The Empire State Building has been accused of “treachery” for lighting up green to celebrate the Philadelphia Eagles’ victory in Sunday’s AFC Championship game.
“Fly @Eagles Fly! We’re going Green and White in honor of the Eagles NFC Championship Victory,” the Twitter account posted after Philadelphia beat the San Francisco 49ers to secure a place in Super Bowl 57.
The tweet lauding the hometown New York’s Giants’ fiercest rival sparked fury, shock, jokes and general disbelief among social media users.
“For anyone who finds this as treacherous, traitorous, and unforgivable as we do - just pretend it’s green and white for #NewYorksStrongest,” the New York City Sanitation Department’s official Twitter account posted. “We take out the trash every day...and next year, that’ll include the Eagles.”
The NYC Department of Buildings joined in, tweeting: “How are we going to explain this to all of the other buildings. They looked up to you.”
A few took aim at Tony Malkin, the chairman and president of Empire State Realty Trust, which owns the building.
Others wondered if the Twitter account had been hacked, and told the building to “blink twice” to indicate if this was a hostage situation.
Writer David Hill jokingly tagged mayor Eric Adams in a tweet, saying: “I want to report a crime.”
Social media managers at the Empire State Building seemed unfazed by the backlash.
When Dave Portnoy, the controversial founder of Barstool Sports, called for the Empire State to be knocked down, the account quote-tweeted a video of him pretending to cry and saying: “Life is so unfair”.
The building later lit up in red to mark the Kansas City Chiefs victory over the Cincinnati Bengals in the AFC Championship Game.
The Eagles rivalry with the New York Giants NFL side has been described by Sports Illustrated as “one of the longest and most intense” in the game.
The NFC East adversaries have played more than 150 times since their first meeting in 1933, two years after the Empire State was opened.
In their most recent game, the Eagles knocked the Giants out of the NFL playoffs on 21 January.
The Independent did not immediately hear back from the Empire State Building’s media spokesperson.
