the Boston Tea Party & the Vancouver Tea(rs) Party

“We didn’t lose to the British, and we’re not going to lose to British Columbia.”

I think Vancouver may have taken this a little too seriously. I mean, the whole Revolutionary War era has some great stuff. Although it was before the actual war, the Boston Tea Party is the only way anyone anywhere in the world at anytime in history will be able to talk about “tea” being a “party”, and a pretty badass part at that. Throwing barrels of tea into the water, dressed up like Native Americans, being crazy and definitely drunk…

Perhaps the riots after Game 7 were just the British Columbians trying to revolt against the evil imperialism of the United States, taking Canada’s game and putting most of it’s teams in the US. And like the refusal to pay taxes without representation, the identities of Canadian players as Canadians is overshadowed during the NHL season by their status as whatever team they play for - a Bruin, a Wild..(is that right?), a Shark, and worst of all, Canadian players wanted to play in the NHL usually will be playing in the US, so they are thus Bostonians, Minnesotites…(? seriously what is wrong with the Minnesota Wild’s name), and San Jose- fuck it let’s just say Californians in that case.

The one opportunity the hockey lovers in the America’s Hat had at bringing good ol’ Stanley “back home” to where he “belongs” was ripped away but a bunch of vicious jerks from Boston. So they said “fuck you, American Empire. We want our freedom! We want all our Canadian teams back that you stole from us and put them in such horrific places as Colorado, Phoenix…and the ones that disappeared all together! We want our Maroons, Wanderers, and St. Patricks back! Damn your colonization, America!” and somehow thought that destroying their own city would accomplish something.

Although I have done a poor job of really illustrating any coherent comparisons between the two events, let’s just pretend that Boston Tea Party was a cool way to rebel, and Vancouver wanted to be cool because even though they say they hate Boston, they secretly love them (Like Lucic). But much like Luongo, they were unable to anchor themselves in reality.

Now, before we get to the obvious destruction of cars, starting fires, looting stores, assaulting your fellow citizens, and etc., etc., think about further motivation against the Evil Empire they wanted to revolt against. That’s right…THE CAMPBELL CONSPIRACY. They were screwed by Colin Campbell’s 1994 Rangers, and they were screwed by once again by him AND his son (ugh, just like the Kings of England). Campbell’s wizardry is astounding, as he was able to persuade every executive and official in the NHL to do whatever they could to give the Bruins the upper hand - even if it meant letting crazy Slovaks that tried to behead and otherwise decapitate a good and pure Canadian citizen (or American citizen playing in Canada, whatever) as a free man, clearly on the hunt for more people he could purposely hurt without consequence. CAMBPELL CONSPIRACY.

And thus the need for wasting perfectly good tea in protest and for the sake of dressing up in costumes, was fulfilled. They did their best to dress up like Native Americans (bandanas over their faces and tears in their eyes count, right?), and were ready to let all taxed goods burn in the name of FREEDOM. FREEDOM FROM ALL THE THINGS.

As Chara was about to raise the Cup, you can see actual mini-barrels (sometimes called plastic cups..) of tea-like substance (sometimes called beer) being thrown into the (frozen) harbor (sometimes called an arena, although much like a harbor if you think about it…it serves as the place of exchange to import and export goods like fans, players, teams, wins, losses, food, jerseys, tears, and tire pumps - the last of which was clearly being smuggled out of the country). The Vancouver Tea(rs) Party was about to begin.

But they couldn’t handle the excitement of revolution and refusing to pay taxes like those from the original Boston Tea Party. Instead, Vancouver fans tried to seek independence from their own city in the most literal way by trying to destroy it and burn it down until it no longer existed in any form.

You can’t tax us, or take our Cup from us that was never really ours, if WE DON’T EXIST!