Pigskin Sex

One of the gravest crises to occur recently in many U.S. households happened on Christmas Day, when the 82-minute and 40-second televised struggle between the Kansas City Chiefs and the Miami Dolphins, the longest in professional football history (see SPORT), left many a turkey dinner in limbo--and many more of the nation's "football widows" in a state of frustrated anger. Now, if the housewives buy the theory of a Brooklyn psychoanalyst, they have even more to grumble about.

"It's no longer just for entertainment that men watch eight hours of football a day," says Psychoanalyst Morton Golden. The other motivation? Sex. Men use the games, says Golden, "as a fantasy to relive the youthful sexual aggressiveness that may have ebbed with age and boredom." Psychoanalysts, of course, see sex or aggression in almost any human activity, and laymen may well be skeptical of the diagnosis. But Golden insists in all seriousness that football has become a male substitute for sex, similar to the role of the soap opera for women.

The football-viewing syndrome is even harder on women because they generally cannot identify with the sport their husbands follow so passionately. "Biological and cultural conditioning of females fuses sexuality with tenderness and affection," explains Golden. Women, therefore, "view football as a display of man's brutal aggressiveness, since it is a game that stresses physical strength and masculine dominance." As a result, says Golden, football widows often end up feeling weak and inadequate.

Golden's advice to long-suffering wives is patience. "Let your husband have his fling," he says. "Tolerate his withdrawal." After the football season is over, Golden reasons, the avid male viewer will return to his family--provided he is not a fanatic for basketball or hockey.

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