Not another "sports seems so meaningless" column, PLEASE!!!!!!!!

I went to the University of Connecticut. It was, as it is for so many other students, one of the happiest, if not the happiest time of my life. I can't even begin to tell you how much those years meant to me, and while I perhaps didn't focus on my studies the way scholars of yester year would have liked, I gained life experiences that are second to none.

So when something like the tragedy at Virginia Tech happens, it touches home. I'm further away from my college days than I like to think about, but not so many years that I can't relate to what is happening in Virginia right now. Colleges are like communities. You might not know everyone walking in and out of class, but there is an unspoken bond there. It a big greek family with a bunch of uncles you never met and hot cousins you never knew you had.

The greatest single thrill of my life was being on Campus, at Storrs, when Uconn won the NCAA Men's Basketball Championship Game over Duke in 1999. The excitement was overwhelming. Our team, OUR SCHOOL had won the championship. The players in that game were the same ones we had classes with, went to parties with, saw walking around, and the sense of togetherness was amazing. I ran out into the campus, my entire dorm in tow, out into the cold night where the entire school had come alive, buzzing as if it were one living organism. We hugged, we cried, we drank a shit load together, and it was all for us. WE, the students, had been a part of something special.

Why do I bring this up? For two reasons; one, as wonderful a moment as the '99 Championship was, as much joy as we all felt together, the sense of communal despair that is hanging over Va. Tech today must be indescribable. If a moment of triumph can bring an entire campus together in celebration like it did for my college, a tragedy like this must bring a campus even closer together in grief. I can only imagine what must be happening there right now.

But my second reason for bringing this up is to ask, beg, PLEAD with everyone to stop with the "sports seems so insignificant right now" columns. ESPN.com Jemele Hill was the first to jump on that band wagon today. I like Hill. She is a pretty good writer, takes on some interesting issues in her column, and while her "Kobe Bryant is better than Michael Jordan" piece recently smacked of someone trying desperately to suck readers in with a ridiculous premise, she has held her own so far. But today we got from Hill the patented "how could we even think about sports at a time like this."

Now, Hill didn't focus solely on that point. She strayed into even more murky waters reminding us all that we live in a dangerous society and that we all need to come together and hold hands in order to rectify the situation. The point of the article was that, whether it be sports or the Imus scandal or anything else, we don't take the right things serious in this country.

There are three things that drive me crazy about columns like this. One, the self importance that oozes from them. No one needs to know what some columnist, hundreds of miles away, is thinking or feeling unless they are actually one of the students or the families in Virginia right now. We aren't there. We aren't going through this, and giving a "boy, am I really upset about this" dissertation really intimates that one takes themselves way too seriously, especially when people offer the standard "we need to address violence in our society" routine. Note to everyone; there are unfortunately always going to be nut jobs in this world. I wish that wasn't the case. I wish we could all, every day, go to school or work or get on a bus and not have to worry about someone with a bomb, a gun or a knife trying to kill us to silence the demons in their own head. It's never going to happen. We live in a free society, one that allows us to live an open, many times unfettered life style where today, if I have the means and the motivation I can jump in my car and head across as many states as I wish taking in the majesty of the landscape. That also means that days like today are going to happen. You mourn, you grieve, you take what you can away from the situation, you search your soul, and you move on. Drilling us with your idea of what we should all be thinking and feeling right now is just arrogance. It is the written equivalent of speaking just to hear one's own voice.

Second thing I hate about columns like these is how insulting they are to the readers. Of COURSE we get that stupid, petty differences about sports and the like mean nothing at this point. No one is going to be sitting with the family member of a loved one murdered in such a horrific way and say "hey, I know you just lost your only son, but I watched the Yankees blow a two run lead in the ninth last night with Mariano on the mound, so, you know, I am not having the best day either."

No one is that moronic. NO ONE!!!!! So why do we need columns reminding us? It is like columnists wake up and go "hey, if I don't say something, people might sit down tonight and think the NHL Playoffs are as important as other things happening in the world. I better jump on my lap top and let them know that isn't acceptable. Without me, they might not feel as shitty about this tragedy as they should." PLEASE, get the fuck over yourselves. The ramifications of something like this don't need to be explained to anyone. If they do, the person needing such a "lesson" wouldn't be the kind ready to learn anyway. Columnists should be there to tell us or talk to us about things we don't know or might not be thinking about. There is no more worthless column in the world to write than "you should feel horrible about a tragedy I already know you feel horrible about."

The final thing that annoys me is that the premise of these columns are just wrong. Sports, other little distractions, serve an undeniably important role in all of this. Can you imagine what the first Va. Tech football game is going to be like? Can you imagine how emotional that is going to be? Can you imagine how much those players are going to want to win that game, not for the standings or the BCS points, but for the people in those stands, the ones who will be seeing the faces of so many who had frequented such games in the past flash before their eyes?

Sports is about community. It isn't just competition, it is a chance for members of that community to come out and celebrate together. No where is that more true than at a university. Now is not the time to forget about sports or belittle sports, now is the time to recognize how much of an important role sports can play in healing open wounds. It provides a place of comfort, it provides a sense of togetherness, a reminder that no one has gone through this alone, and for many it simply provides a needed escape. That isn't something to forget, that is something to cherish.

So how about, from here on in, we forget about columnists telling us all what should and should not be important to us? How about we decide that for ourselves. And how about we start the games as soon as we possibly can, not out of disrespect for the fallen but in remembrance of them.