I was lurking at one of my usual haunts and in this thread came across an argument between two women about the social/moral merits of Tim Tebow vs. LeBron James. Unsurprisingly, the more conservative woman (whom I’ll call June) supported Tebow while the obvious feminist (whom I’ll call Gloria) supported James. Here’s the exchange:
June:
Here’s what I don’t get. Why can’t everyone just stop being bitter and praise the kid for what he is. Is he a legit good quarterback? No. Is he beating all the odds and doing well beyond his means? Yes. Is he out at clubs with bitches, raping girls, or killing dogs? No. Why can’t everyone just stop and realize for once, a good person with a good heart that is working really hard and getting to enjoy it, whatever the talent level, is reaping the rewards? It makes me mad.
and
Like, if this isn’t a fel good sports story, than what is. I mean the kid in the offseason goes to prisons and talks to people. Most players after one negative tweet go off in the locker room in a tirade and he’s never been impolite or anything and even in losses, is gracious. I have seen opponents that are ruthless 99% of the time, as soon as they hit him, immediatley help him up. HE is the epitome of sportsmanship and what should be shown to children. He is succesful by sheer will, and not raw talent. I don’t understand.
A likeminded commenter (whom I’ll call Donna) adds:
Because that’s not what sports are about, apparently. It was better to hear non-stop press for months on end about where Lebron was going to sign (someone who finally just proposed to his long time baby mama, though has multiple side children) than to hear about Tebow.
As is typical of internet exchanges, one person can’t permit a dissenting opinion to go uncrushed, so Gloria immediately shows up and says:
He’s a douche, but Lebron hasn’t done anything as offensive as aligning himself with a bigoted anti-gay rights group just to push his anti-abortion agenda. Not even — ::gasp:: — having children (that he’s entirely responsible for and is actively involved in the lives of) out of marriage and not marrying the mother immediately.
He’s also by far one of the best players in the world at his sport. Something Tebow will never, ever be.
It’s like you couldn’t ask for a better subconscious confession of feminist values if it were something you could order on a menu. Let’s take a look at what’s going on here:
- Gloria hates Tebow for living out his traditional (Christian) values.
- Gloria also hates Tebow for being not alpha enough, i.e., she doesn’t consider him a good player. (I suspect she especially has a lot of subconscious scorn for him for remaining a virgin as well. Feminists don’t respect self-thwarted alphas.)
- Gloria loves LeBron James. Notice how it doesn’t matter to her that James (himself a bastard of an ex-con) has fathered bastard children and has only recently even deigned to offer marriage to their mother. What truly matters to Gloria is that James is a charismatic apex alpha and therefore everything about him is forgivable or hamsterable.
Donna replies:
One commercial during a Superbowl, that how many of you have actually seen since, is not pushing in my opinion. But good to know Lebron is the okay douche. lol
Gloria, of course, can’t handle an apex alpha like Lebron being called something as derogatory as an “okay douche,” so she retaliates:
I don’t think Lebron is an “okay douche”.
I’m not going to morally judge him for having kids he clearly adores and a relationship that has worked for both he and his partner and hold that below Tebow’s willingness to publicly join with a group that has historically been against gays’ and women’s rights like you are.
So I guess you’re free from the moral judgment of a feminist if you fork over resources to women and children, but not if you think women should give birth to the children they’re impregnated with. Feminism is about the transfer of resources from men to women, QED! Also, the “relationship that has worked for both he and his partner” might as well be called “woman puts up with indignity of not being married in order to hold on to apex alpha male.” Any woman who honestly believes that a lower-status woman in a sexual relationship with a charismatic apex alpha male truly does not have any interest in marrying him any time soon (and therefore locking him up financially, status-ly, and at least nominally penis-ly) is lying to herself.
GRAMMAR NOTE: DO THEY NOT TEACH THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN SUBJECT AND OBJECT PRONOUNS ANYMORE? I mean, it used to be limited to stuff like “me and him went to the store,” but now I see stuff like “they bought a gift for him and I” and the above “for both he and his partner.” IT BURNSSS US, PRECIOUSSSS. It’s doubly worse because in the latter examples, people say stuff like this thinking they sound more educated. GAHHHHH!!!!!!!!! (And don’t get me started on all the people who think that plurals are made by adding ‘s to the ends of words.)
