Freedom Curtailed In Order To Celebrate Freedom

Sometimes I feel myself evolving into Andy Rooney - a curmudgeon complaining about everything. Well, here I go again. What I want to whine about today is the policy of the New York Yankees during the National Anthem and God Bless America. I see in today’s NY Times that the Yankees now have a strict policy of fan being forbidden to move at all during the playing of these two songs.

OK let me start at the beginning. The playing of the National Anthem at the beginning of sporting events is a long held American tradition. I have no problem with it at all. I stand respectfully with my hands to my side and hat off. (I have always been annoyed at people who put their hands on their hearts during the national anthem. As best I can recall, Ronald Reagan started that to prove he was extra double proud to be an American. It doesn’t make any sense and reminds me of people, who during moments of silence, close their eyes extra tight for everyone to see and says “Amen” extra loud to demonstrate their piety. It’s silly.)

So I think that the National Anthem is fine at the beginning of the game. But ever since 9-11 we now all rise to sing “God Bless America” in the 7th inning. An easier song to follow (especially after 7 innings of beer sales) the crowd usually sings along. Personally I think that we should sing God Bless America at the beginning and leave the rest of the time to sing “Take me out to the ball game” and “Charge!!”. (Every team probably has their own unique sing-a-longs. My favorite at Yankee Stadium is the song for Jorge Posada. It is difficult to write how it goes but basically it is a long chant of “hor-hay, hor hay, hor hayyyyy, jor hayyyy, hor hayyyyy”. Believe me it sounds good when tens of thousands of people are cheering/singing it).

But the Yankee policy of now forbidding people from making their way to the restroom or wherever during these songs is just too much. I have noticed that 90% of the people naturally stop where they are while the National Anthem plays then afterwards make their way to wherever they are going. During God Bless America there is a bit more activity as people rush between innings so they get back in time for the end of the game. Now we will not be permitted to move freely as we sing about our freedom. We will be forced to stand where we are until, under the watchful eye of security, the song stops and we are permitted to go take a pee or buy an All American hot dog. To me - it seems downright Un-American to MAKE people stand for a song. In fact, it sounds down right fascist to me.

So, I have to agree with the ACLU

“Yankee management is free to promote its brand of musical patriotism,” Arthur Eisenberg, the legal director of the New York Civil Liberties Union, said in a written statement. “But we need to be wary of enforced cultural conformity and the use of a ballgame to impose political correctness on a captive audience.”

Shows of patriotism, like that of religious faith, seems to have taken a strange turn during the past generation. Once a private action, recently we have been forced to publicly demonstrate our beliefs. We have had politicians build up reverence for symbols like the flag and these songs while they simultaneous remove the very freedoms the symbols once stood for! They have tried to force Christian rituals on the American people while they pursue policies which can be argued are not very Christian at all. Frankly, I think the efforts to elevate the importance of symbolism are part of a conscious plan to distract the American people from the substance of policies these politicians pursue.I personally believe that people should stand for the songs, stay still if possible and show respect for our country. But to FORCE ticket paying customers to do so is way beyond the pale. It seems pretty basic knowledge that the 1 sure fire way to make someone resent doing something (even something they would voluntarily want to do) is to mandate it. I have no problem standing still for these songs. I do have a problem being told that I must do that.

As a related issue (not sure if I wrote about it last year) is the use of military aircraft to open a baseball game after the National Anthem. During Opening Day 2006, the fighter jets buzzed the stadium so close that the noise shook the seats and the danger to fan safety seemed real. One false move, one mechanical failure and a speeding jet plows into the seats. That alone is a bad idea - never mind the symbolism of cheering an aircraft designed only to kill. During the 1st playoff game last year they also used fighter planes. I was running late for the game and was in line to get in the Stadium when the jets unexpectedly flew directly overhead. I am not exaggerating when I say that we unsuspecting fans and ticket agents all either crouched down in terror or hit the ground flat! C’mon is it really necessary to do that?

This commentary is crossposted at DailyKos.com. You can read the comments from those readers at the bottom of the page here . I also have this up at a Yankee blog and am getting a lot of interesting comments here.

UPDATE: Apparently the law says you have to put your hand on your heart. I did not know that. I do now.