Carlos Delgado, an all-star first baseman from Puerto Rico, was recently traded to the New York Mets. The Mets have informed him that according to team policy he will no longer be allowed to remain out of sight as a protest when "God Bless America" is played, but will have to stand at attention with the rest of the team. He had previously declined to do so as a protest against the war, and the connection baseball had forged bewteen "God Bless America" and what Delgado saw as a belicose U.S. foreign policy.
Delgado is, of course, right about the use "God Bless America" has been put to by baseball. The Commissioner has mandated that all teams play the song since 9/11, often accompanied by military color guards or Air Force flyovers, and have treated the song as if it were the National Anthem (which, of course, also gets played.) When Delgado first began declining to participate, in the command that God bless the U.S, he was a member of the Toronto Blue Jays, which added another note of absurdity to the requirement that the players join the request that God treat the U.S. with special favor. (What do you think? Is "God bless America a request that God do so, or a statement that God already does?)
Anyway, I don't need to explicate the meaning of another example of "political correctness" which will never be reported as such. Delgado is agreeing to follow the team rules. Nonetheless, as someone who beacme a Mets fan when I lived in New York some time ago, I have written to the Mets to express my displeasure. I think it important that organizations that act to stifle expressions of opposition to the war hear from those of us who object to such actions. The marketing assumption that being anti-war is bad for business must be challenged. (Over the years, Delgado's stance got never caused a great deal of controversy among fans, despite occasional attempts by some new organizations to stir the pot.)