And fret not that Gloria doesn’t believe the entire feminist party line, because she follows that up with this:
There are tons of better “feel good” stories in sports than a privileged, rich white Christian male that has never been an underdog in his life before he got to the NFL getting overhyped and overvalued by the media and his cult fandom.
Look at Patrick Willis (you know, the best LB in football) and what he had to overcome as a child and young man to get where he is. Hell, watch any weekend OTL edition or E:60 and you’ll come across multiple ones each week.
Remember, if you’re a white Christian male, you never have to work for anything and you never can be an underdog. White Christian men spend all of their time standing on their mountains devising new ways to oppress women and minorities. They also practice laughing evilly and twirling their mustaches.
Kind of makes you wonder how much the Tebow-hating feminists would secretly love him if:
- He won a Superbowl ring, or
- He had premarital sex, or
- He were ABW (Anything But White), or
- He gave them all $1000 and told them they were pretty.
Not that I think Gloria would ever turn down a date with Tebow if the opportunity presented itself. He’s not that unattractive to her, LET’S BE REAL.
This post is BRILLIANT.
(My first comment here, btw)
Tebow is the youngest of 5 kids. His father is a pastor and his mother was a home-maker. That’s not exactly a wealthy background.
LeBron James is a jerk who announced he was sigining with Miami on national TV, without informing his old team beforehand. He gives up in the 4th quarter and is a generally whiny player. The fact that Gloria feels that he is a more moral person than Tebow shows how deluded feminist logic is.
I’ve heard the idea that Tebow doesn’t “deserve to win as much as he is” before. Due to their relative lack of experience, aren’t rookies pretty much always underdogs? And when I looked him up, the article said he won the Heisman. He’s not exactly a bad player.
Possibly, part of it is to this Gloria person not understanding team dynamics. A less skilled player may have a greater effect as part of a team (compared to a more skilled player) if he demonstrates superior teamwork. Indeed. The fact that Tebow is now winning means you MUST use one of 3 operating assumptions:
1) Tebow is a good player, and hence deserves to win.
2) Tebow is a good enough player that he manages to hand the ball to the better performing team members. Those other group members are performing well, so THEY deserve to win.
3) Tebow is facing crappier players than him and deserves to win.
Any good coach will tell you that you can take a full group of 11 individual players, put them up against a team that has trained together and developed teamwork, and loose. Even if your players are better skilled individually. It’s why upsets exist. It’s why underdogs sometimes win. It’s why I won’t understand this seeming moral component to people’s description of the situation.
I once participated in an online competitive tournament. After describing it to one of my co-workers, she wondered aloud about the moral implications of me potentially competing against a 10 year old. I responded that if a 10 year old can gather up sufficient skill, and plays by the rules, and actually does beat me…he deserves to win.
In retrospect, I think that the co-worker was assigning a moral value to the actual effect of the competition. Those who are familiar with sports, and other competitive games tend to realize that the only moral component is in playing by the rules on the field. Winning and loosing doesn’t affect your moral standing.
This sounds more racial and Cultural Marxist than a woman in love with an alpha bad boy.
Is Gloria black? All I read from her is basically white=bad, black=good.
Is he a legit good quarterback? No.
I just don’t get this. He’s a starting quarterback in the NFL. He won the Heisman Trophy. Is he the bestest QB ever to play the game evers? Maybe not. But, yes, he’s a good quarterback.
I’m not even a Tebow fan, but this meme is just dumb.
… Tebow’s willingness to publicly join with a group that has historically been against gays’ and women’s rights …
I’m confused … is Gloria saying this is a bad thing?
Gloria is just pretty damn stupid. And racist. Sounds like the ho’s I have to work with in the ghetto.
Ceer,
There’s also a 4th possiblity, based on the fact that Tebow plays qb. He could be only an average passer (by pro standards) but he could read defenses well and could make excellent decisions. A lot of qbs with better arms don’t make the right decisions.
Gloria sounds like she’s dated too many progressive guys. She seems like she’s an advertisement for game theory. James is the physically imposing bad boy who engages her emotions, so as long as Tebow doesn’t engage her in that way, she’d probably come up with any rationalization not to like him.
