Sunday, June 19, 2011

The NFL Lockout: A Consciousness Evolution



The ongoing NFL Lockout is but a reflection of our evolving collective consciousness.  I'm not a big sports fan so until now the lockout was just a blip on my radar. 

Then I read that Senator Arlen Spector is calling on Congress to save America by ending the deadlock. Really? Yes, really.



Senator Specter wrote in an op-ed piece in the NY Times that cancellation of the 2011 National Football League season would "disrupt the social rituals (tailgating, Super Bowl parties) that surround the game; it would also have serious economic consequences".

Am I the only one who thinks the Senator was referring to more than tailgate parties when he mentioned rituals?  Like maybe the fact that the televised football season is in itself a Mega Ritual?  But I digress.

It's true that the lockout has deep financial implications across all aspects of society.   
The economic impact of the NFL’s lockout is far-reaching, with many groups being affected: individual cities, small businesses, stadium workers, staff, local hotels, restaurants, seasonal jobs, taxpayers and more—in short, anyone associated with the game.NFLLockout.com

In a recent ESPN interview Ray Lewis went even further, stating his belief that society would experience a complete breakdown without an NFL season: 

Lewis said that "if we don't have a season -- watch how much evil, which we call crime, watch how much crime picks up, if you take away our game." Lewis' contention was that the lockout affected the fans as much or more than the players and owners.

"There's too many people that live through us, people live through us," he said.Yahoo News

But the heaviest financial impact would be on the television industry.  We're talking billions of dollars in lost revenue from TV commercials alone. 

However, I think the greater loss to the television industry would be the free-form platform the NFL provides for them to reach and influence millions of viewers' minds.  Ray Lewis may be correct in his assertion that without this form of mind control a type of chaos could ensue. 


The average football fan spends 3-6 per week watching games, but some fans admit to watching up to 40-50 hours per week. 

With all that mind power freed up to actually think and observe, who knows what could happen?  Maybe people would actually start to notice that they're living in a box (or an X-Box as ViolatoR so aptly noted in his latest sync video over at The Stygian Port).

Egads!  Man the hatches!  Call Congress!  We must stop people from purposefully thinking!  We need them to continue mindlessly thinking and spending so that America can survive!  Sheesh. What a load of bologna. 

Anyway, this whole television industry meltdown (and by extension the movie industry) totally syncs to Kubrick's movie 2001: A Space Odyssey

The NFL stars' rebellion against the game is like the scene in 2001: A Space Odyssey where the committee from Earth realize they are inside the Monolith (the movie screen).

The lights in the movie scene are even very similar to the lights over a football field.

Here's a video describing the meaning of the Monolith and that scene in 2001: A Space Odyssey:

 

Update 6/26/11:
Here's a really funny video about how sports fans engage in a "Communal Suspension of Disbelief" to avoid facing reality. This guy's talking about the NBA, but it still applies. Hilarious. (Thanks to @DishinNSwishin for the link).

2 comments:

  1. Arlen Specter is responsible for the Magic Bullet theory (KK33).

    Videodrome much? In my Sync Book piece, I mention that a movie theater represents Plato's Cave--by stepping out of the movie screen in the "Jupiter and Beyond the Infinite" sequence, Bowman is stepping out of the Cave. This seems to be the missing piece of the puzzle.

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  2. @Eleleth - Good info. So, Senator Specter has a history of supporting Mega Rituals. Why am I not surprised?

    Videodrome...haha, yeh I'll never forget the scene in "The Ring" where the chick comes out of the TV. It scared me so bad I almost wet myself LOL.

    Seriously though, the analogy of Plato's Cave is very applicable to the experience of Sync. Once you have seen even the tiniest edge of the box, you know beyond the shadow of a doubt that something else exists out there (though you still know not what) and there's just no turning back.

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