RSS File


 
Return to Main Page

CFL Football and Canadian Patriotism

CFL Logo

by Marko Peric

With Canada Day over and the CFL regular season starting tomorrow, one has to take a moment to reflect and ask this serious question — is the CFL truly Canadian? At a glance the game appears to be just a revision of American football. As much as I love the idea of having a Canadian Football League, I do have a few small problems with this.

Yes, our game is different, and of course better than the American version. Be sure to point this out to any American that cares to debate the topic. After all, we play with three downs, not four, and our field is longer by 10 yards. Or is that metres? (If anyone knows for sure if a Canadian football field is measured in yards or metres, please email me and tell me. Editor's Note: It's yards. Thanks, Ian, for passing on your CFL knowledge.) Oh, and Canadian balls are bigger than American ones. This fact is sure to impress the Americans. All in all, CFL football is harder than NFL, therefore it is better. Remember that. Our patriotism lies in the fact that we are not Americans, and that we burned half of Washington in the War of 1812 (which we won, of course).

But I've been digressing. I must admit I don't watch a lot of football, but I support the CFL. And when I say support, I mean I'm opposed to disbanding it. It's good they decided to do away with that crazy expansion idea and all those American teams. I mean, American teams in the CFL, that would be like, well, Canadian teams in the NBA. Or maybe in major league baseball. Okay, so it wouldn't be all that weird, I guess, since we play in their leagues, and this reminds me of another tenet of Canadian patriotism, that a Canadian team, the Blue Jays (which were mostly Haitians and Puerto Ricans at the time, if I remember correctly) won the World Series twice.

On the topic of leagues, the National in National Hockey League bothers me. Not as much as Gary "lets dump tradition and make the NHL look like basketball" Bettman's wonderful ideas (which is a topic for another day), but which nation owns the league? Us or them? Anybody know? I'm guessing we do, since the Cup was donated by Lord Stanley, and Americans don't have too many lords. Of course, we don't either, not any more, but we used to.

But back to the CFL. My biggest issue with the league are the team names, some of which are just, well, out there. No problems with Stampeders. Fits fine for Calgary. And the Allouettes, well, makes just as much sense as the New York Yankees, named for a song. BC Lions are okay, I guess, it's short for mountain lions, but there's nothing wrong with that name. Ditto for Hamilton Tiger Cats, apart from the redundancy (Tiger Dogs anyone?). Then it all falls apart. Toronto Argonauts. Hello? Greek mythology? Where did this come from, and how does it fit Toronto at all? Of course, they could have used, say Mycenaeans, or even worse, the Trojans, so we can all be thankful. Then there's the Blue Bombers, which has even less to do with Winnipeg than the Argos with Toronto, if that's possible. That's minor though, when compared with the Roughriders. The name itself is bad enough. I mean, the original rough riders were Teddy Roosevelt's regiment in the Spanish-American war. How much less Canadian can you get, really? And for years there were two teams named this? (Oh, wait, Ottawa was Rough Riders while Saskatchewan was Roughriders. Big difference there.) Who let them do this, and why weren't they shot posthaste? Even if they were both independent club teams before joining the CFL, it's still wrong. The only other league I've ever heard of having teams with the same name was the Soviet Elite Hockey League, or whatever it's called now, which had several teams that called themselves Dynamo. Do we really want to look as dumb as the Russians?

This leaves the Edmonton Eskimos. Or should that be Edmonton Inuit? After all, a few years ago someone in Ottawa apparently decided that there were no Eskimos, just Inuit. Apparently Eskimo is an offensive terms. Of course, they didn't tell us all that very plainly, and I remember wondering who these Inuit were anyway, and where did they come from? Of course, no one told the Americans that they should rename their favourite frozen snack to Inuit Pies. (Amusingly, Coolbrands Inc, a Canadian company, recently bought Eskimo Pie Co.) So I guess the Eskimos had best do the right thing, stop offending people, rename the team, and repaint that EE logo on their helmets to EI.

Hmm, EI. Also known as Employment Insurance, which of course we all knew better as UI, aka Unemployment Insurance. Which for those that haven't had to collect it (i.e. aren't from the East Coast) is what you collect when you lose your job.

So here's waiting for the day when a professional Canadian football team takes the field with helmets bearing the inscription 'EI'. That would be truly Canadian.

The BNC

Curious George: A Quiet Day at Home

The Best of A Thousand Words

The Man with the Pink Bicycle

 
Contact Credits FAQ About Us Privacy Info

Copyright 2000-2016 Dontmindme.com. All rights reserved.

 
Web www.dontmindme.com