HardyBoy

You also gotta think he heard a lot of stuff from fans too...prob just wants a fresh start

I hope that's being said with the understanding that is happening everywhere, across spectrums, and while the individual canceling is super lame, there are people getting whipped into a frenzy where it's entire groups of people that are marked as others and the thing that whips them into a frenzy and the groups it's focused on just continuously changes and grows.

But they're not anonymous...the entire team is together in the room and Josh Allen reviews the notes and I'm assuming finalizes them and picks the specific things to bring up to Brady. To call that process anonymous is not accurate.

I would imagine that is what the money the Army paid was to get that to happen... that was paid for, just like the stuff you see at nfl games

I dunno, I've been on this board pretty much all off-season and don't remember it being talked about...and the article I linked was published three hours before I shared it here. Lol, watch someone searches and posts a screenshot where I was like super active in the thread that potentially existed and have no recollection of it at all!

I know, this one is making me way more annoyed than I thought it would... like obviously he wasn't ready to play. What I'm not sure on is if he knew it at the time and was just saying he was fine...or if he genuinely believed he was fine, because you kinda need that level of self confidence to just make it to D1, let alone the nfl, and looking back upon introspection and reviewing the outcome he realized it was the wrong move. I really hope it's the second and he learns from this, but totally agree, this makes it hard to trust anything he says...positive thinking is cool and I'm sure he believes in positive manifestation, but maybe he could work on positively manifesting some honest appraisal as well...

https://www.espn.com/nfl/story/_/id/40640119/bills-von-miller-says-not-played-last-year

I was kinda hoping Matt Bove would have gotten it...no idea if he has any play by play experience, but I think he could be awesome at it.

I hope Hyde retires

It won't potentially just be on regular TV over there?

Even if it's a result of him having serious mental health issues as a result of playing the sport we all so excitedly cheer for? I mean it really does seem like there might be a steep cost to the players for playing this sport and I know I'm making an assumption, but if he has significant CTE, does that change anything in terms of your opinion? I'm not excusing his behavior at all and many of his actions likely impacted the lives of people negatively forever, it's awful. Just if he's suffering from dementia, which I'm not saying he is, just that it's possible, and he got that dementia by playing a sport that we all cheered for...I dunno, like I get your perspective and point of view and I'm n it trying to tell you to change it, it just feels like this might be the cost some players pay for playing the sport and we're part of the machine as fans that ultimately churns out people that end up in these types of situations that otherwise would have not faced potential life changing brain trauma and subsequent dementia

Oh, so the sabres are going to be in Europe all week leading up to the games in Prague?! Just checked New Jersey and they are the flyers in their last preseason game Oct 3rd in Philly...the Sabres are about to Jaguar this thing!

Why, because one is a choice and the other isn't? I'm not here to decide what groups are worthy to be allowed to have their own sports leagues and which are not. While we're at it, I think we should get rid of this message board and replace it with a single board for fans of all teams...why do we need a specific team board, it's super exclusionary. People who are minorities, like gay people, like police and firefighters, like fans of individual teams like to form social groups where they can do shared social activities and hobbies together because they have things in common. There was a Greek social club down the street from me when I lived in Boston right by my bus stop...a bunch of older guys sitting around playing dominoes...if the Boston town council had money put aside for funding social groups or for helping older people with social opportunities and someone from that club reached out asking for a grant/help promoting their club and they gave them some money and posted a blog post about the club on their website...and people went all, why isn't there a white non-immigrant American club?!

Ok, you know when people say happy holidays and then it turns into a "war on christmas" and then people say, well this is "a Christian country"... But people don't go around saying that normally, it's just kind of I guess implied or assumed by a lot people apparently... You don't need to start a white straight football league, it's implied as that is the majority...please understand that, it's an important thing...there are differences when the majority labels something that is implied already and it's not cool when done in response to a minority group trying to gain validation and awareness, especially when that group is marginalized..."well this is a straight country" is how that comes across

Ok, well I'm sure the flag football league is open to players of all races and professions. Also, the flag football league is open to all sexual preferences. Cool, so we good with starting a petition to get rid of police and firefighter only sports leagues so we can be consistent, or you all agree that would be ridiculous and perhaps we can stop being hypocritical?

