Not Just A Game - Preview - Available on DVD

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Not Just A Game: Power, Politics & American Sports
A Film by the Media Education Foundation
Featuring Dave Zirin

We've been brought up to believe that sports and politics don't mix -- that games are games and athletes should just "shut up and play." In the view of iconoclastic sportswriter Dave Zirin, this mentality cheapens both. In Not Just a Game, Zirin shows that far from providing merely escapist entertainment, sports have also reflected, and at times played a role in shaping, the political tensions and social struggles at the heart of American society. The film takes an uncompromising look at how sports culture has glamorized militarism, commercialism, racism, sexism, and homophobia. But it also excavates a largely forgotten tradition of rebel athletes and sports writers to show how American sports culture, at its best, has modeled forms of courage, resistance, and perseverance that have enriched American life.

Dave Zirin
Named one of the UTNE Reader's "50 Visionaries Who Are Changing Our World," Dave Zirin writes about the politics of sports for The Nation and is host of Sirius XM Radio's popular weekly show Edge of Sports Radio. Press Action's 2005 and 2006 Sportswriter of the Year, he is a columnist for SLAM, The Progressive, and a regular op-ed writer for the Los Angeles Times. His writing has also appeared in the Washington Post, the New York Daily News, New York Newsday, the Baltimore Sun, the Houston Chronicle, the San Francisco Chronicle, The Pittsburgh Courier, The Source, and numerous other publications.

Zirin is the author of Welcome to the Terrordome: The Pain, Politics, and Promise of Sports and What's My Name, Fool? Sports and Resistance in the United States. His newest book release, A People's History of Sports in the United States, is part of Howard Zinn's People's History series for the New Press.

Zirin has appeared on ESPN's Outside the Lines, MSNBC's Countdown with Keith Olbermann, ESPN Classic, MSNBC's Morning Joe, CNN's The Campbell Brown Show, MSNBC's The Rachel Maddow Show, Comcast Sports Network's Washington Post Live, Al-Jazeera's The Riz Khan Show, C-SPAN's BookTV, and Democracy Now with Amy Goodman. He has also been on numerous national radio programs including National Public Radio's Talk of the Nation and All Things Considered; Air America's 'On the Real' with Chuck D; The Laura Flanders Show; ESPN Radio; Stars and Stripes Radio; The Joe Madison Show; Pacifica's Hard Knock Radio, and others.

Category:

Sports

Tags:

• MEF
• Media Education Foundation
• Media Literacy
• Dave Zirin
• Sports
• Politics
• Gender
• Masculinity
• Militarism
• Commercialism
• Michael Jordan
• Muhammad Ali
• LeBron James
• Billie Jean King
• Jackie Robinson
• Tommie Smith
• John Carlos
• Not Just A Game

[berniewentboom]

As usual, Dave Zirin nails it with this important and passionate look at the controversial intersection of sports and politics. It is resistance journalism at its best. Like the epic Howard Zinn, Zirin tells the story from the POV of the people, and sometimes the victims, and not from the POV of power, money, and wealth.

[ostifari]

Great film - saw it on RT USA in the middle of the night a few months back - finally found out what it was. I WANT TO SEE IT AGAIN.

[kissfan7]

5:59

Gaa!

No disrespect to the man, but Jack Johnson looks like he ain't well in the head in that clip.

[Tralman1965]

Boo

[Oyin26]

this looks like a good film, i hope black women are included though. sometimes people forget that black women face racism AND sexism in sports as well as being marginalized from feminist movement and the black power movement.

[MindofaJedi]

It is disappointing how few athletes have a backbone . Isn't it amazing there are NO gays in the NFL , NHL , NBA etc . What are the statistical odds of this ? The Phoenix Suns took a stand on Arizona's racist immigration law , which was a step in the right direction . Could a collective of athletes and stars have helped keep us out of Iraq ? Who knows , but it wouldn't have hurt them to try .

[biegner]

He also does mention Scott Fujita, linebacker and Super Bowl champ of the New Orleans Saints, and how he is pretty open and active in the fight for gay rights. There are not many professional athletes willing to speak their mind on anything, especially if it is against the perceived norm (which is an absurd standard of masculinity based on the idea that men are superior physically, thus socially). The basic argument though is that sports and politics have NEVER been separated.

[biegner]

He obviously is a liberal. It stands out particularly in the militarization segment. But are you really going to argue that there is no more sexism in sports? Racism is not an issue in this country anymore? Homophobia and an absurd standard of masculinity is not dominant and endorsed by modern sports? I find it hard to believe that equality is a "liberal" cause.

[welsherbry]

Hell yes!!!

[DeeDemonwitch]

@nubbs My misunderstanding. I read your comment: 'doesn't want athletes to be political. he wants them to be liberals.' to mean that you thought being a liberal was not being political.

I'm afraid there is absolutely no point in mentioning the names of any athlete/sports player to me. I couldn't even name one's from my own country, let alone anyone else's. It's just not a subject I take interest in. In fact this is the most interesting thing I've ever seen involving sports.