New York Fans Slam Landmark's 'Traitorous' Green Lights

The Empire State Building is known to take on different colors to celebrate or commemorate special occasions, and on Sunday night, New York City's most famous landmark was "aglow in Eagles' green," per CBS Philly. That's because the Philadelphia Eagles creamed the San Francisco 49ers 31-7 earlier that day, winning the NFL's NFC championship game and earning themselves a place in the Super Bowl. "Fly @Eagles Fly!," the Empire State Building's Twitter account cheered. "We're going Green and White in honor of the Eagles NFC Championship Victory." It was a fraternal gesture to the City of Brotherly Love—except in the eyes of cranky New York-area sports fans, who didn't fully appreciate the shoutout to an NFL team that's not the New York Giants or New York Jets.

Fox News compiles some of the best responses, including that of sports reporter Jeff Eisenband, who posted a video of Giants coach Brian Daboll having a temper tantrum, with the caption: "Every New Yorker seeing this." Retired Jets center Nick Mangold wrote, "You are dead to me," while the New York Giants' official Twitter account retweeted the Empire State Building's post and noted, "I'm just here for the comments." Even municipal agencies got into the game: The NYC Department of Sanitation called the green illumination "treacherous, traitorous, and unforgivable." "Just pretend it's green and white for #NewYorksStrongest," the account noted, referencing its slogan and own green-and-white logo. "We take out the trash every day ... and next year, that'll include the Eagles."

Meanwhile, the Empire State Building—or, rather, the humans that run the building's social media, because we all know skyscrapers aren't sentient (uh ... right?)—had some fun with the hubbub. "That hurt us more than it hurt you," its tweet said of the green lights, noting it was next shifting colors to red and gold in honor of the Kansas City Chiefs, who won the AFC championship against the Cincinnati Bengals 23-20 on Sunday. It also trolled controversial Barstool Sports founder Dave Portnoy, who went on a bit of a rant about the Empire State's green, calling it "lame" and adding, "They should knock it down." The Empire State Building responded by tweeting a short clip of Portnoy mock-crying and whining, "Life is so unfair." (Check out a Chiefs player's "controversy" after his own game.)