Last Thursday, LeBron lit up the Knicks to the tune of 50 points at the Garden. That’s probably your lead story on SporsCenter. I get that. But as he was leaving the game late in the fourth quarter, a young fan – adorned in a replica James jersey – slipped past security and onto the court, and approached James to profess is adoration for the NBA superstar. He was quickly detained by security and hauled off, and James and the other players were unharmed. How is THIS not the bigger story?Bizarre enough until you read that the 17-year old fan, Anthony Erskine, doesn’t think that he did anything wrong. He claims to have a “shrine-like” room to LBJ, complete with posters, jerseys and shoes. It probably wouldn’t surprise me to find out he had a letter like this one:
Dear Bron,
I wrote you but you still ain’t callin’
I left my cell, my pager, and my home phone at the bottom,
I sent some pictures back in autumn, you must not have got ‘em,
There probably was a problem at the post office or somethin,
I know you hear this all the time, but I’m your biggest fan,
I went to a preseason game and you threw me your sweaty head band,
I got a room full of your posters and your pictures, man
I love you, and I love the Cavs even though they’re horribly ran,
What’s it like being around Ben Wallace now, is he cool?
I can’t wait to meet you and bring you to my school,
I think about you when I’m lonely,
knowing you’re my one and only,
Hit me back Bron, that’s no baloney,
your biggest fan, this is Tony…
OK, so maybe that’s a stretch, and Eminem is a lot better at that than I am, but the fact remains: our obsession with celebrity in this culture is scary. It’s one thing to have a healthy adoration for people that we look up to. But for someone to knowingly dodge security and approach someone he’s never met, and then to think that he did nothing wrong is asinine.
True, Anthony Erskine meant James no harm. And James seemed unfazed by the episode. But I shiver to think that one day, someone not in their right mind, someone with just as unhealthy (or more so) obsession with a celebrity, will walk up on them and kill them on the spot. It happened to John Lennon in 1980. Monica Seles was stabbed by a fan during a tennis match. It’s going to happen again. And it’s going to be equally as tragic. All because we are obsessed with the idea of celebrity.
For now, let’s just hope and pray that Anthony Erskine isn’t going to tie up his pregnant girlfriend in the trunk and drive off of a bridge.
(P.S. I’m not trying to libel Erskine in any way. I’m just using him as an example. I think it’s unnecessary to parade him around through the legal system for this case of simple trespassing, but he needs to understand that what he did wasn’t acceptable under any circumstances. And besides, for all I know, he doesn’t have a girlfriend, and is now and forever devoted to LeBron James.)
I wrote you but you still ain’t callin’
I left my cell, my pager, and my home phone at the bottom,
I sent some pictures back in autumn, you must not have got ‘em,
There probably was a problem at the post office or somethin,
I know you hear this all the time, but I’m your biggest fan,
I went to a preseason game and you threw me your sweaty head band,
I got a room full of your posters and your pictures, man
I love you, and I love the Cavs even though they’re horribly ran,
What’s it like being around Ben Wallace now, is he cool?
I can’t wait to meet you and bring you to my school,
I think about you when I’m lonely,
knowing you’re my one and only,
Hit me back Bron, that’s no baloney,
your biggest fan, this is Tony…
OK, so maybe that’s a stretch, and Eminem is a lot better at that than I am, but the fact remains: our obsession with celebrity in this culture is scary. It’s one thing to have a healthy adoration for people that we look up to. But for someone to knowingly dodge security and approach someone he’s never met, and then to think that he did nothing wrong is asinine.
True, Anthony Erskine meant James no harm. And James seemed unfazed by the episode. But I shiver to think that one day, someone not in their right mind, someone with just as unhealthy (or more so) obsession with a celebrity, will walk up on them and kill them on the spot. It happened to John Lennon in 1980. Monica Seles was stabbed by a fan during a tennis match. It’s going to happen again. And it’s going to be equally as tragic. All because we are obsessed with the idea of celebrity.
For now, let’s just hope and pray that Anthony Erskine isn’t going to tie up his pregnant girlfriend in the trunk and drive off of a bridge.
(P.S. I’m not trying to libel Erskine in any way. I’m just using him as an example. I think it’s unnecessary to parade him around through the legal system for this case of simple trespassing, but he needs to understand that what he did wasn’t acceptable under any circumstances. And besides, for all I know, he doesn’t have a girlfriend, and is now and forever devoted to LeBron James.)
2 comments:
Just wanted to point out that my team (Liverpool) revenged the earlier loss to Reading (your team) this week. I watched the game, it was a good one. How did you come to be a Reading fan? I started watching the EPL about 4 years ago, after 2 years I decided I needed to get a team. I wanted a team that I could watch (Fox Soccer Channel seems to show Man U, Chelsea, Arsenal, Liverpool, Blackburn most frequently) and ultimately I just fell for Gerrard. So I've been pulling for them since. I got to watch the Champions League final last year in a pub in London which was great, EXCEPT for the Liverpool loss. That sucked, because we (can I say "we" when I'm not on the team?) controlled the first half, and then in extra time they got a goal off a lucky deflection, and we could not come back from it.
Yeah, I was watching that match. Tough one to take. I thought the offical was a little lenient on some foul calls in the second half, especially when Kevin Doyle got dragged down in the box, by the L'Pool defender. Oh well. Congrats on the win.
I started liking Reading because of my good friend Josh. His cousin is married to Marcus Hahnamann, the Royals keeper. In fact, he was over in England two weeks ago visiting them and went to the Man City match, a 2-nil Reading win.
I've only really been a fan for two years, since they came up to the Prem.
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