The streets of Dakar are currently vibrating with the kind of primal, unearned euphoria that only occurs when a group of highly compensated young men successfully navigate a piece of inflated plastic into a net more times than another group of young men. Senegal has won the Africa Cup of Nations, and if the grainy footage of the ensuing chaos is any indication, the entire nation has collectively decided to suspend the laws of physics and economics in favor of a temporary dopamine spike. It is a fascinating, if repetitive, study in human regression—the way a trophy, which is essentially a shiny paperweight with delusions of grandeur, can momentarily mask the structural decay of reality.

As a non-journalist who views the world with the weary detachment of a man watching a toddler try to eat a battery, I find the 'drama' of this victory particularly nauseating. The headlines scream about 'dramatic' wins and 'historic' achievements, as if the trajectory of a leather ball has any bearing on the existential dread of the twenty-first century. We are told this is a moment of national unity, a phrase used by politicians and pundits whenever they need to distract the populace from the fact that the electricity is flickering or that the local currency has the purchasing power of a used napkin. Sports remain the ultimate opiate, a cheap substitute for actual progress, administered in ninety-minute doses to keep the masses from noticing that the stadium is the only thing in town with a fresh coat of paint.

Let us deconstruct the 'Lions of Teranga'—a nickname that anthropomorphizes athletes with the grace of a corporate branding seminar. The celebration of this victory is rooted in the bizarre, parasocial delusion that 'we' won. In reality, a handful of elite athletes, most of whom spend their weeks padding their bank accounts in the gated communities of Europe, performed a physical feat. The fans, meanwhile, provided the soundtrack of screams and horn-honking from the sidelines of their own lives. There is something profoundly tragic about the way the human animal attaches its self-worth to the movements of strangers. It is a vicarious existence, a way to feel 'victorious' without having to actually accomplish anything more significant than staying upright in a crowded square.

Naturally, the political class is already salivating over this. Expect the usual suspects to emerge from their air-conditioned offices to drape themselves in the national colors, hoping that some of the athletes' unearned charisma will rub off on their own stagnant approval ratings. The Right will use the win to preach a hollow, chest-thumping nationalism that ignores the globalized reality of the sport, while the performative Left will treat the victory as a 'profound statement' of continental empowerment, as if a trophy from a FIFA-sanctioned event somehow dismantles the legacies of colonialism. Both sides are, as usual, aggressively missing the point. The point is that the circus is in town, and as long as the lions are winning, no one asks why the bread is so expensive.

Then there is the 'drama' itself—the penalty shootouts, the last-minute saves, the tactical maneuvers that the commentary teams describe with the gravitas of a heart transplant. It is a spectacle designed to exploit our ancient tribal instincts. We are hard-wired to want our tribe to beat the other tribe, but since we can no longer settle matters with spears without upsetting the neighbors, we have outsourced our aggression to men in colorful polyester shirts. The sheer scale of the celebration in Senegal suggests a deep, aching hunger for meaning, a hunger so vast that it can be satisfied—if only for a night—by the outcome of a game governed by an organization as notoriously transparent as a brick wall.

In a few weeks, the flags will be tattered, the temporary holiday will be a memory of a hangover, and the fundamental misery of the human condition will settle back over the continent like a heavy fog. The trophy will gather dust in a glass case, a silent witness to the fact that for one brief, shouting moment, a few million people were convinced that a game mattered. I find no joy in this, only the cold realization that humanity is never more predictable than when it is 'celebrating.' We are a species that would cheer for our own extinction if it were televised with a catchy theme song and a slow-motion replay. Senegal won, I suppose. But as the sun rises on a Dakar still plagued by the same problems it had before the kickoff, the only real winners are the beer companies and the cynical architects of the status quo who know that a well-timed goal is worth more than a thousand policy papers.