The Big Country/Run

September 1, 2014 10:58 AM

College Football has returned, and Spencer Hall has .gifs and feelings as accompaniment.
posted by DGStieber (8 comments total)

Good lord. I guess this guy might be saying interesting things someplace in his writing, but so much of what is actually there is so off-putting with its smugness and superior tone I can't find any content to care about.
posted by hippybear at 11:16 AM on September 1, 2014 [1 favorite]

*skims idly, happening upon "Roman Phalanx"*

*Ctrl-F to find his exasperated response to pedantic commenters*

*comes here to be meta-pedantic*
posted by Earthtopus at 11:35 AM on September 1, 2014

If you're reading the comments first to decide whether to invest in the article, I'll use mine to cancel out hippybear's and say that aside from the Talking Heads quote in the subtitle (which actually ties rather elegantly into the thesis of the second half), I found very little here that was smug or superior. What I did find was a lovely bit of writing and a meditation on what it means to feel a connection to a point on a map, and I'm very glad it was posted.
posted by Ian A.T. at 12:07 PM on September 1, 2014 [8 favorites]

He mentions Cormac McCarthy, and three paragraphs later, we get this:

"Sense has never made a dent in how people fuck, drink, or watch football. They are inelastic ghosts with tin ears and large, bellowing mouths."
posted by sutt at 12:14 PM on September 1, 2014

I liked the writing. It helped explain why I watched Georgia prove their way of life superior to Clemson's Saturday night, hating myself for filling that aching chasm with something so useless and important. One more prayer for Quezzie Green's wishboned hip socket and I'm OK.
posted by surplus at 1:22 PM on September 1, 2014

I must admit to a certain reflexive reaction of revulsion when I read articles glorifying college football. I think it's deeply weird and wrong that we continue to support a sport in our universities that causes brain damage.
posted by conorh at 1:41 PM on September 1, 2014 [2 favorites]

I feel that too conorh, I'm part of the problem by consuming, by being swept up in the romance. We're all broken, and we come from broken homes, and we walk to a broken future.
posted by joecacti at 1:57 PM on September 1, 2014 [3 favorites]

"Go to Boulder and realize you have done something very wrong to not be there all the time, and to not look like the people there, and do the healthy, fit, virtuous and cheerful things they do.*

*Going to Boulder is realizing you are now, by making all the choices you have made in your life, part of the problem forever."

Made the whole thing worth it, even if the Buffs are no good at football.
posted by benk at 2:02 PM on September 1, 2014