Sis Boom Bah

I find watching people at group social events interesting. Sometimes I find myself looking around movie theatres and wondering about the people there. But today was a different event. I attended the Roughriders-Stampeders football game (6 and 0 baby, yeah!). It was 35,000 people basically hanging out together, watching the game.
I find sports games interesting because they give me hope for the future. I know, that sounds somewhat melodramatic, but think of it. It is a group of people who have gathered together and are united in their cause. I was giving high fives and talking with people that I will never see again, and whose names I will never know, and that happens everywhere. In day to day life, everyone, especially in the city, and doubly especially downtown in the city, is an island unto itself. To extend the metaphor, each person is an island, and with their friends they make up a chain of islands, but islands nonetheless. But put these same people at a sports game and they are one, unified in purpose and desire. That is cool.
However, there is a flipside. I sometimes wonder if sports aren't this close (you can't see me, but my fingers are about a centimetre apart) to being the downfall of society. The concern that comes in is that these games pit one team against another. Now, despite what the school system seems to be trying to teach children these days, I think competition is a good thing. But the fans of one team are completely devoted to their team, to the exclusion of all else. It is more of an issue in European football where sports fans actually clash and riot over these games. Maybe I have read to many cyberpunk science fiction, but I sometimes can see a future where society has largely broken down and the streets are roamed by packs of Maple Leafs fans who are engaged in civil war against wandering hordes of Canadien fans, but both will unite, however briefly, against the Patriots fans. The games will still be played, but now, sudden death is exactly what it says.
I am only half kidding when I say that. The seriousness with which some people take the games is slightly frightening. It is not even all that back in Canada, at least at the CFL games. But I look at how sports are regarded in the U.S., or the football in Europe and I wonder if people aren't becoming too involved in their sports teams. To make matters worse, sports games are the perfect time for people to devolve into the whole mob mentality, where the lowest common denominator becomes the highest aspiration of the individual.
Until then, I will continue to watch and continue to enjoy. With any luck, things will never get as bad as my imigination.