Podcast | Ready to Be Strong Ep. 24

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Transcript:

Tania: Welcome to Ready to Be Strong. I’m Tania Israel.

Elizabeth: I’m Elizabeth Scharf.

Tania: Together we’re broadening our minds, opening our hearts.

Elizabeth: And strengthening connections to face the challenges of living in a divided world.

Tania: In this episode, we’ll be gaining insight into political division through the lens of sports.

Elizabeth: Yes, surprise, surprise, Tania. I wanted to talk about sports today because I recently went to, I believe it was my first professional basketball game in New York City. I was there a couple of weeks ago and went to the Knicks playoff game, game number six for all the fans out there. And they won famously by 20 points. And it was so fun walking from our seats to outside the stadium because we walked down this long narrow corridor of a hallway, down into the stairs, and people were chanting, “Go New York, go! Go New York, go!”

It was the first time in a long time that I’d been in this big crowd of people and we were all celebrating together. But I knew that we all came from different walks of life. And I thought there was such cohesion among us. But at the same time, I thought, hmm, like this person probably lives very far from where I live. This person probably has had different life experiences than I have. Maybe even this person is on the other side of the political sphere from me. But here we are all chanting. And it spilled out onto Madison Square Garden and the corridor there. And it was this huge celebration.

And I just smiled and I was so happy to be in the mix with all these different people, but all together in this love for the win and the New York Knicks. And it was contagious.

Tania: Yeah, you felt super connected to these people.

Elizabeth: Yeah, and I’m not even really a big Knicks fan.

Tania: But you got caught up in the moment.

Elizabeth: And I was told that I couldn’t wear green for the Celtics. So, you know, here I was even being swept up into this just joyous, cohesive group.

Tania: Yeah, that’s amazing. And I think being part of a fandom makes you feel close to other people just because there’s something you’re all excited about together. You know, I wonder, too, when you’re talking about sports, because you were talking about like, yeah, we weren’t allowed to wear the colors of the other team. And it’s not only that you’ve got this group that you feel connected to, but you also have this group that you feel is the enemy. Right?

Elizabeth: Absolutely. And I think about that in the case of the Olympics, too. It’s something that brings ideally all walks of life from a certain country together. Part of it is winning, but it’s winning also against other countries, right? And maybe I’d have to brush up on my Olympic origin story history. But maybe that was all part of it, to make sure that a group of people is super cohesive and ultimately, to make people feel cohesive, you have to pit them against another.

Tania: Oh, so interesting. And I actually have an example of this that I talk about in Facing the Fracture. First of all, let me say, I’m really glad you brought up sports because it would not have occurred to me to bring up sports as a topic because I’m generally not a sports person. I’m in fact a terrible sports fan because I’m always like, well, someone’s gonna win and someone’s gonna lose, like, why should my team win?

So I’m often like really excited whenever anyone does anything good, but the people around me who are rooting for one particular team don’t always appreciate my appreciation for something fantastic that the other team just did.

Elizabeth: Yeah, noted. Do not invite Tania to Notre Dame Game Watches.

Tania: No, right? Well, I’ve come—I’m really good at bringing snacks. So the actual competition aspect of it—because I sort of bring this equanimity to it, like, hey, both teams are doing really good things, or I feel bad when something happens to somebody on the other team. But I do have an example of it that I talk about.

Because I’m not really a sports fan, but then someone started inviting me to Dodgers games. I know a lot of people who are Dodgers fans, you know, we live close to LA. And so I started going to the games. Well, the first thing that’s very exciting about going to a Dodgers game is that you can get nachos in a hat. Oh my gosh. Fantastic opportunity. So that’s great. So you can get nachos in a hat.

So at first, when I started going, I would just go and like eat my nachos and enjoy being outside on a lovely summer evening. But then I started noticing what was going on in the game. And then I got interested about it because they’re showing the different players, and I’m like, OK, they’ve got backstories. People have lots of interest.

So then I actually started rooting for the team and I started rooting for the Dodgers. And then I started wearing Dodger blue. And then I was like, “That player’s fun because his name’s Puig,” and everyone would yell “Puig!” and his number’s 66 and that’s the year I was born, so I was like, cool. So then I got a jersey—but then right after I got the jersey, he was traded away. I was like, “What? How is he no longer part of the team?” And I just bought this thing!

So I got very caught up in all of the different aspects of Dodger fandom. One of the people who works in my department was a Dodgers fan, so I would stop by her office and we would debrief the games and that was really fun. So I felt connected to her. And then my friends, they would watch the games and I would watch the games with them. And then the Dodgers won the World Series and that was fantastic.

