Thursday, August 25, 2005

Red Sox Ownership: Yankees Don't "Suck"

In a move designed to make Fenway Park less hostile for opposing teams' fans and families with young children, the Boston Red Sox have decided to ban the popular "Yankees Suck" t-shirts worn by fans who patron the Park. (Scott Van Voorhis, "Sox Eye Stopping Epithet," Boston Herald, 8/25/2005). Although the team has avoided using the word "ban," fans wearing the t-shirt have been asked to turn their shirt inside-out, and, to date, no fan has refused. The t-shirts are sold by independent vendors, and can also be purchased on-line.

So have the constitutional rights of Red Sox fans been violated? Have they lost their freedom of speech? No. Private actors, like sports teams, can restrict speech and messages. They are different from state actors (e.g., the Massachusetts Department of Transportation; the University of Massachusetts) and are not under the same set of constitutional obligations as are those actors.

While this may appear to be a symbolic victory for Yankees fans who venture into Fenway Park and who (quietly) cheer for their team, their team is still 3 and a half games behind the Red Sox in the American League East standings, and are tied with the Oakland Athletics and the Cleveland Indians for the American League wild card (and those two teams have a combined payroll of $96 million, while the Yankees' payroll alone is over $208 million -- I guess $200 million doesn't buy what it used to!).

0 comments:

Post a Comment