By Tom
One of the hardest aspects of life that Cardinals Nation struggles with is that athletes are not a monolith; they are complex and intricate collections of memories, thoughts, ideology, and consciousness–you know, human. Athletes are also not pariahs, or naturally deserving scorn–that is for police officers and Major League Umpires–but are not outside the realm of criticism and analysis. A baseball player is never always a baseball player, when he leaves the ballpark and goes home what is he then?
This is an archaic cultural staple that followed previous generations who didn’t have access to iPads and were brainwashed by the succeeding liberal powers in a post-war America. Your career is your identity. Jack Flaherty is more than just a starting pitcher for the St. Louis Cardinals, he is also a vocal advocate for police reform and critic of institutional racism. Bill DeWitt is more than just an owner, he is also a strong benefactor for conservative causes, donating millions of dollars a year to back candidates and PACs. While we have criticized the DeWitt sphere for supporting conservative candidates in lieu of Roe v. Wade being struck down, the example that I hope I’m constructing is hopefully clear.
I’m not Tom the cell phone salesman, but also Tom the socialist, tenant organizer, cat lover, and podcast host. You are more than what you are reading here. Imagine a keyhole that peers into your consciousness, but you’re only ever able to squeeze through that hole what you want people to see. Now imagine if that door was open for everyone to see.
Athletes are not protected from criticism if they’re open to our adulation and praise. We have the right to infer and ponder and wonder and question and waste copious amounts of our limited breath–it’s our life to waste, right?–discerning what they pour into the public.
Cardinals fans have struggled with that dichotomy–not just them, but sports lovers in general–that athletes, trainers, managers, coaches, owners, etc. never just stick to sports all the time. The question I have is when does it become a concern?
Ben DeLuzio attended The First Academy, a private Baptist school established in 1987 in Orlando, Florida. The First Academy boasts a 100% college acceptance rate along with tuition rates over $20,000 for high school students. Like all schools they had their ups and downs; in 2017 they were named the best private school in Orlando just a year removed from when a bunch of students did a debate on if it’s cool to say the n-word or not.
DeLuzio was a two-sport standout in a family of athletes. His father played football at Colorado and his older sister Alexa was a starter on FSU’s basketball team. His younger sister Brynna would follow their father to Boulder where she played volleyball, and his younger brother Joe, currently plays volleyball at Pepperdine. He had good roots, and he used those roots to play wide receiver and running back in the Fall, and shortstop in the Spring. He was pretty good at both, a real standout especially among his 2A peers, getting scholarship offers to play at SMU for football and a dozen others for baseball.
Ben was drafted in the 3rd round of the 2013 draft by the Miami Marlins. They offered him $681,000 to sign, but he turned all that down and instead went 256 miles west, across the panhandle, to attend Florida State with his sister. He admitted that the money almost got him, but he committed first to FSU and wanted to honor that. A guy has to have his principles.
Deluzio’s college stats weren’t anything to write home about. His coach was the legendary Mike Martin Sr. who really appreciated DeLuzio’s speed and versatility and decided to try him in center field. There were some learning curves along the way, like the time he had to go to the hospital after crashing into the wall at Clemson. He put up a .769 OPS his freshman year, but his stats fell off after that. After a mediocre sophomore season he slashed .237/.346/.333 his junior year, and when no one at the 2016 MLB Draft called his name, he decided to enter the market as an undrafted free agent.
He signed with the Arizona Diamondbacks shortly after his junior season, packing up and heading to Hillsboro, Oregon to play low-A ball. I wonder if it crossed his mind at one point, that 3 years earlier he was part of a draft class that had Kris Bryant, Tim Anderson, Cody Bellinger, and Aaron Judge. For the next seven years of his life he would slowly grind his way through the baseball farm system, eventually being taken by the Cardinals in the minor-league Rule 5 draft in 2021, before finally reaching Baseball Mecca on September 2nd against the Cubs.
This should make you feel good at this point. And Ben DeLuzio is not a bad person, even after you read this next part, the part where we talk about why he was trending and what I found researching it. It’s easy to foment outrage over trivial matters, at least that’s what aggrieved conservative political pundits tell me. But I want you to disregard that, and understand that Ben DeLuzio is part of a microcosm of baseball and nationalism in America.