And so that was really fun. Although then I just kind of stopped watching it. It all went away, you know, and I just haven’t been paying attention at all. But the other thing I know is that the Dodgers have a history. And I also have a lot of New York people in my life—a lot of my family’s from New York and stuff. And there are people there who hate the Dodgers because the Dodgers left Brooklyn and moved to LA.

So the people who were Dodgers fans—like die-hard Dodgers fans—hate the Dodgers because they moved away. So I’m like, people have so many really strong opinions about the sports teams, right?

Elizabeth: Absolutely. Yeah. I mean, my dad was a Brooklyn Dodgers fan. One of my oldest son’s first-grade teachers was really into the Dodgers. And I just remember, I think she brought up the Dodgers early on to get all the kids to be cohesive and root for the Dodgers and sort of have this, “Okay, we’re all part of one big family,” and her conduit for that or vehicle for that was making them all Dodgers fans. Kind of brilliant to have all these six- and seven-year-olds come together on this point.

Tania: Yeah, it’s great to have something to root for together. And like you were talking about, it’s not only rooting for something, but it’s also rooting against the other team. So the reason I talk about this in Facing the Fracture is because I was like, “This is tribalism,” you know? It’s like we’ve got this one group that we see ourselves as super connected to.

And you were talking about with the Knicks fans, you’re like, yeah, there are differences here among all of us, but we are all tonight the New York Knicks. And then there’s this other team that’s the enemy. There’s great research that shows, yes, one of the ways to bond people together is to have a common enemy. I mean, another way is to have a common goal that you’re working toward. But having the common enemy is a great way to bring people together and to make them really bond—and really mad at whoever that other entity is.

Elizabeth: So sports has been on my mind because I think it’s—you know, in the past we’ve talked about bridging the divide by getting involved in civic organizations and maybe government or school, et cetera. And I think sports provides a really easy access opportunity for people to join a group and to join a tribe. There’s something democratizing about it. Its “entrance exam”—there is none, right? You put on some red and all of a sudden you’re a Cardinals fan, you’re a Chicago Bull, and you don’t even have to be from that city.

So I just think it’s a great vehicle to get engaged with people that you normally maybe wouldn’t be engaged with. And you could talk about different players. You’re all rooting for the same pitcher or shooting guard at the time, and then you have—you know, there’s always halftime and you have small talk with different people that you normally wouldn’t have.

Tania: Yeah, that totally makes sense. I mean, this is the whole business model of sports bars, right? You can come together with people who you don’t even know, hang out and watch these things together and be on the same team—or even have a sort of friendly competition with other people there who are rooting for a different team.

But yeah, it’s definitely—and it’s funny because we do see that with presidential debates and things. People will go to a bar and watch with other people. And it’s a little like a sporting event. But I love this idea that anybody can be a sports fan.

Elizabeth: Yeah, do you think that having a common enemy, though—is it a good thing or is it just mimicking politics once again?

Tania: I think it’s a great question. I don’t know that the problem is that sports is mimicking politics. I think a bigger problem is that politics is mimicking sports. Because I don’t think that there’s such a corrosive factor in our society to have people rooting for different sports teams. Like, I’m like, yeah, that seems fine. People get enthusiastic about it. People dress in a certain way.

I think in terms of sort of having some spirit of cohesiveness and excitement about something, that seems like a good, healthy thing to have. When we start treating politics like sports—like it’s all about who you’re rooting for, and “Here are all the people on my team and there’s the enemy”—that, I think … seems to be having a real corrosive effect on our society in terms of demonizing people on the other team and really narrowing who we feel like we can even associate with ourselves. I don’t think sports and enthusiasm for sports is a problem. But I think that when we treat politics as entertainment and as sports in that way, it seems to be having a negative impact.

Elizabeth: You know, I used to tell my kids—and still do—not to cheer when another team makes a mistake or doesn’t do as well. And I noticed when I was at the next game, people were cheering when the other team made a mistake. I don’t know if that’s a cultural shift or just that game in particular, but I remember growing up and you weren’t—it was not cool to cheer when the other team missed a free throw or something like that, or to make fun of other team members. So I’m wondering if politics has already infiltrated sports and how we act and how we make it corrosive. I do think it becomes very powerful when you do have a common enemy.

Tania: Yeah, now I’m going to draw on what I know from being a podcast listener. I like to listen to We Can Do Hard Things—Glennon Doyle and her sister, and Abby Wambach, who’s a professional athlete and award-winning soccer player. They do this podcast and they were talking about kids’ sports. I am not generally a sports fan. I never played sports and I don’t have kids, so I know nothing about this world. But when they were talking about it, they were saying the vibe around kids’ sports has gotten so much more heated and pressured and all these things. I’d be curious to hear your perspective.

