Storyline: What happened at Mizzou this week happens all too infrequently in sports. It took courage. It involved taking a risk. At issue is whether the action taken by MU football players will stimulate college athletes elsewhere to become more socially active.
(Photo courtesy of Andrea Morisette Grazzani)
We’ve seen many times on ESPN. It’s a promo with the question, “Who’s In?” We know what’s asked: Who’s likely to make college football’s Final Four?
It’s a sports question.
This week the nation and college football got a different answer to the question: Will you stand with me? The football team, you see—and then its head coach—took a stand against racial injustice.
A history of racial insults burst into public display. The Mizzou football team joined the campus protest, suspending practice and play. The outcome? The system-wide president and campus chancellor resigned.
It’s likely that football—a magnet for public attention—figured prominently in showcasing what was taking place in Columbia. And it’s likely that football helped seal the deal, too. The potential loss of a $1 million dollar guarantee to a visiting team (if Saturday’s game wasn’t played) would have been big-money lost to the school.
What can we make of it? Big-time collegiate football is mostly about game plans and business plans—winning games and making money. But this time—this time—college football was about something more … social responsibility.
Social responsibility is related to the sport-society intersection. It’s about who we are, what we value, and what we stand for—as a people—and how those stances translate into how we conduct ourselves in relationship to sports. Taking action means being socially responsible. The integration of Major League Baseball is an example.
The stark reality is that a public display of social responsibility doesn’t happen that often in sports today—in any game, college football included. But it has happened before.
In the late ‘60s “The Black 14,” a group of black football players at University of Wyoming, protested playing against a school governed by an institution with exclusionary practices towards African-Americans. And, in the late ‘80s, the head football coach at the University of Colorado went to the Boulder City Council pleading for public acceptance of his black players. Those players were mostly inner-city kids the coach had recruited to attend CU, a school that (at the time) had fewer than 500 African-American students enrolled on campus.
MIzzou president at resignation (Courtesy NYTs)
In both of those cases–and, again, this week at Mizzou–courage was on display. It involved taking a risk, too. Wyoming players were tossed off the team and the CU coach was ridiculed in the local press. Mizzou players and coaches stepped forward not knowing what the future might bring. Think about it: they stood against two of the most powerful figures at their university—the system wide president and the campus chancellor.
But they did recognize and act on something they thought was more important—a deplorable social circumstance. As team members Ian Simon, J’Mon Moore, and Charles Harris put it:
“We love the game. But at the end of the day, it’s just that: a game. Through this experience we’ve begun to bridge the gap between student and athlete in the phrase “Student-Athlete”—by connecting with the community and realizing the bigger picture.”
And by taking action MU football players forged a strong link between their two identities—as students and as athletes. That link is sadly fragile and tenuous in today’s big-time, revenue-based college sports.
But while athletes—especially today’s athletes—don’t often speak up and take action when it comes to social causes, students do. America’s college students are expressing social leadership that’s broad in scope, deep in meaning, and oriented toward social change—just as students did back in the 1960s. So, in a very real way, MU athletes did what many students are doing across the country–taking a stand and taking action.
Across the U.S. college students are addressing an impressive list of issues: campus sexual assault at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill; campus suicide at UPenn; endowment investing at Stanford; and racial-ethnic insensitivity at Yale, to name a few examples. And there are cross-campus initiatives, such as 350.org (global climate change).
Ithaca College students organize and protest (courtesy WRVO.org)
And students aren’t just focusing on social issues broadly. They’re also concerned about how issues are being handled on their own campuses. We saw that happen at Mizzou and similarly at Ithaca College, where students also gathered this week calling for the college president to resign.
What’s prompting this student action? Some analysts believe it’s a response to the prevailing posture in higher education today—an enterprise that many perceive acts more like a company than a social institution. Ross Douthat put it this way in The New York Times: “The modern university’s primary loyalty…is to the school’s brand, status, and (economic) bottom line.” And, bluntly, big-time college football helps in those dimensions. But what Douthat asserts, if accurate, would also lessen higher education’s sensitivity and response to social issues, including the way issues are addressed on college campuses. Some students aren’t willing to accept that outcome—the argument goes—so they organize and take action.
So it’s noteworthy that athletes stepped forward in Columbia, joining fellow students in organizing for change. At issue is whether the action taken by those football players will stimulate college athletes elsewhere to become more socially active.
If it does, then the paradigm will change when it comes to knowing the meaning of “football player.” If it doesn’t, then “Who’s In?” will continue to be about game plans and business plans.
We’ll find out “Who’s In?”
