I’ve been meaning to write for awhile about my outrage over Comiskey Park (where the White Sox play; it’s only a couple blocks from my house) becoming US Cellular Field. When the change initially took effect, there were many radio personalities, especially sportscasters, who said they were going to keep calling it Comiskey. That lasted until someone (no doubt US Cellular’s lawyers) got angry and started suing people. At one point, I think (this has not been verified, so take it with a grain of salt), the FCC started levying fines when someone said “Comiskey Park” in reference to “US Cellular Field,” just like how they fine stations when they slip up and broadcast “illegal” words over the air.

Anyway, the outrage I feel at renaming a historic sports landmark to something as ridiculous as US Cellular field may seem unwarranted. But for all you baseball fans out there, how would you feel if Wrigley Field became Wrigley Juicy Fruit Gum Arena, or even worse, Spider-Man 2 Movie Coliseum? The problem is the perversion of our social culture by advertising. There’s an article over at k5 that nearly made me cry (out of agreement with what the guy was saying, not sadness or happiness). Finally, someone else who feels the way I do. I mean, one of the main reasons I built my own web server was so that I didn’t have to host my site somewhere where they advertise all the time. I use Mozilla Firefox as my browser so the pop-ups don’t bug me. If slashdot and k5 wouldn’t advertise, I think I’d like them even more. I absolutely hate static advertising. Why does everything have to revolve around money?

Interestingly, when I bring this up in conversation, most people I talk to seem opposed to the idea (though admittedly not as vehemently as I am). So why aren’t we fighting this sort of thing? Does our apathy and laziness truly run that deep? In the end, I am forced to ask the age-old question: Is nothing sacred?

http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2004/5/5/165728/6687

Oh, and I am trying to buy the domain savecomiskey.org, and hope to develop a site where people can speak out against the evils of advertising. Maybe we could even buy out US Cellular’s share of Comiskey! Then we could call it whatever we want, right? I mean, money talks… If you’re interested in helping me out, drop me an email.