Ben DeLuzio is a Christian. Fervently so. I learned this yesterday on Twitter, where most people learn things that upset them. I was a fundamentalist Baptist growing up–real fire and brimstone kind of guy–but I grew out of that in college when I drank a beer and got some pussy. I went through a militant atheist phase, one that I’m not too proud of as some of the guys I looked up to at that time–Lawrence Krauss, Richard Dawkins, and Sam Harris–turned out to be a bunch of dicks.
I don’t really engage in religious debates on the merit of is there a God?! more so as I engage in what effect religious institutions–like all institutions–have on people, and if those outcomes are good or bad. I know it sounds contradictory, but my lense for criticism isn’t rooted in being right and, honestly, some trauma about growing up in poverty with only a church to attach meaning to; but instead in something more tangible and constructive. Churches, like many private institutions, serve the behest of a status quo and exploit their influence and power. As you’ll also notice when you read further, churches, as institutions, benefit largely from the State through tax exemptions, these are not enforced because of the Establishment Clause of the 1st Amendment, which sought to separate the influences of the State and Church. However, this delusion is based on who you ask, as our government officials and institutions are heavily influenced by religious institutions in this country, and these institutions are tax exempt despite collecting their own form of tax from their congregation and using their pulpit to spout some of the wildest shit about American politics.
Except your church. I’m sure your church is fine. But you get the gist.
I don’t really care that Ben DeLuzio is a fundamentalist Christian in that he loves Jesus and doesn’t want to backslide into sin and wants to wait till marriage or retweets weird memes about Puritanical masochism.
What I do care about is the other part, the harm part. Ben DeLuzio rarely tweets personally nor does he offer many public statements. He does however like and retweet a lot, which is public for all to see, and my own psychosis was all the more-willing to have me dive headfirst through 8 years of Ben DeLuzio being on Twitter. Here’s what I found.
There’s a lot to unpack.
For one, there’s a lot of Christian life-advice. Some of them are just silly memes that make you tilt your head sideways. But other interests are centered around what you would assume from a religious devotee; dating advice, remaining steadfast and sure in your faith, and a lot about family, whether it’s building a family into the Christ-like ideal, offering guidance to your wife, or raising your kids in Christ’s image.
There’s a classist mentality with that last part, and it bleeds over into what will eventually be, my argument, for endorsing harmful behavior. The accounts that DeLuzio likes and retweets to the public do not just encourage straight-laced Christian behavior, but segregation from what they deemed secular.
This is very evident in the treatment of LGBTQ+ and public education. In regard to churches accepting queer folk, one account stated churches that “that baptizes unrepentant sinners and endorses sin isn’t a church but a synagogue of Satan.” With regards to education, DeLuzio’s Twitter has supported numerous tweets calling for Christians to remove their children from public education. This classism isn’t just limited to private vs. public education, but accuses the Left of indoctrinating children via the school system, or the government for societal woes.
Education and LGBTQ+ exclusion is just scratching the surface. When we break the veneer we find that DeLuzio’s Twitter supported numerous right-wing beliefs regarding those subjects, and much more. It’s unChrist-like that Joe Biden canceled $10,000 to $20,000 in student loan debt, instead 17 and 18 year-olds should go to a private Christian unizversity instead. If your bullshit meter is starting to ring off, it should be, as statements like these are immediately contradicted when one takes in that public and state university tuitions are usually 25% cheaper than private ones, and that, depending on which source you use, the cost of attending a private university ranges between $38,000-$50,000 a year, and that private school attendees graduate with $6,000 more in student loan debt.