Ceer and Willie–
The CW on Tebow is that he’s not a good passer and that he’s not all that great at reading defenses. He can be really bad for most of the game and then snap into gear at the 11th hour and pull out the win. That’s why his detractors are so beside themselves; the Broncos have won a lot more games this season than they “should” have.
Personally, I’ve always been a bit annoyed whenever people discuss who “should have” won games. By definition, the winning team is the one did more of the right things at the right time to score more points, so if Tebow has won a lot of games it’s because he and his team are doing better than their opponents. That’s why the game is played in the first place… it’s the game outcome, not the predictions, that is the true test.
As for Gloria’s Tebow hate… I think this is a prime example of worldview insecurity. The idea that someone who espouses a different view of success than can be as successful as Tebow is puts her entire worldview on shaky ground. So since she can’t make any reasonable argument she must resort to insulting his manhood.
I think feminists are just unhappy at their core, and men provide an easy target for their self-loathing-turned-outward.
I think you’re probably right on all counts about Gloria the feminist. I have nothing to add because I don’t know anything about football! But, on a grammatical note, I think the Internet, text messaging, and…some kind of overall decline of literacy in Western society is ruining people’s ability to write proper English at an alarming rate. These are real excerpts from real undergraduate essays that I had to mark once upon a time…I actually copied it down because it was so memorable. ( I’m taking a chance that the writer won’t catch me quoting her on the Internet!):
“”The negative aspects of advertising and how it blemishes an individual’s lifestyle focuses more on the substantial influence it has over oneself. Advertising plants an opinion in an individual’s mind. This outlook impacts the mind on conceptions that guides an individual on sustaining oneself in civilization”
“The way advertising controls Men and Women appearances negatively impacts the individuals’ morality. Men and Women are less likely to prevail their own personalities, so they become someone that they are not.”
Yes, this person was a native English speaker. I *think* she was overusing a thesaurus…
*I meant to say, *a* real excerpt from *a* real undergraduate essay (I don’t want to start using bad grammar myself!)
Can you explain why you chose the word “bitches” in the phrase “out at clubs with bitches”? Just curious.
Feminist and football fan here. Tebow is absolutely 100% free to be as Christian as he wants to be, to support exactly the causes that he wants to support. On the flip side, I am absolutely 100% free to be as non-Christian as I want to be and to disagree vehemently with the causes that he espouses. Hate the sinner, not the sin, isn’t that a thing with Christians? I can disagree with what he stands for but still step back and say – you know, he’s a pretty good quarterback. Not the best. But pretty damn good.
In sports, it’s the NUMBERS that count. The numbers, the wins. That is all. Off field is irrelevant unless it’s making someone play shitty (I’m looking at you Tiger Woods).
Now Tom Brady – awesome quarterback. Reprehensible human being. Does that mean I won’t be rooting for him come Feb. 5th? Nope. He’s still the better quarterback.
“Hate the sinner, not the sin”
You got that backwards.
Indeed I did. I meant Hate the sin not the sinner. Although my Freudian slip may have been showing just a teeny bit there. I have seen it played out the other way so many times.
how is lebron a bad dude. what he did was a narcisstic thing in television special, lets stop saying he owed his team anything. Teams can trade players without their consent in the nba. he was a free agent. he was no longer under contract and owed nobody anything. the cleveland franchise tripled in net wrth and he made the owners of the team a lot of money while he was on the team.
I really dont understand the big thing about tebow. most of the critiques about tebow from most rational analysts have been about his mechanics and accuracy, and his supporters have been about the wins. The problem isnt with either of these men, its with the sports talk tv culture has adopted the political talk culture habit of being so extreme that these expert opinions are mostly nothing more the people screaming at one another. Tell me whats the difference between a first take on espn and now defunct shows like hanity and colmes on fox news and crossfire. its ridiculous
Enjoyed your GRAMMAR NOTE because I have the same upset — so much so that I wrote a small self-help book on the problem: “Me and Him Are Killing English!” BTW, Tim Tebow is not a me-and-him talker.
Gloria seems somewhat annoyed that Tebow who has morals will not compromise himself to get involved with women who have questionable morals. This somehow makes her feel uncomfortable,perhaps guiltyof her past.