Elizabeth: Yes, so our kids started in town sports a couple years ago through the soccer league here in California. And it reminds me of how I grew up—playing town soccer, parks and rec, etc. And it’s been great. And the kids have come together. I’m going camping actually with the team—the Leopard Sharks, the kindergarten team—this weekend. Maybe we’re not all so dissimilar, but we definitely wouldn’t have been friends had our kids not been on the same Leopard Shark soccer team together. And that’s wonderful. And actually, they celebrate when they do well and they’re cohesive and they don’t really make the other team the enemy—the corrosive enemy. But I’ve heard that it really heats up in the next few years and it becomes overwhelming for the kids and the parents and there’s travel and you have to spend a lot of money. And it kind of takes away from the point of sports, which is to come together as a cohesive unit, understand how to relate to your teammate who might be very different from you. This is actually how I grew up in the basketball world. And I think basketball is like a pretty open access sport versus like tennis or sailing or something like that. And it was about being with other people, enjoying the game, celebrating one another. And that part kind of gets sucked out earlier and earlier of kids’ lives, I think, these days, because it’s become a business. It’s become a very big business. So how do you keep the innocence—maybe not the right word—but the pureness of sports and what it does to bring people together without having big business or being corrosive, almost like politics? How do you make sure that you preserve that?

Tania: Can you talk a little bit about—since I haven’t played team sports—it does seem like there’s things that you learn as a member of a sports team about working together with other people toward a common goal, and things that are useful skills to have in society. Can you talk a little bit about that?

Elizabeth: Yeah, I think you know, people use this phrase like “meet the person where they’re at”—like you kind of have to meet other players where they’re at and understand and talk with them about what are their strengths. And you have to do the same about yourself. And then you figure out as a team who should do what and when—of course, a coach is involved in this. But that’s really navigating how to work together with people that could be very unlike you, with different skills, different backgrounds, etc. How to communicate is a huge one as well. And being vocal about what you need and what you can offer—you know, “I got the backside,” “No, you get front,” “I got—,” things like that. And you see it play out. And I think what you said before about the Dodger that got traded—unfortunately, that is happening more and more in college sports now. And I love college sports because people come together as a team because they’re playing for their peers as well—the other students. And now you have people changing teams all the time because rules have changed.

Tania: Wait, they’re transferring schools?

Elizabeth: Yeah.Sometimes four different schools in four years.

Tania: But what about their academic trajectory? 

Elizabeth: I know. That too, of course. Because it’s become a big business. So when I think about, wow, even college—there isn’t as much cohesiveness because people can change schools so easily now. And then you talked about youth sports and how that’s becoming more and more intense because youth sports is now a big business. How do we find our tribe in the kind of old-school spirit of the game? And I think when kids are really young and in town sports, that’s one route. And then even for adults—my 85-year-old mother plays bocce. You know, she can’t play some of the sports she used to play back in the day, but she still rolls on down there and plays bocce. Every time I talk to her on Wednesday mornings after her Tuesday bocce evening game, she tells me about John the Doctor from Boston and Rafik from Toronto and all these different people who she normally wouldn’t get to know. And that is really wonderful.

Tania: So like sports clearly has the potential to bring people together either as players or as fans. Maybe you get to connect with people you wouldn’t have before. But I love the things you’re talking about—identifying what your strengths are. And maybe, you know, people have different roles that they’re bringing to it, right? And maybe some people have different potential to be really great athletes compared to other people, but that there are different roles that people can play that will play to their strengths. So that’s great. And working with other people—collaborating, doing an assist—is a really important role to have, not just being the one who gets the basket right?

Elizabeth: Yeah. Exactly. So if I circle us back to why we thought it would be interesting to talk about sports in the context of the political divide—maybe politicians should form a basketball team and get it back to pure sports. I don’t know. And I even think about sometimes work has kickball teams and softball leagues and things like that. There is something to sports. And I think you breaking down—what is this magic sauce—is really important. And to think about in the context of how can we do that in politics as well. Is that possible?

