Memo to the Saints: Knock it off already. You're losing fans at an incredible rate.

Oh, it's not because we're "jumping off the bandwagon" or anything like that. It's just that you keep sending us to the hospital. And we Saints fans aren't the healthiest bunch to begin with. Hell, if I keep aging at this rate every weekend, I'm gonna be John Carney's Tom Benson's age by Halloween. And I already look like Mickey Rourke as it is! So quit it, would ya? Um… not the winning part though, okay? The winning part is great, so keep doing that. 'Preciate it. It's just that the other stuff has us Saints fans about to start punching one another in the face.

See, being a die-hard fan of a particular sports team tends to make people do some pretty stupid shit.

An example of the aforementioned stupid shit is that when there's a cognitive dissonance with regard to the team's performance, many of us attempt to resolve it by choosing whichever dissonance-free "truth" we prefer, dig our heels in, and turn on our fellow fans who prefer a different "truth." Often with the unrestrained zeal and resulting hostility usually reserved for huge jerks.

There's a cognitive dissonance right now. You're 3-1. No NFC team has a better record, and no team in the whole fuckin' league has more wins. You pretty much handed the Panthers their asses Sunday afternoon. It was probably your best effort in all three phases of the game so far this year. You're this close to breaking out of this slump and running away with what looks to be an incredibly weak NFC.

But in the meantime, while you're a shanked kick away from being 4-0, and Atlanta is a shanked kick and a hotdogging cornerback from being 1-3, the unfortunate reality is that you're both 3-1. Not only are you not (yet) running away with the incredibly weak NFC, a reasonable case could be made that you "should" be 2-2 or even 1-3 yourselves.

None of us really know for sure which is closer to the Undeniable Truth, but most of us have gone ahead and made up our minds anyway. And it's turning us into a bunch of assholes.

Not that this is unique to our current situation or anything. This is just one of those stupid things that die-hard sports fans do. Some fans prefer to wave the pom poms no matter what. Some fans prefer to swaddle themselves in the comforting simplicity of "A win is a win!" and "Why can't you just be happy with what we've got?" Others choose to "Demand excellence" and observe the team with a critical eye, regardless of the record.

The one thing they have in common is that both factions are convinced beyond any doubt that they're right, and their way is the only "correct" way to approach being a fan. Optimists are labeled as "homers" and critics are labeled as "fake fans" or "bandwagoners" or lately, the cringe-inducing fad term "NewDat."

(Side note: I suspect that Mark Lorando's Who Dat Lexicography was compiled by Lucifer himself, and the douchebaggery contained therein will eventually result in a full-blown epidemic of people being punched in the face by strangers, the likes of which never before witnessed south of the Jersey shore. I mean, for the love of fuck.)

But to whatever extent that the whole "I'm a REAL™ Fan and you're not!" thing is just an inevitable "feature" of sports fandom in the first place, it's only exacerbated by the cognitive dissonance of a defending first time Super Bowl Champion (high five!) being 3-1 despite relativley shitty play.

Throw four decades of ingrained fatalism AND four decades of unconditional love on the pile, and you've got the recipe for the mother of all excruciatingly tedious and pointless pissing contests over who's a REAL™ Fan and who's not.

What had been relatively harmless confusion and irritability over the first three weeks has now blown up into full-on shotgun rage aimed in the general direction of people who, for crying out loud, are wearing the same goddamn Morstead jerseys "your side" is wearing! 

Sigh.

Seriously, what the fuck? We used to be friends.

These days, half of us are trying to throw the other half off the so-called bandwagon.

Those of us who are concerned that the Saints haven't been soft-tossing chumps like we've come to expect "…must be 'NewDats' and couldn't possibly have been around in the Bad Ole Days when we'd have gladly offered up our genitals for a 3-1 record!" Be grateful, you fucking bandwagon fan!

Meanwhile, those of us who are quite happy to be 3-1 right now, despite everything else, "…must be 'NewDats' and couldn't possibly have been around in the Bad Ole Days if they don't give a shit that we're headed right back there if things don't change pronto." Take off the black & gold glasses, homer!

And all roads lead to yet another round of exposed penises and Finneyesque John Gilliam/Tom Dempsey/Jubilee Dunbar references and whipping out Tulane Stadium ticket stubs. All for the sake of "proving" who's the "better" Saints fan. Lovely. We're all totally riveted over here, dickface.

Say, how about this? How about we all get the fuck over ourselves and quit telling one another how to be a Real™ fan?

How about instead of punching one another in the face because we disagree on certain details, we go back to high fiving one another because we're all wearing the same fuckin' colors and pulling for the same fuckin' guys?

Because that was a lot more fun.

Isn't this supposed to be fun?