Cool, get rid of police and firefighter sports leagues then.

Dude, what are you talking about?! There are like 256 teams in this league, you think it's a freaking top level high level competition thing?! You all are getting your nuts twisted up over a largely social beer league for people who have historically not been welcome in social beer leagues, and the Bills tossing some money to help get it off the ground in Buffalo and use their name to help more people be aware it exists...like perhaps it's time to truly evaluate why this stuff is so triggering. All this ignorant backlash so many people automatically have had to this proves so clearly why something like this needs to exist. From the Boston league page (all skill levels encouraged to participate)

I mean people like to hang out together with other people who they have things in common with. I don't think that's going backwards, I think that's totally natural. So the issue isn't the league existing, right like gay bars are a thing, it's a social place where you can meet people you might be interested in talking to and maybe forming a closer relationship...this flag football league sounds largely like a social kickball league at most levels, where I know a few people who met one another playing kickball and got married, I think a social flag football league where if you are gay you might have a better chance to find a partner is totally a reasonable and fair thing that I don't think we really need to discuss further in terms of if it is something valid, it clearly is from a social hangout having fun hanging out with people you have stuff in common with perspective. So that leaves the higher levels of the league, like what I imagine being the highly competitive levels that will maybe even get to play a championship game on the field at the stadium because of this. Is your point about going backwards more about why are the Bills putting money behind this and not other flag football leagues? I have an explanation based on my experience working at a big corporation, just want to see that makes sense in terms of where I'm leading this convo?

I don't want to speak for others eapecially that I'm debating, but I think that for the vast majority of people in this thread that sound like they are against the league, I am getting the sense that likely don't actually have an issue with there being a league. Also, I don't think you need to justify or defend why a league like that should exist. People arguing that point and not listening to the answer aren't going to change their mind and I think you did an excellent job explaining it earlier in the thread. Like you have your experience, people saying your first hand experience is wrong and that you're not thinking or feeling the things that you're feeling or have felt/worried about in your head, feels a bit gaslight, though I'm not getting the sense it's actually intentional, just might be a valid time for you to quote Stanely from the far superior US version on The Office and drop a "did I stutter?" Quick aside, when I lived in Fort Lauderdale, my wife and I actually lived in Wilton Manors for 7 years (annoying I feel the need to preface that with "my wife") and it is such a cool and amazing place and just seeing people who in a lot of situations might feel judged and marginalized being able to sit and just talk at a restaurant and hearing them fully and genuinely laugh. There actually was a flag football team that used to practice in a park I used to walk to in my neighborhood and they were pretty good and I'm assuming they were all or majority gay. Before I get to my point, I do think that my favorite misconception I've seen in this thread is about how people are joking that this league would be super popular with gay guys because all the athletes would be super in shape and classicaly attractive, and I don't think that's necessarily the case from my understanding...the hidden benefit of being a marginalized minority group in some ways is that societal norms haven't really been forced onto them, including unrealistic beauty standards...I think there is a significantly wider range of what attractive is and so many different ways to express oneself, which is so different from what it is like in the mainstream society, especially for girls...shoot, talking about grooming, we've be grooming girls for eating disorders since at least 1955. Alright, my main point...I think it might be interesting to talk about virtue signaling, DEI and the difference between fluff corporate bs where it's just like slogans on a helmet vs actual meaningful stuff that can come from people within corporations demanding change and working together to speak truth to power through employee resource groups that lead a lot of this stuff in actually meaningful ways.

