have been winners like Mr Sportsguy! Yay Mr Sportsguy!”.
The irony being that you’re giving an example, while you think you are giving a different one. People showed you that word was wrong, but you doubled down on it and even started demanding apologies. You had a single definition from a single dictionary which you misunderstood, a chain definition going from the original word to a synonym, not realizing that not all definitions of a synonym necessarily apply to the original word.
Granted, I could have apologized for not having figured out where you went wrong, but (1) saying I thought you were thinking of a different word wasn’t an insult, so an apology was optional, and (2) I don’t give in to demands when people are a jerk to me.
I will give you this: you have gotten much closer to being right this time. You could “deign an apology” if you give it condescendingly. assuming you are from the eighteenth century. It is now universally marked as archaic–i.e. not used anymore. Before you forgot the “condescending” part.
I’m not sure “keep getting caught” is an entirely accurate depiction. As far as I know, this is the second time they’ve been caught at something, and unlike the last time, this one appears to involve about three guys, and no one on the coaching staff, ownership, or management. Also, in the general theme of “tampering with balls” they’re not the only ones to be caught. The Vikings and Panthers were chastised for illegally warming balls last year.
This is not an excuse for cheating, but frankly the idea of integrity in professional sports is laughable.