Tania: But let me just get back to sports for a minute. Because one of the things that occurs to me about sports is that people are doing it in person. Like you’re not on your phone playing sports. You’re actually in real life with other three-dimensional human beings. And that, I think, is one of the most important things that we can do—have those opportunities to connect with people. When we’re dealing with very narrow ideas of people based on who they are on their social media feeds or the stereotypes that we have of people who are on the other side of the divide—there’s tons of research that shows we really misperceive people across the political divide. But one of the things is we are filtering them through what we see in the media and in social media and in very small glimpses of them. But when you’re actually doing sports and you’re practicing with people and you’re doing games, you’re getting to see people in this very real-life, human, three-dimensional context. That’s—maybe I’m thinking—my greatest takeaway from all this about the power of sports and what sports can bring to our society to help overcome some of that division—is getting people engaging with each other in real life.

Elizabeth: Do you think sports offer that opportunity more easily than, say, joining a club in your town—like a civic organization or going to church or any of the other options that we’ve talked about before?

Tania: I mean, I think that all of those things are really great and you can do all of those things. But some aspects of those things are probably going to be, again, kind of mediated through other things. You’re not always going to be in real life with people. Like sports—I mean, it’s a real-life experience, you know? So that’s kind of cool. You get out there, you’re doing something physical. I mean, I think that where we can do it so that it is not corrosive in the ways that it can be—I guess it’s the thing about everything. Like politics is the same way. Where we can be in places where we’re engaging with other people in real life—when I’m knocking on the doors, talking to people about what’s on the ballot—that’s a fantastic experience to have, because I’m actually hearing often something really different and more nuanced than I’m hearing in the media about what people think about things. But I guess the point is also—in order to bring our society back together more, we don’t always have to be talking about politics. Like, in fact, we shouldn’t be. You know, we should not be constantly in that.

It’s something that I think we need to take seriously. We shouldn’t treat it like it’s a sport, because politics is more consequential. And at the same time, it’s not the only thing that we should be focusing on when we are thinking about or engaging with another person—where they are politically. It’s consequential, but it shouldn’t be the only thing that we’re viewing about a person. And maybe sports—I don’t know—if that gives us at least another lens, another way of connecting with people, either as teammates or as fans. But it seems like it at least gets us off of our phones.

Elizabeth: Right. And I also think that for me personally, it seems like if I join a sport and I participate, it’s going to be joyous. And I’m not saying going to church is not joyous or going to a civic organization meeting is not joyous, but I put on a different hat when I go to play sports. I’m eager to run around or hit the ball, throw the ball, use my body and to exercise and have fun. At the end of the day, civic organization meetings can be fun, but that’s not my anticipation going into it. That is not my expectation. And so I think that there’s something just about having fun with one another in real life, right? It’s more effective sometimes to get people to get together in real life if they’re going to play a sport versus going to a civic organization meeting at a town hall. Sometimes that could be a lot—I mean, I consider that to be a lot of fun—but I think more universally, sports.

Tania: Yeah, we should have fun with other people. We should have fun with other people. I think that’s the conclusion. We should have fun with other people, whether it’s watching a sport together and chanting and singing and wearing the colors—and that’s fun—or whether it’s getting out there on the field or the court and actually engaging with other people and supporting other people in their own accomplishments and in their own enjoyment of the game.

Elizabeth: Yeah, I agree. Fun should not be ignored. Fun—and I also think that people let their guard down a bit and become a little bit more open with their spirit and emotions. And there’s a camaraderie that happens that I think is a little different than going to town hall.

Tania: Yeah, well, there’s something about sports where it’s very in-the-moment—what’s happening. You can’t script it all. And I think that’s something that people try to do with their engagements around politics—they’ve got their speech in their head that they want to make and their bullet points and all this. And in sports, you’ve got to be in the moment. You’ve got to be thinking quickly about how to respond to different things. And that’s actually a great thing for us to know how to do. Okay, so sports is great because we get to sometimes engage with people who we wouldn’t in any other context than being a fan or being a teammate. It’s also good because we recognize that we have different strengths that we can bring toward a common goal, and that’s a great thing. It’s also something where we are in real life engaging with other people. And it’s also something where we are in the moment, where we’re needing to pay attention and respond to what’s going on. And that kind of responsiveness and flexibility is a really important skill for us to have.

Elizabeth: And lastly, it’s—fun!

Tania: I’m Tania Israel, professor, psychologist, and author of Facing the Fracture.

Elizabeth: And I’m Elizabeth Scharf, social entrepreneur and urgent optimist. Make your choice.

Tania: Are you ready to be strong?

Tania: Ready to Be Strong is brought to you by me, Tania Israel.

Elizabeth: And me, Elizabeth Scharf.

Tania: And produced by Sarita Bhatt. Our theme music is by Jeff Marcel at Premium.

Elizabeth: We hope our conversation will spark you to have a conversation or share the episode with a friend. Please rate and review the show so others can find Ready to Be Strong. And lastly, thank you for spending time with us today.