The holiday season is upon us, Philadelphia. It’s a time for family, it’s a time for friends, and it’s a time to give thanks (get it?) for what’s truly important in all of our lives.

So while you’re sitting around the Thanksgiving table, belt undone, watching your Delco Aunt rip through a pack of unfiltered Pall Malls as she tells you why vaccines are causing higher autism rates in children, I want you to remember one important thing.

Please remember to be thankful for Dallas Cowboys fans, Philadelphia, because no matter how bad things in your life are, you can always take solace that you’ll never be as pathetic as someone who roots for the Cowboys.

Now look, I know what you’re thinking. COGGIN, how in the world can I be thankful for Cowboys fans?! They’re a despicable group of people, living in a Matrix-like reality where they believe their franchise is a contender each and every season, oblivious to the fact that everyone in the entire county hates their putrid guts. It’s enough to make you wretch, and we’re supposed to be thankful for that?

Yes, gang, that’s EXACTLY why I’m telling you to be thankful to have them in your lives. It’s a freeing and cathartic realization that being a fan of just about any other NFL team other than the Cowboys automatically puts you head and shoulders above anyone who has ever worn a silver and blue starred jersey.

You’re part of a fraternity that can never be taken away from you, a fraternity of individuals who can silently nod to one another as they see an early thirty-something man or woman unironically wearing an Emmitt Smith jersey and Yankees hat out in public and instantly know what the other is thinking.

“Look at this fucking asshole.”

I know it’s hard, it really is! Look at the average Cowboys fans. Spineless. Weak. Completely unaware of just how irrelevant the franchise has become, clinging to the pathetic notion that Dallas is still “America’s Team” and that everyone else is just a hater. Sure, they won some rings in the 90s, and they’ll try to throw that back into your face, but we all know it’s completely irrelevant. Nothing they’ve done in the last two decades has amounted to anything other than heartache, and that should make you smile from ear to ear.

It’s like Uncle Junior proclaiming Tony Soprano “never had the makings of a varsity athlete.” He was living in the past, completely unaware that Tony had pulled the wool over his eyes, thinking he still mattered in a world that had left him far behind. He was irrelevant, a joke to everyone that knew him.

Just take a look at their most famous fan, Skip Bayless. Skip is like that one uncle nobody wants to show up at Thanksgiving every year, who somehow received an invitation out of pity years ago and thinks its a lifetime opportunity to crash every holiday. He’s there because nobody is rude enough to tell him to leave, he never brings anything worthwhile, and he’s definitely the one guest you warn your wife beforehand to not leave alone around the kids.

Sure, he’s not going to do anything, but they’ll probably have picked up a few choice racial slurs from him before the night’s over.

Everything has to be about him. Everything is about what a success he is, what a fancy car he drives, how much money he has. You let him go on and on because you know the truth. You know he lives alone in a converted apartment over a garage, you know he has no friends, and you know he’s still living off a shady five-figure settlement he made with Wawa after “slipping” in one of their aisles back in 1996.

You know the truth about him, the truth about his existence. But you let him prattle on about why he really does matter, why he’s important, and you just sit back and smile and nod along with him, knowing everything he’s saying is utter baloney.

You’re thankful you’re not him.

Be thankful for Cowboys fans, Philadelphia, because without them we wouldn’t have anyone to look down on.