This is about Richard Sherman.
We are a use-it-and-dispose-of-it style culture here in the USA. Everything from our fast food to our streaming internet clips and social media posts are made to be consumed and then forgotten as we move on to the next content like a ravenous pack of data-driven T-Rexes.
Nowhere is this more glaringly obvious than in our professional entertainments. Most professions which reach the pinnacle of what we are taught is The American Dream have some element of exposure to the public. With that exposure comes the fickle focus of the people who focus on your show, your product, your service or your sport.
Sports are a profession unlike any other in that they combine a ritualistic, public grading of one’s performance that is not only recorded for posterity but, in the current milieu, rigorously dissected by legions of journalists, streamers and a horde of commenters. Professional athlete’s skill, talent and pain are weighed and measured with the rewards doled out in trophies, riches, accolades and most of all: Attention.
Andy Warhol’s famous quote, “In the future, everyone will be world-famous for 15 minutes,” has now come to full fruition in our era. It tends to dumb down a little how we perceive fame. After all, ask anyone whose retweeted-by-Grant-Cohn-GIF received over 20K views what it feels like and they (I) will tell you that it felt like a tasty Warholian slice of fame.
However, the fact remains that the vast majority of us will never have…
