It's late October 2024, and I find myself in New England on a bright Sunday morning, in a vast parking lot next to Gillette Stadium, surrounded by fans of the Patriots.
And by ‘vast’, I mean dozens of rows of vehicles, several thousand cars, SUVs, minivans and pickup trucks, their tailgates down and groaning under the weight of packed ice coolers and portable grills – immersing me in the scent of sizzling burgers and brats.
All around me there is beer and music, as fans of all ages throw footballs and flip burgers and play cornhole and stand in Port-a-Potty lines, having the time of their lives. I myself am settled in a collapsible canvas chair, in delightful company, sipping something, an unopened book in my lap. I am taking it all in, and likewise having the time of my life.
The Patriots themselves are in for a pretty good day; they have been stumbling like 2 a.m. drunks on an icy sidewalk through this abysmal season, entering their stadium this afternoon with a depressing 1-6 record – owing to the departure of Coach Bill Belichick (surely one of the top 10 coaches in the history of pigskin) and the mediocrity of every player on the current roster not named Hunter Henry. But… they are going to win.
Yet nobody in this ocean of fans knows that at lunchtime; I doubt very many of them expect it. Still, here they are, having such fun, making burgers and making noise and getting blissfully beery in anticipation of the contest to come.
A New York Jets fan marches down the aisle in which I sit, sporting a jersey of green and white, shouting “JETS RULE! PATS DROOL!” All the navy-blue-and red jerseys sneer and jeer. The Jet boy marches this gauntlet defiantly, but finds himself unmolested all the same upon reaching the Port-a-Potty line.
And I briefly reflect: What a partisan thing to do!
If a conservative Republican were to march defiantly down the aisle at the Democratic National Convention in a red cap, shouting, “MAGAS RULE! LIBTARDS DROOL!” he would certainly be booed and jeered, and someone might well stuff a copy of The Handmaid’s Tale in the back of his pants. Conversely, if a liberal Democrat made a similar stand at CPAC – well, he might not get out alive.
And so Jet Boy here is representing, in small, our national predicament.
And yet…
As I look around me, at the dozens of happy beer-guzzling, hot dog-munching fans within earshot, and the hundreds beyond – I can’t tell who’s a liberal and who’s conservative.
The profundity of this thought strikes me with the impact of an unseen tetherball to the head, and I retreat momentarily into the solitude of contemplation. Surely there is an epiphany lurking in this contradiction!
MAGA has spent the past decade shouting at the top of its collective lungs that the Libtards are traitors! Agents of Satan! Out to throw open the borders to rapists and drug kingpins, and eradicate Christianity! And those same Libtards have been shouting at the top of their lungs that MAGAs are deplorable! Ignorant! Fascists! Racist nationalists intent on jailing or deporting anyone who isn’t a white Christian Evangelical!
I keep up with such matters, and I know that it goes far beyond mere shouting: each group is, at this point, convinced that the other group represents an existential threat to them – and, by extension, the nation. And as we’ve all seen, to our heartbreak, it has already gone to bloodshed.
And yet…
By the numbers, the raucous party animals in whose company I am basking are roughly equal parts MAGA and Libtard. Oh, this is Massachusetts, the bluest state of the Union – but by the numbers, more pro football fans are conservative than liberal. Oh, here in Patriot Country the Dems have a 3.2 point advantage where football is concerned, according to Nate Silver, but that’s well shy of the 5/3 ratio in the state’s liberal/conservative count.
So I am sitting here surrounded by MAGA and Libtards in roughly equal measure. And I’m asking myself…
If MAGA is an existential threat to liberals and the very nation itself – and if Libtards are an existential threat to conservatives and the very nation itself – why aren’t guns blazing here in this parking lot?
Why, if the MAGA faithful consider liberals so dangerous, are they utterly disinterested in the disposition of those around them in this place and moment? Why could the Libtards here not care less about the TRUMP bumper stickers clearly visible here and there?
And the answer is – the answer must necessarily be – that nobody here really believes that those in the opposing political tribe are in any way interested in wiping them out, or deporting them, or even denying them a beer. Jet Boy is not going to be seized and dungeoned up in Guantanamo. The lesson of this marvelous moment is that our political hostility and enmity are utterly contextual – as faux as… well, you know.
So I’m thinking – yes, this is exactly what the world needs. We are immersed to near drowning in the yowling and screeching of partisan hatreds day in and day out – and we tailgate barely at all, relatively speaking. If we spent more time doing this, and less time doing that – well, there would be a lot less yowling and screeching, and a lot more burgers and beer. And cornhole.
Ironic, isn’t it, that we’re all here to celebrate Patriots…
...Patriots who are going to win, for all of us.