What Camp are You In? | Jeremy Fain's Blog

The more comments I read from fellow Niners' fans, the more I begin to see the developement of a few distinctly separate camps, that make up what we call Niners Nation.

For the sake of this argument, we shall call the first camp, The Old Timers; and I mean "Old Timers" in the most respectful possible way. These guys and gals have paid their dues. I can barely phathom waiting roughly 31 years to reach that first championship . I consider these fans, that have been around since day one, up until 1979 to be The Old Timers. These good folks should be the most revered camp of all the camps that make up Niners' Nation.

-A faction of this camp, is the group of fans that latched on to the Championship team in 1981; these are your classic bandwagon fans. And by "bandwagon" I mean that in the most respectful way. Afterall, I am a bandwagon fan. But I don't come onto the scene for another decade or so.

-To further complicate matters, we see another faction emerge from the bandwagon faction; these fans are your classic fairweather fans; there is no loyalty in this camp. They swap their favorite team from year to year. This camp should be the most despised. In fact when you detect a fairweather fan you must accost and or attack; personally, I prefer the latter. I try to keep one of these handy, for such occasions. Of course, I am not condoning violence of any kind. But you must abide, or be banished.

The second camp we shall call The New School. This camp is a veritable melange of Niners' fans. The first distinction of this camp is that anyone born in 1979 (and thereafter) is automatically placed in The New School, provided they are not a fairweather fan. You may have studied up on the Niners' history and storied tradition; you might be able to recite every starting lineup since 1950, but you still fall into this camp. I am in The New School/bandwagon camp. That is to say, I was born in 1979, and I have been down with the Niners every since I can remember.

I also considered the existance of third camp, that we shall call, The Traditionalists. This camp is the creme de la creme. Old Timers are automatically in this camp; The New School and bandwagon fans can only be considered Traditionalist in the true sense, if one or more of their parents were Old Timers or New School/bandwagon fans. And of course once fairweather has been introduced into one's genes, there must be a skip in generations; sorry but this is written in stone. And to be perfectly honest, I pine to be a traditionalist, but alas neither of my parents were/are Niners fans. Some day if I have a child of my own, he/she shall become a Traditionalist.

Contrary to popular custom, I saved the worst for last. There is also another faction, if you can even call it that, more like a group of about ten guys living in a shanty down by the creek, barely worth mentioning (but ironically this group kind of got me started on this topic). This group of despondent malcontents hope and pray for the demise of Nolan at all cost. These fans people would rather see Nolan go 0-16 and sent packing, as opposed to producing a winner. I suggest the same treatment be applied to these folks, as we would treat a fairweather fan. In summation, this faction, which doesn't even deserve a name, unless you just want to call them The Nolan Haters. These people, as Antiquity (a Seattle fan over a foxsports) once described our beloved Niners, are "lower than whale excrement."

Now we can easily identify the three major camps-- The Traditionalists, The Old Timers, The New School.

Then you got the minor factions-- the bandwagon fans, fairweather fans.

And of course those other guys.

Okay so you know what camp I am in. My question for you is, what camp are you in? If you can't be pigeonholed then please explain.

Hey guys you should click on the link to Niners Nation and cast your vote in the poll.