Oh say can you see

[buckweaver]

Good reasons not to play it:

1) - In any given basketball, hockey or baseball there will be a significant minority (majority in hockey's case) of players that aren't American.

2) - Sometime in this NHL playoff, and likely during a Raptors playoff game, some yahoos will boo the Canadian anthem. Then some yahoos in Canada will think that the appropriate response will be to boo the American. Then....

3) - Games are too damn long already. Kill the anthem and you could gain as much as 10 min.

1) Since when did the anthem become about honoring the players? If the game is held on American soil, operated by American businesses and as an American venture, guided by American laws (or antitrust exemptions, as the case may be) -- then any accepted American customs would seem to apply. Playing the American national anthem before the start of a ballgame has been an accepted American custom since the end of World War I. Try again.

2) If "moran" fans were the reason to get rid of anything at a ballgame, then there'd be nothing left. Try try again.

3) Kill all the oversized-checks-to-local-charity ceremonies, and ceremonial first pitches by oversized CEOs, and you'll kill 10 minutes too. Every game starts at the exact minute it's supposed to start -- and if it's early, the umpire will wait until it's exactly 7:05 before signaling "Play Ball!" The anthem has nothing at all to do with the length of games.

 

[NoTalentAndFatToo]

1) Since when did the anthem become about honoring the players? If the game is held on American soil, operated by American businesses and as an American venture, guided by American laws (or antitrust exemptions, as the case may be) -- then any accepted American customs would seem to apply. Playing the American national anthem before the start of a ballgame has been an accepted American custom since the end of World War I.

I guess my issue is this: why is it still a custom? What purpose does it serve? In a world where the destructive force that is nationalism is constantly demonstrated, why do we continue to promote it?

 

[buckweaver]

I guess my issue is this: why is it still a custom? What purpose does it serve? In a world where the destructive force that is nationalism is constantly demonstrated, why do we continue to promote it?

Woodrow Wilson would be proud. Seriously.

Honestly, I don't know why it's still done. Like I said, if there were any good reasons for eliminating a tradition that very few people still alive can remember the days when it wasn't, maybe there would be support for it.

But I like a little pomp and circumstance before a game. It makes a game feel like something special, which it is. No two games -- in any sport, at any level -- are exactly alike. Never have, never will.

 

[chester]

Because this is the United States of America and it's our f*****n' national anthem. Some of us actually still love this country, even with all the bulls**t that goes on sometimes.

And you just proved his point ... :

I guess I didn't mean for it to come off that strong. I apologize for it. Got a little carried away.

 

[chester]

Because this is the United States of America and it's our f*****n' national anthem. Some of us actually still love this country, even with all the bulls**t that goes on sometimes.

And you just proved his point ... :

I guess I didn't mean for it to come off that strong. I apologize for it. Got a little carried away.

Carried away with what?

The intense anti-Americanism displayed in this thread? The obvious hatred for freedom that many SJers hold in our hearts? McDonald's, Coca-Cola, Nike, repre-SENT?

I wasn't trying to insinuate that at all (I apologize if I'm missing the sarcasm font). I just got a little peeved at the previous post, and I wrote without thinking.

 

[MonitorLizard]

I have a pet peeve about standing and taking my hat off for God Bless America. It's not the national anthem; you don't have to stand at attention for whatever patriotic song they decide to play. Seems like a post-9/11 thing, but maybe I've just noticed it more since then.

 

[NoTalentAndFatToo]

Because this is the United States of America and it's our f*****n' national anthem. Some of us actually still love this country, even with all the bulls**t that goes on sometimes.

And you just proved his point ... :

I guess I didn't mean for it to come off that strong. I apologize for it. Got a little carried away.

Carried away with what?

The intense anti-Americanism displayed in this thread? The obvious hatred for freedom that many SJers hold in our hearts? McDonald's, Coca-Cola, Nike, repre-SENT?

I wasn't trying to insinuate that at all (I apologize if I'm missing the sarcasm font). I just got a little peeved at the previous post, and I wrote without thinking.

Suggesting that nationalism is a bad thing is not anti-American. Nor was the suggestion exclusively directed at America either.

America is a wonderful dream that will not collapse if they stop playing the national anthem before Upper Armpit High's football games.

 

[Herbert Anchovy]

With the longer TV breaks after innings, MLB added 18 minutes to each game without throwing a pitch. Eighteen minutes, more in the postseason.

 

[Lyman_Bostock]

Because they've been doing it that way since World War I. There's maybe a hundred people alive who have attended an MLB game when they didn't play the anthem, so unless you can find a good reason NOT to do it, it's here to stay.

Good reasons not to play it:

1) - In any given basketball, hockey or baseball there will be a significant minority (majority in hockey's case) of players that aren't American.

2) - Sometime in this NHL playoff, and likely during a Raptors playoff game, some yahoos will boo the Canadian anthem. Then some yahoos in Canada will think that the appropriate response will be to boo the American. Then....

3) - Games are too damn long already. Kill the anthem and you could gain as much as 10 min.

From what I recall, in at least the last few times this has happened, the first shot in those pissing matches comes when the Canadian yahoos boo the American anthem. That big anti-American chip on their shoulders gets heavy sometimes.

I don't care if they play it or don't, but I don't understand why some people are so viscerally opposed to it. It's two minutes in length, max. And you know what? For all this country's faults, it's still a better place to live than almost anywhere else, and I'm pretty proud of it.

 

[Tom Petty]

I stand, address the flag and place my right hand over my heart.

If I'm wearing a hat, I take the hat off and hold it in my right hand over my heart.

It's the national anthem. That's what you're supposed to do.

you "address" the flag? god man, sorry coffee, i think you're pretty cool, but god man, that's gay.

Remind me to introduce you to my old drill sergeant, Staff Sergeant Johnson: "PRIVATE, when the national anthem is played, you will stand at attention, address the flag and salute! You will do this every time the national anthem is played! You will do this when the flag passes by you in a parade! You will do this when the colors are presented at any event you attend when you are in this Army's uniform! You will stand at attention, address the flag and salute! Do you understand, PRIVATE?!?"

Hotdamn right I understood (right quickly, thankyaverymuch), and so did every other recruit in Charlie Company, 4th Battalion, 3d Basic Training Brigade, Fort Leonard Wood, MO (and every damned one of us was named PRIVATE!, unless our name turned out to be IDIOT! or AN EMBARASSMENT TO THIS FINE UNITED STATES ARMY!).

touche coffee, touche.

i'll be the first to admit when i speak out of my ass: i spoke out of my ass.

 

[three_bags_full]

Trust me, there's a danger at a prep football or basketball game of letting a PE instructor handle a CD player.

Same danger in letting a private play revellie (sp?), too. As a young lad at Caserma Ederle (Vicenza, Italy) the cassette player which we used to play the daily songs had a funny play/fast-forward button.

So, obviously, Pvt. three_bags forked it up one day. When I hit the play/ff button, it decided to fast forward. By the time I realized it and hit the button again (to engage the play function), the song was nearly over. Only the last four notes of revellie were played that day.

8)