NASCAR Fans Spoil NBC's Attempt to Create News

An NBC News’ attempt to create news has failed. In preparation for an NBC Dateline piece on anti-Arab racism in the United States, the news network “planted” Arab-Muslim men, complete with turbans, in the crowd at last weekend's NASCAR event at the Martinsville Speedway. The idea was to film bigoted NASCAR fans as they harassed the innocent Arab-Muslims with racist remarks. The only problem for NBC is that nobody harassed anyone.

NASCAR's managing director of corporate communications Ramsey Poston commented on the failed attempt by NBC to create a story.

No one bothered them... NASCAR thinks it's absolutely outrageous that you have a news organization trying to make the news instead of reporting the news.

Mike Smith, director of public relations for Martinsville Speedway, added this:

Our security knew almost immediately that [the Dateline crew] were on site and they were monitored the whole time they were here, for obvious reasons -- their protections, fans protection -- and they were not disturbed. It says a lot about our fans... it shows that the image so many people have of NASCAR fans is a false one.

The image Smith is talking about is the image of the NASCAR dad. Wikipedia defines NASCAR dad as follows:

...a male, usually middle-aged, working-class or lower-middle-class, and often rural...

In political theory, the full meaning of the term NASCAR dad implies a bloc of perhaps unsophisticated voters reacting impulsively to 'hot-button' issues such as aversion to gay marriage or facile appeals to patriotism, while ignoring the more complex economic and social issues in an election campaign which invariably might result in a real negative effect upon their lifestyle.

The term was made more popular in the 2004 United States Presidential Election, as a companion term to soccer mom. Yet another constituency, this group was heavily courted by the Republican Party, as their demographic tends to vote this direction historically.

This is the segment of American society that NBC apparently believes is the racist, non-tolerant segment. It’s that segment of American society that is unsophisticated, has an aversion to gay marriage, ignores complex economic and social issues, and, oh yes, tends to vote republican.

It’s too bad that when NBC set out to prove that their notion of the republican voter was accurate, the racist NASCAR crowd didn’t cooperate.