Maybe, but I don't think one of the central plot points of Mean Girls (probably the key plot point tbh) was a girl starting a rumor that another girl was a lesbian was done at all by accident. I posted this earlier up thread, but feels fitting...I read this when it came out in the actual magazine back in 2011 and I haven't re-read it, but it obviously left enough of an impression that I searched it out intentionally when I was reading through this thread earlier: https://www.espn.com/womens-college-basketball/news/story?page=Mag15unhealthyclimate

I don't know if DEI is the same as greenwashing though...like I hear ya, but I was able to participate as much as I did in this thread today because I was off work forJuneteenth. Like sure you could say that might be because that allows them to put a blog post out how we're honoring the day and all that and do what many might argue is virtue signaling. However, I think the real value is not in that blog post, but showing people within the organization that their diverse perspectives are heard and more so helping share those with others. I had no idea what Juneteenth was until that Blackish episode a few years back, and it was cool learning that there was this really influential holiday I had no idea existed and it helped me understand the perspectives of others a bit better and kinda gave me and some coworkers the ability to have something to start a conversation over that perhaps would have been more tricky in the past. Greenwashing, like saying you're doing something positive for the environment, when that isn't actually the case. From what I've seen, DEI stuff based on objective research that I've glanced at (granted probably from sources that I trust to have journalistic integrity, but perhaps wouldn't share all the research, so there might be bias) shows significant positive outcomes from DEI stuff, and I'm not talking about transparent virtue signaling type stuff. The Bills doing this though, in my experience, which is based on working at a large legacy tech company, is there are actual people that are super passionate about getting this partnership to happen within the organization, they put a ton of effort into it, it's not just false lip service to virtue signal, but there are actual programs and events and trainings and outreach and town halls where people come into the organization and share their experiences and how this partnership is helping people and all that. Virtue signaling is annoying, but to say anyone doing anything good in an organization is doing it as a virtue signal, or perhaps where the intent of the action is to virtue signal (like greenwashing)...I think that's cynical

Omg, I genuinely bought a mattress on president's day this year! Haha, not by choice...and the day my youngest (4 years old) came into my room saying he didn't feel well and projectile vommed all over my pretty nice, not cheap, less than four year old mattress is when I learned the reason to always have a mattress protector on...did go from a queen to a king though

My dad grew up in the Soviet Union, came here and fell in love with the Bills as a way to assimilate and they were fun to watch in the early to mid 70s. Did you know that in the Soviet Union there were virtually no left handed people? Isn't that crazy, like basically nobody was left handed even though it's I believe about 10% of the population. Fun fact #2, my dad was left handed, but they believed left handed people were evil over there and different and non conforming and a threat to unity, so they forced him, like literally would hit his hand with a ruler if he used his left hand. Basically did conversation therapy on him until he was able to write right handed. I'm having a hard time seeing the difference between this and how gay people have been treated. Then, if after my dad grew up, there had been loosening of the restrictions on him being himself, and suddenly felt comfortable saying he was left handed and that he was proud of being left handed and wanted to shout to everyone you tried to break me from being proud of who I am, but you couldn't and I'm going to shout it so everyone can hear it because you taught me who I am is evil, yet here is stand... Help me understand the difference? Btw, they had the same views on gay people in the soviet union, and still have the same views on gay people over in Russia, except they'll actually put you in jail for it or worse, where being left handed would get you ostracized

How about people stop shoving Christmas down my throat? It's super annoying, I celebrate it now because I married into it, but I didn't grow up celebrating it...how about people stop shoving their specific form of patriotism down my throat.. I'm plenty patriotic, but I don't choose to express it by conforming to some weird social norm that some people keep trying to cram down my throat...why is this specific thing bothering specific people? Especially whe the people complaining about this thing being the very people that are often most guilty of cramming the most stuff down people's throats?

Basically...there is a bunch of stuff crammed down all our throats every day by corporations...why is this specific thing the thing that drives people wild? Then why do all the people that have an issue with this, as well as happy holidays and a few other issues, why do they all sound the same when they hear/see the thing that insights the reaction? It feels very very very indoctrinated. Like you can predict basically the same sequence of phrases and what will trigger them, it's weird.