DeLuzio’s Twitter has liked and retweeted numerous threads condemning the gay and trans community; Twitter threads using scripture to say that man shall not lie with man, or wear women’s clothing, another that wanted to end “rent-a-womb surrogacy” denying gay couples, and straight couples who cannot reproduce, the right to have children. DeLuzio liked a meme showing a straight couple as “the monkey pox vaccine.” There’s also this really bizarre and jumbled statement from John White–who runs the Van Til College Discipleship Program–that either calls for the illegalization of gay marriage and adultery or criticizing “Christians” lax attitude toward them, this thread then descends into saying that, “It’s why we have public drag queen twerk lessons and story hours. It’s why public schools teach homosexuality and transgenderism. It’s why 43 million kids are being discipled to hell each day in our public schools.”
DeLuzio’s Twitter has retweeted theocratic fascist Matt Walsh’s condemnation of Pennsylvania University swimmer Lia Thomas, a trans woman. Equally as disgusting, is his public approval of this Allie Beth Stuckey tweet stating that, “Every time you use “preferred pronouns,” you are validating a movement that is permanently sterilizing & deforming minors and allowing men into girls’ restrooms. You’re not being polite or empathetic. You’re being complicit in one of the gravest evils our culture faces.” Stuckey’s tweet came on August 5th during a period of harassment engaged with children’s hospitals in Washington DC and Boston, culminating in a fake bomb threat at Boston Children’s.
Let’s briefly talk about this. Trans people are subjected to intense scrutiny, harassment, and discrimination at all forms of governmental and societal engagement. Trans people are often treated as outcasts, pariahs, and second-class citizens. There is plenty of evidence that shows the tribulations they face are not a result of mental illness–transitioning is not a mental illness to begin with–but how society and the state treats them. When it comes to trans people competing in sports, academic studies have shown that there is no consistent or direct research to show that they possess an unfair advantage. The Olympics has permitted trans people to compete since 2004, and it wasn’t until 2020 when a trans athlete won a gold medal. Trans people do not dominate sports as you are led to believe, they do however, along with their gay allies, dominate suicide rates, homelessness, and exhaustive/invasive discourse on if they have the right to live freely or not.
DeLuzio’s Twitter has also engaged with accounts that spread misinformation about climate change, Covid, and Hillary Clinton. Some of the hits are a retweet of Dr. Simone Gold, a right-wing pundit and grift-artist, who was fired from her job after peddling that hydroxychloroquine was a suitable treating agent for the coronavirus. Various tweets about Hillary Clinton destroying her computer to cover up her 30,000 missing emails, and, perhaps the most deranged, that the “global warming” people are worried about will be God’s righteous judgment when he returns.
It also serves as no surprise that DeLuzio’s Twitter has retweeted and liked statements objecting to the precedent set by Roe v. Wade, and their subsequent celebrations when the US Supreme Court struck down that federally protected right. DeLuzio has retweeted accounts that have referred to Elizabeth Warren and the “secular left” as evil and another that jokingly designated Planned Parenthood as assault weapons. He has liked memes that have referred to abortion as child sacrifices and, my personal favorite, a memetic edit of a Gretchen Whitmer post that says she is “fighting for hell” on abortion rights.
A lot this feeds into the Christian Right’s movement to embolden nationalistic sentiments and resentment to political opposition. Christian nationalists have convinced themselves that they are an oppressed class in America, that their views and humanity are under attack. They participate in extremist movements like QAnon and Trumpism, they go to public libraries and accuse workers of peddling pornography, or they refer to their political opponents as pedophiles–or better yet, exploit a marginalized and victimized class such as LBGTQ+ individuals–or secular communards who threaten personal and religious liberties. Christian Nationalism is as much a threat to the well-being of people who don’t share their beliefs as the opposite, which is why the Republican Party in America has been more than willing to adopt and legitimize the term.
At this point you know what’s coming next. Ben DeLuzio and his Twitter definitely like and retweet Christian nationalist members, who trivialize the concerns of others as a misinterpretation of the term, or that the real problem people have is not with nationalists but Christians. They believe that the Christian Family is under attack, that sin has infected everything in the world, that there is only one God and that Islam and Judaism are affronts, that modern day tragedies are acts of demonic possession, that socialism and the teachings of the Bible share nothing in common and that any Christian who identify as progressives are non-believers and that the word of God outweighs democracy even if it is pretty unanimous. And with all that in mind, it shouldn’t surprise you that DeLuzio–along with his older sister–liked an account sharing the speech of Italian politician Giorgia Meloni, whose far-right party is poised to take control of Italy’s Parliament, with Meloni set to become the nation’s next Prime Minister.
