The Morning According to Us

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The good news is scientists have now learned you can get drunk enough to trash your own city in under three innings.

As could be expected, it was not a peaceful night in Philadelphia. It wasn't so much the fans who climbed atop light poles and made stoplights their own, or the drunk fools who made kindling out of the property they destroyed, set it on fire, and then jumped over the flames. No, things turned "ugly" when, "A car was set afire, and a luggage store was looted before police intervened. Firefighters turned a hose on some revelers, who were preventing them from reaching trash can blazes. Around 12:40, two buses full of police in riot gear arrived on the scene." Why does this happen when people are happy?

First off, it didn't happen for everyone. A PFD spokesman said early this morning that, "99 percent of the people were behaving themselves, just having a good time." But for that problematic one percent—and there is always, whether it's Iraq or elementary school, a problematic one percent—what happened in Philly played out along lines is quite familiar to psychologists. It's actually fascinating how predictable sports fans are.

First, there's the macro-picture stuff. We live in an increasingly transient world. Employees have next to no fidelity to their employers because, well, these days in particular, the reverse is true, too. This means we move a lot, which means any tie we can maintain to any group of people is increasingly important. Next, cable or satellite TV allows us to follow a team—on a nightly basis even—from anywhere in the country, strengthening the bond. (Thank you, Bristol.) And yet our transience only naturally creates an isolation with the world around us; rooting for a team is strengthened all the more, then, because fandom is a way to make a scary world seem smaller and more familiar.

Next, when one quits all that traveling and actually goes to a game, abnormal social behavior is not abnormal at all: You can paint your face, scream at a stranger, high-five a stranger, or, as is the case with Philadelphia fans, throw snowballs and batteries at a stranger. You do this because, by this point, the team you root for is no longer your team, but yours; the connection is personal. This means any suffering the team feels, you feel, which means any relief from that suffering is hotly anticipated. Enter alcohol. Before a big game, it's consumed to either calm the nerves of fans or tamp down the inhibitions they'd feel for what they might do later. (This research is now looking squarely at you, Philadelphia.) After a win—a huge win, especially a World Series win—people gather en masse to celebrate. Finally, something called "de-individuation" takes effect: the idea that no person's actions, or a subset of the mob's actions, can be held accountable. Basically, it's We Can Do Whatever We Want. Some time later, to quell violence, fire hoses are sprayed on Phils fans.

Elsewhere…

We're not capable of tiring of stories where a gambler sues a casino because he's addicted to the pursuit. That statement was sort of meta. Nevermind.

Hedge fund managers beat the crap out of eachother, doing what most would like to do to them. Minimal justice.

A 39-year-old English boxer is fighting his 300th and final fight. Dude has lost 256 of them, which means he's basically brain dead by our calculations.

Politicians play a soccer match and turn into raving thugs.

Trying to make weight caused a rash of positive drug tests in the NFL, it seems.

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