During the World Series, I read several articles on a national sports website that described Chicago as a "divided city". They portrayed Sox fans as authentic, blue-collar baseball fans, basking in the glory of their team's success and resenting the indifference of elitist Cubs fans. At the same time they portrayed Cubs fans as pouty little brats, refusing to cheer on the success of their Windy city brethren, crossing their arms in disgust like petulant children.
I was not in Chicago for the pennant race or playoffs so I don't know firsthand how the fans reacted. However, I resent the representation on general principle.
First, why SHOULD Cubs fans support the White Sox? Just because they live in the same city? That's ridiculous. If you take any sports team that has another franchise of the same sport in the same city, for the most part their fans are not only loyal to ONLY their team, but they despise the other. You don't see many Mets fans who cheer when the Yankees win, or vice versa.
Second, Sox fans aren't exactly supportive of when the Cubs are winning either. I heard an interview with Bernie Mac (who is a diehard White Sox fan), who said he supported the Cubs when they were in the playoffs in 2003 and doesn't know why Cubs fans can't show the same support when the White Sox are winning. That would be fair, if not for the fact that earlier in the same interview he said that he cheered when the Padres knocked off the Cubs in the 1984 NLCS, and described Cubs fans as "uppity" and "brown-nosing". You gotta love the hypocrisy of the typical White Sox fan.
Third, what is this Cubs-are-haters argument based on? One ESPN article made this argument based his observation that there were very few people at Murphy's Bleachers (a pro-Cubs drinking establishment across the street from Wrigley Field) on the night the Sox won the World Series. However, he failed to mention that it was a WEDNESDAY night, and the temperature in Chicago was about 38 degrees. Now I like to have a beer as much as the next guy, but why should I battle the cold weather, to go to a bar in the middle of the work week, to watch a team I don't particularly like win the World Series? Either this guy thinks that all Cubs fans are raging alcoholics or his journalistic analysis is a little skewed.
Okay, I'm off my soapbox now. Recently I saw a piece on ESPN that talked about the division between the North and South sides of Chicago. They said that the border between the two was Madison Avenue. Now I had never heard this before, and as a diehard Cubs fan I was nervous. I was raised in Chicago but moved out to the suburbs as a kid, so I was not sure on what side of the city I was born. Am I not a natural-born Cubs fan? Have I been denying my heritage as a White Sox thug (see above picture) all these years?
I had to know. I Mapquested my old house in Chicago (818 N. Tripp) and drew a line at Madison Avenue. Here is the result:
The blue line is drawn on Madison, and the red star was my old stompin' grounds. I was relieved to discover that I was born north of Chicago's Mason-Dixon line, and am therefore not a filthy Mudblood but a true natural-born Cubs fan.
Another case study for the ongoing nature vs. nurture debate.
2 comments:
i agree with you kuya wilmer. why should i go around flaunting the sox world series shirt when i'm not a big sox fan. i didn't wish that they get slaughtered and at the end, i was simply impressed at their dominant world series (although i'd argue that if they were playing the cards or any other team, they'd be less dominant.) two years ago when the cubs were in the playoffs, i didn't see any sox fans putting on cubbie jersies. does it matter that i'm i did not root for them? no, i don't think so. and i'm glad you were born north of madison!
oh and did you hear that hoopla about reinsdorf saying that dynasties were no good... by next season we may be seeing a totally different sox team. whatever!
so for next year, all we can do is root for the cubbies!
The ESPN article you were referring to was Scoop Jackson's smug article (a sox fan friend of mine posted it on my blog comments) about how he is *sob* so confused as to why northsiders don't care about the White Sox *end sob*. At one point he kind of equates the division to racism. I hope nobody takes him seriously. He's the same guy who said the Chicago media and Cubs fans are racist because they were calling for Dusty's dismissal. He's the same guy who said that the NBA banning gold chains was racist and he equates the NBA to modern slavery (even though slaves usually don't get paid millions of dollars and have promiscuous sex with white women).
Also these ESPN frauds don't point out how much support Sox fans gave the Cubs in '03... actually spending money on Marlins hats and jerseys to get free drinks at southside bars. How about those bouncers who happened to be Sox fans who ridiculed us and got in our faces during game 6 of the NLCS, while the management at Alumni Club wouldn't do anything about it.
And what puzzles me the most is why so many Sox fans are pretending to be confused about why Cubs fans didn't cheer for the Sox. It's because they helped create the rivalry. People like Bernie Mac and Scoop Jackson and Richard Daley helped create the rivalry. Why should Cubs fans suddenly forget the heckles and the "Cubs Suck" t-shirts when the White Sox get to the World Series? Why should I forget the heckles I get while driving around Addison with a Cubs flag on my car?
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