Meloni is part of an amalgamation of growing right-wing extremism spreading through Europe. She has close ties with Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban and has been praised by France’s Marine Le Pen. Meloni opposes same-sex marriage and supports laws barring same-sex couples from adopting. She has engaged in xenophobia against immigrants and has endorsed The Great Replacement Theory, a white nationalist conspiracy theory that frames immigration as a form of genocide against native white populations. She has participated in Covid denialism, organizing anti-vax demonstrations in Rome. In 2012 she founded the Brothers of Italy, a far-right political group that promotes nativism and isolation. This party shares historical ties to the Italian Social Movement, a neo-fascist organization formed in the wake of World War II until their dissolvement in the early 1990s. Meloni’s party even adopted the MSI’s far-right logo. Party members have stoked fascist fears in social media circles and possess facisit memorabilia that they display in their party headquarters. Meloni has expressed fondness for Benito Mussolini, and supported his grandchildren to run under her party.
At some point the born-again Christianity phase wears out its charm and welcome, and what we’re left with is the reactionary tendencies of someone who has been brainwashed their entire life. There’s real harm in denying trans people their right to exist, gay people the same opportunities to be miserable like the rest of us straight married folk, generations of Americans plagued by predatory student loans, the millions of current and future millions of people who will be ravaged by climate catastrophes; the spreading of misinformation about treating the coronavirus, or engaging in outright denial of a pandemic that has killed over 1,000,000 Americans, the denial of state services for women to practice safe abortions and the enforcement of state pregnancies, the defense and support of right-wing Christian Nationalism and the close ties they share with theocratic fascism. At some point it may be appropriate to ask Ben DeLuzio what all he knows about the things he likes on his public Twitter account.
That was a lot, I know.
You can choose what you want with this information. Cardinals fans have a tendency to be blaise when reminded that athletes never just stick to sports, unless that player is Jack Flaherty, Cardinals fans love to have opinions about that guy. I wouldn’t say that position is the wrong one, nor is being upset about it all. Ben DeLuzio is simply a product of his environment, most likely a well-off middle to upper middle class one, a family of athletes raised on their faith. A man has to have his principles.
I doubt that Ben DeLuzio is really that invested in these beliefs outside of his religious core. His bad beliefs deserve scrutiny, imagine if he had a gay teammate, would that be a safe and an acceptable work environment for that player knowing he had a teammate that thought of him as lesser than?
I doubt Ben is that well-read on inflation or carbon reduction or student loan debt relief. I doubt he’s that well-read on fascism, the American education system has really failed in teaching its citizens how to spot and reject authoritarianism. If anything these beliefs are adjacent to who Ben DeLuzio is, and he likes these things out of reaction. Am I supporter of the dumb shit Occupy Democrats stands for if I like a meme? I’m sure Ben DeLuzio is a cool guy; he’s worked hard his whole life being a small school standout who entered the MLB undrafted, and then battled his way for seven years to get to where he is. It’s a good story. I also bet that if I sat down with Ben he wouldn’t be that educated on these subjects we talked about. I don’t mean that as an insult, we all like to talk about things we don’t know about. He’d be just some dork like the rest of us sharing shit around. At least I hope that’s the case, because the opposite of that scenario is far more terrifying.
But here’s the question I want you to think about, because it’s what I think about. When is the time to be concerned and who do we bring those concerns to? Should we begin to reconsider what should or should not be gatekept in the sport? Major League Baseball is predominantly conservative and Christian, I’m confident that the views Ben DeLuzio has, extreme as they may be, are at the very least tolerated by his teammates. Baseball as an institution is very right-wing, and proud of it, the sport has been a launch pad for some of America’s most militaristic jingoism. It works hand in hand with the Department of Defense, and, as I hope you know, its regional broadcasting avenues are owned by right-wing propagandists.
Ben DeLuzio is right at home.
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