The issue between three-time NASCAR champion Tony Stewart and a belligerent fan at the Chili Bowl is one example of a larger issue in NASCAR and the world of sports.
For those of you who might not have been in the loop this past weekend, you might have missed the news that three-time NASCAR champion Tony Stewart was involved in an altercation with a fan at the Chili Bowl. According to several fans that BTF spoke with, the fan appeared to be the one that caused the issue. Multiple fans stated that the man verbally harassed Stewart for much of the night (even flipping him the bird on a few occasions) before Stewart finally decided to approach the fan.
As can be seen in the video (and heard) in the video below, the fan had no issue with telling Stewart to his face what he thought of him. After a few seconds their hands became tangled and it appears as though the fan shoved Stewart.
The incident between Stewart and the fan (who later was discovered to be an off-duty member of the Tulsa Sheriffs Office) is just the most recent example of a much larger issue in NASCAR and sports. For some reason fans seem to believe that they have the right to speak their minds when it comes to athletes, regardless of the time, place or forum.
Despite this apparent belief, the truth is that these fans could not be more wrong.
Yes, being a famous athlete or any figure in the public eye comes with a certain level of understanding and the sacrifice of certain things that somebody working the 9-5 desk job might not have to deal with. Athletes understand that privacy doesn’t exactly exist and that normal things like going to the movies or the mall might be more difficult. Athletes also understand (or should understand) that their words and actions will have a larger impact than others.
If Tim for the local gas station goes on Twitter and makes a racial or sexist remark, chances are nothing happens and the needle doesn’t move. If someone like Dale Earnhardt Jr. or Tom Brady does the same thing, it’s national news. It might not be fair but it comes with the territory and athletes largely understand that.
The rub here is that fans seem to forget that rules of common decency apply to everyone including athletes.
Sure, as fans we all have drivers that we cheer for and drivers that we would rather see not win races. As fans we sit in front of the TV and yell for our favorites to do well and the one that we dislike to blow a tire and that’s fine. What isn’t fine is the type of actions that the fan at the Chili Bowl exhibited towards Tony Stewart.
NASCAR drivers, NFL players, NBA players and athletes in general are all people. For the most part they are all people that the majority of fans know nothing about, yet fans feel that they have the right to treat these people any way that want to. Just because you don’t cheer for a certain athlete, it doesn’t give you card blanch to treat them like less of a human.
Over the years I have not been a huge fan of Kyle Busch due to his actions on the race track. I know nothing about Kyle off of the track, I don’t know what kind of man he is, what kind of father he is, what kind of husband he is, what kind of son he is, what kind of person he is; all I know is the kind of driver that I perceive him to be. With this information I would never walk up to Busch in a public forum and berate him with insults. Moreover, I would also never take to social media to call Busch any name under the sun and make comments about him, his wife or his family.
Unfortunately, not all fans have the same level of respect. We have all seen or witnessed the ridiculous behavior of fans. Whether it be throwing bottles onto the track, going off on a driver, his wife or his kids on social media, approaching a driver in public and saying whatever ridiculous things come out in that moment or whatever other off of the cuff things these fans come up with.
While the level of the action is often different, the overall inappropriateness of the behavior remains the same. Drivers and athletes are people too and as silly as it seems to have to say that, some people need to be reminded of it. If you work for a bank and who banks at the bank across town approached you outside of work and started calling you names and verbally attacking you because they didn’t like where you worked or the “team” that you worked for, would you have an issue with it? If you were a server and someone ordered mashed potatoes and you brought them a baked potato and they began cursing you out, would that be okay?
While things like this might happen in the real world, they are no way acceptable and if you were the one on the other end of it you would not be okay with it happening. So what the heck makes it any different when it comes to drivers and athletes?
Could Stewart have chosen not to go into the stands at the Chili Bowl? Sure, he could have continued to ignore the man who was swearing and cursing and making lewd gestures at him all night. However, Stewart going into the stands isn’t the issue here. The issue is the fan who feels he has the right to treat Stewart like less than a human being. The issue here is all fans who feel that they have some sort of right to treat any driver or athlete like less than a human being simple because they don’t like how they perform or act in their profession. The issue here is the fan who feels it’s appropriate to attack a driver’s family and children because they spun out another driver on a Sunday. The issue here is the fan that hurls a glass bottle from the stands towards the track putting innocent fans in danger as a result (not to mention anyone of the track if the bottle makes it that far).
Fans can be amazing and some might argue that without fans there would not be sports. That being said, fans can also be horrible and in my opinion it’s those kinds of fans that every sport can do without because those people really aren’t fans at all.
