Seattle Kraken and the death of Cringe Culture™
The name of the NHL's 32nd team is perfectly fine, you all just hate fun.
Hello friends!
Last week, the NHL announced the name of the league’s 32nd franchise: the Seattle Kraken. The name is a fan-favorite in online circles, but there have been some major detractors to it on the basis of the “lol cringe” mentality that’s made up a lot of online culture over the last few years.
Let’s take a look at why that mentality is the wrong one to take and why cringe culture should be put to rest once and for all.
It’s hard to imagine the NHL’s 32nd team being anything but the Seattle Kraken. Since the NHL gave Seattle the okay to become the league’s newest expansion team in 2018, hockey fans have been clamoring for this name, and the wave of support has only gotten stronger in the years since that announcement.
Kraken, it seems, was always going to be the name for Seattle’s new franchise, it was just a matter of keeping it a secret from the public until it was time to announce. And last week when Seattle announced the name to great fervor, the stars had aligned for hockey fans. Finally, for the first time ever, the NHL got it right!
However, for some, the Kraken name was always going to be a big miss. In the midst of the celebrations online, a vocal minority made their displeasure known about Seattle’s choice. For some, like Washington Capitals forward T.J. Oshie, Kraken was “different” than what was expected.
“I don’t know. I guess being from Everett, I was hoping they would go with the Totems,” Oshie said.
(Because yeah, Seattle would definitely culturally appropriate a name from indigenous people in a time when Washington’s football team is changing their racist name.)
Others, like Tony Kornheiser and Michael Wilbon of ESPN’s Pardon the Interruption, ripped the name because… Seattle doesn’t claim ownership of a fictional mythological being?
Tell that to the Pittsburgh Penguins, a place I’m sure penguins originated from, or the Chicago Bears, where all bears in the world surely have descended from.
Then there’s the portion of backlash that has come for the Seattle Kraken name based on… cringe? For some, Kraken is too AHL-like, too minor league baseball-like to be a pro sports team name.
Sure, the name Kraken is kind of hokey. It’s clearly playing to the fan appeal that’s amassed in support over the years since Seattle was given an NHL team. However, all sports teams appeal to their local area and fans. Most often, sport team names have a history and mean something to the local community, no matter how “dumb” it seems to those on the outside looking in.
To go after the Kraken for having a “different” name when teams such as the Red Sox (a piece of clothing) or the Jets (a plane) exist seems like classic cringe culture at work. Cringe culture has always been around pre-internet (think generational gaps or cliques at school), but has no doubt been amplified by social media over the last decade or so. Cringe culture peddles in making fun of earnest enjoyment of a harmless activity, as described by Study Breaks:
The term generally refers to a mockery of groups or activities that are harmless, awkward and/or too earnest for the ever-ironic web. Targets exist on a spectrum from more innocent fun like cheesy performances and bad newscasts to more pointed jeers at groups like feminists. Especially popular subjects include celebrities, furries and TikTok users who take the app seriously.
Increasingly online, it’s seen as cringy to enjoy anything un-ironically. There’s a vein of online culture that makes their brand on satire and irony, where they’re “too cool” to enjoy things and must always take the contrarian position, lest they be seen as having fun.
Cringe culture has roots in that online persona attitude, where showcasing genuine excitement over something — mainstream or not — is made fun of. Hockey is very familiar with this idea, as just last year the Carolina Hurricanes were ripped for being “a bunch of jerks” for having too much fun with their Storm Surge celebrations after every home win.
While the slogan became a rallying cry for the Hurricanes and their fans, there were still segments of hockey fandom that pushed back against the team’s ownership and use of the phrase.
The reveal of the Seattle Kraken name has also fallen into this category over the last week. It’s absolutely fair to think the Kraken name and branding is not your speed, that it just doesn’t do it for you the way it does for others. And that’s fine! More than fine in fact, that’s how the world works. No one will 100 percent agree on any given idea.
There are even legitimate reasons to be concerned with the Kraken name, as potential fan nickname “krakheads” has racial connotations and should not be used as a moniker for the fandom.
(Personally, the alliterative Squid Squad is my favorite fan nickname for the Kraken.)
However, clowning on people who do enjoy it in the name of “cringe” is… well, it’s cringy in its own right. Hockey fans have a right to be excited about the Seattle Kraken name. For starters, the team knocked its branding out of the park with the crisp logos, the gorgeous jerseys, and even the snarky Twitter bio post name release.
Kraken is such a unique name when compared with the others Seattle was debating, such as the Sockeyes or Emeralds. After all, Seattle named their team after a terrifying mythical monster that lurks at the bottom of the seas! If I had my way, all sports teams would be named after myths like that, because the cool factor is just off the charts.
And I get it. If it’s not your cup of tea, that’s fine! There are plenty of popular things out there such as reality television or wrestling that just don’t do it for me. However, where the line should be drawn is clowning on the enjoyment of others just because you find it cringy.
Cringe culture as it stands should be on the way out regardless. It’s 2020. We’re in the midst of a global pandemic. As long as the thing someone enjoying is harmless to them or to you, just let them have their fun.
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