The Turnaround, Politics, and Human Nature
Philly fans are the worst.
When I was a teenager, my dad was stationed close enough to Philly that we could go see the Cubs (my dad was from Chicago) versus the Phillies. Even in a half empty stadium, my dad’s hat attracted curses and threats. At the end of the game, three drunks threatened to fight the two of us. And for those if you who think we were especially ill-behaved visitors, I remind you that these fans threw snowballs at Santa Clause, used to need a jail in their football stadium, and applauded injuries.
But not every fan is like that.
The Turnaround, on Netflix, is the story of a fan, who suffers from bi-polar, and Phillies’ shortstop Trea Turner, who suffered from the pressure of a large contract. Turner was terrible in his first year for the Phillies and Phillies fans reacted as you would expect Phillies fans to react — with boos, derision, and rants on social media and talk radio. Except for the fan, John McCann.
McCann posted a video encouraging his fellow Phillies fans to give Turner a standing ovation. And they did. Turner, visibly moved by the gesture, turned his season around at that point.
Some people want to believe that human beings are inherently bad. There is precious little reason to think that is true. Sometimes, people are given permission by the people around them to indulge in their worst, but most of the time people behave well toward each other. The picture of people turning on each other during disasters is generally untrue. In general, people pull together and help each other. (Though research does show rich people can be exceptions.) It has been that way through our history — we are not a competitive species, on issues that matter. We have always been a cooperative species. And while we can be moved to be worse, the Turnaround shows that we can also be moved to be better.
We are living through interesting times, unfortunately. Fascism and authoritarianism are on the rise worldwide, and we are just about a week away from the most consequential US presidential election in decades. The fascists want you to think of your fellow human beings as the problem, as “the enemy within”. That the world is eat or be eaten, and that only violence and oppression can keep you safe.
It is all bullshit.
People are cooperative by nature, and people, if given the chance, will generally live up to their better nature. Not everyone, of course, and not all the time. But the problems in the world are not that human beings need discipline and cruelty. The problems in the world are generally that we create conditions, through cruelty, through oppressions of various kinds, through propaganda, through inequality, that encourage people to be cruel.
It does not have to be that way. We can choose to create conditions that give people the space to be the cooperative, kind people they generally are. And it starts with rejecting leaders that see other human beings as “scum” or “poisoning the blood of our country.”
After all, if kindness can help a shortstop, imagine what it can do for a country.