Nostalgia has saved the CFL before, and it may do so again
The Grey Cup has been played 100 straight years. In its infancy, the Great War sidelined the great Canadian game, but nothing has since. COVID-19 has put that streak and the league’s future in jeopardy — at least, that is the CFL’s narrative.
The CFL’s challenges may be unique, but its hat-in-hand response follows an established pattern. The league wants $150 million from the federal government; $30 million now and up to $120 million more if the season is shortened, played in empty stadiums or cancelled outright. CFL commissioner Randy Ambrosie’s request comes from the well-thumbed playbook of crisis operations — a text, it seems, every CFL steward has come to know by heart.
The template has served the league well. First, the commissioner frames the CFL as an integral part of Canadian identity and the Grey Cup as a symbol of national unity across regional divides. Next, the commissioner contrasts the CFL and NFL, conflating each league’s image with its respective national stereotype. The CFL is plucky, hardy, humble; the NFL is dominant, sophisticated, brazen. More importantly, the CFL belongs to us, the NFL to them.
Finally, the commissioner argues that the CFL will fold if it does not receive financial support, thus equating government bailouts with cultural preservation. If the CFL is lost, the argument goes, American culture will further subjugate a once free and independent Canada.
In the past, this argument relied heavily on nostalgia.
When, as in the late-1980s, the
CFL’s vacant stadiums contradicted its claims of national unification, only nostalgic appeals to former glory could legitimize its cultural value. League officials, journalists and key politicians overcame significant public opposition to secure government bailouts through persuasive nostalgic rhetoric. Whether acting to protect jobs or avoid tarnished political legacies, these groups argued publicly for the preservation of a national institution while safeguarding their private livelihoods.
There are clear parallels between the CFL’s response to COVID-19 and its actions in the late-1980s, a period when several teams dodged insolvency only with the injection of public funds.
In 1986, Jim Durrell, mayor of Ottawa from1985-1991, pushed the Ottawa Rough Riders to pursue a nonprofit designation, a move that improved the optics of later rent reductions at Lansdowne Park. Two years later, Ottawa city council granted the Rough Riders a subsidy worth $614,687, and the OttawaCarleton Regional Council loaned the team another $500,000, interest-free.
Meanwhile, Hamilton city council flaunted the Ontario Municipal Act to supplement the privately-owned Tiger-Cats’ marketing budget by $300,000 and provide the team with full rights to Ivor Wynne stadium, including its concessions and advertising space, for the annual sum of $1. And in 1988, the Calgary Stampeders sought similar support in the form of $2.5 million in rent abatements over a five-year term. Although the Stampeders’ request was ultimately denied, nostalgia figured prominently in all three cases.
Journalists during this period often relied on nostalgia when supporting government subsidies and bailouts. Financial Post contributor William Watson supported the CFL’s narrative, arguing that the CFL is “a classic part of Canadian culture” and that loss of the Grey Cup would result in a “different and less distinct Canada.” The Ottawa Citizen’s Eddie MacCabe “saw the league as a unifying force in the country,” and The Globe and Mail’s David Shoalts felt we would be “diminished as Canadians if we let it slip away.”
The CFL’s flagging cultural prominence in the late-1980s undermined arguments of this nature and necessitated the use of nostalgia.
NFL teams threaten relocation to win government handouts. The CFL lacks the financial and cultural power to mimic this approach and, quite frankly, viable markets beyond those already in the league do not exist. In the past, the CFL has bargained with its own imminent collapse, claiming it will either receive support or fold. Although the CFL is currently in a period of relative prosperity, its response to COVID-19 — a financial challenge of unparalleled magnitude — replicates its past approach.
The CFL has revisited the past to survive the current pandemic. If the federal government opens the national wallet, expect nostalgia to underpin its justification for doing so.