I could care less, it's just kind of sad to see phoniness on such a scale. And what in the unholy f--- does Patriotism have to do with this? I'm just calling you out on being a plastic. It doesn't matter what country you're in. We could be in Canada or Jamaica or whatever. Fact of the matter is, you're supporting a team you have absolutely zero connection to except some long dead relatives. And amongst sports fans, that's grounds for mockery and derision.
From growing up in New York and not being of Italian descent, I can tell you a few observations of Italian Americans. Italian-Americans are very proud of their Italian identity. They are in huge numbers in NY and they seem to really enjoy and hold onto their Italian traditions. I felt submerged in Italian traditions just living in NY and having many Italian-American friends. (And by the way, nobody in NY would call themselves Italian-Americans, it would simply be Italian.) So, you can imagine how submerged in Italian tradition a Italian child born in NY, and other areas, would be. I think Italians are somewhat unique in the way they hold onto their heritage more so than many other nationalities. The Irish in NY are a little similar but not as much as Italians and now living down here in Texas, I notice that Mexicans are very similar to Italians. The difference there is the Italians are already a couple of generations into being born here, where the Mexicans are more numerous in first generation. My point being, I can see how Italian-Americans can have a tight bond with all things Italy. In NY, so many of them are submerged in it since birth. Italians are a huge influence on NY culture. NY accents, in my opinion, are because of Italians, I still have mine, the food - which I miss very much, the fashion - which I don't miss at all , NY attitude are all influenced by the Italians. I havent been back to NY in a few years but I bet it hasn't changed much. Obviously, much of the rest of this country seems to have a fascination with Italians also. We have the Gotti's on TV, the Sopprano's, The Godfather movies, they all seem to do pretty well. You don't think Italian American kids will be proud of their ancestry and attach themselves to this? I know this is alot of rambling but I can see how and why they would consider themselves Italian fans over U.S. fans. They probably have a much longer, deeper and proud history with Italian Soccer than they do U.S.. Me, I like Italians but I hope we kick their azz really bad and I think we can.
That is very true. But things like growing up gotti and the sopranos I really dont like. I think that it puts Italians in a bad view. It gives us a bad name. I dont honestly think that all Italian kids are like the Gotti boys. Actually, I know they arent. The Irish are very, very similar. Most of my friends are Irish. They all hold on to their culture and ethnicity a great deal, and they take great pride in being Irish. With all of my Irish friends, they have things everywhere that show that they are Irish. Throughout their homes, and in everyday conversation, you can tell the effect it has on them. For me, I wear an Italian horn, and I get frustrated when my Italian heritage is put into question. People hear my last name, and they dont believe I am Italian. I dont really need to prove it to anyone, because I know what I am, but there is a misunderstanding in the US that if you dont have the last name of your claimed heritage, you arent that heritage. My mother took my fathers name when they got married. Fine with me, but people need to be more tolerant here. One time, I was talking in a different board, one about the Olympics, and I mentioned that I hoped Italy would win an event (not sure if it was soccer or not), and in response I got "fvck off and go back to that shvthole you call Italy, you are not wanted in the USA" If that is the way that people in hear think like, then fine. Let God be the judge of you.
That's a pretty wide brush you paint with. You could easily insult people who's life story you do not understand. I thought "plastic" refered to people who changed allegiances easily and thus were fake fans. If someone grew up as a fan of Italy and stodgily retains his or her allegiance, how can they be plastic? Look. Passion in soccer is great, but why? Not because it gives us a reason to fight, but because it gives us a reason to hope and feel alive. If someone feels passionate about their national team, you should be happy, because now there is passion in the world. And if you have passion for your national team, let it manifest in positive ways. Why do you have to turn it into a negative and seek to denigrate your contrived "opposition"? Opposing fans are not enemies, we are merely foils for a ritualistic drama that fills our hearts with the juices of life. You can't force passion on someone. That is the plastic fan phenomenon you keep talking about. Passion comes from inside and it is totally irrational. And passion doesn't have to be smack-talk. Passion can be opposing fans sharing a song and dancing together in the streets. The US is a great country because of all the varieties of people who live here. Celebrate that. It may be more complicated than in other countries where they have a dominant race, culture, and religion, but it is worth it. For those of us who can open our hearts and minds to other people, our souls become richer from all the diversity we are surrounded by. If there are people who are passionate about the Azzuri, then your experience as a soccer fan is all the richer. That is what makes soccer so awesome. You get to experience other people in their most vulnerable and rawest states with their emotions on display. No more formalities then, we are all equal. We are all human beings. - Paul
I used to live on the East coast, and I do remember kids always making a big deal about whether they were Irish, Italian, Portuguese etc...Where I live in CA, it's really not a big deal. I think there is more intergration of cultures in certain respects...lot's more kids have parents of mixed race or ethnicity. Too bad you and your Irish buddies couldn't cheer for the same national team. Any morons that are like that Olympic board are just stupid and you shouldn't take them seriously. I'm just genuinely calling out people like you who turn their backs on USA soccer and how you perpetuate the myth that soccer is unAmerican. I totally can understand and appreciate where you're coming from in chosing your team, but people like you still frustrate me as an American soccer fan.
These USA fans I really hope dont represent the greater US fanbase. I really wonder if the USA fans are as passionate as the Italian American fans are. Do you get excited the day after the World Cup final for the next world cup? Do you follow every WCQ or confederation tournament and are as nervous as anything youve ever experienced during them? Do your eyes well up when you see your team take the field in any competition? Do you feel your heart stop every time the other team touches the ball during the World Cup? Do you get an excitement that is undescribeable when you win a game in the World Cup? Do you cry when your team loses? Do you get scared everytime they give up a goal, or when something else happens in a game that means alot to your teams' progress? Do you not go to previously scheduled engagements to see your team in a major tournament? Do you chant even if you are by yourself at home watching the game? If you said "no" to any of those, then you probably arent a 100% dedicated fan. I do ALL of those when I see Italy play. I always have. I cant do it when I see the USA play. Im sorry I dissapoint you, but I cant.
Everything that's false, wrong, arrogant, presumptive, stupid, and immature about your worldview is contained in the post above. 1. I have dual citizenship. Far from "long dead," half of my family lives in Italy now. Far from zero connection, I went to see Italy play several times as a boy, have followed their every game for years, have watched Serie A for years and years, and had passion for Italian soccer long before the MLS even existed. In childhood, in Italy, this connection was first formed in 1990 when I experienced all the emotion of being an Azzurri fan. My story might be similar to someone else's here. Who are you, really, to tell anyone what sort of connection they have or don't have to a particular team? 2. I want you to say in this thread that Thomas Dooley was a plastic American. Born in Germany and barely spoke English; surely he had zero connection to the USMNT, right? Say that here, so I can laugh at you, because you clearly haven't thought through the consequences of your thinking. If anyone born in country A is bound to support/ play for country A, how do you explain the honorable career Mr. Dooley had as a member of the USMNT? Again, you need to think more about the complexity of the world today. You need to look at the issue from other angles; 3. Probably the best poster on BigSoccer, Tpmazembe, is a passionate Brazilian fan. He knows more about the team and the history of the team than anyone I know, and is one of the most of the broad-minded, intelligent posters around. But Tpmazembe was not born in Brazil--he was born in France, and only later in life, when he became engaged to a Brazilian woman, did he discover the passion for Brazilian soccer that now informs his life. Is Tpmazembe a 'plastic'? By your definition, yes, he is. But let's look more closely. Though not born in Brazil, this is a person that has a deeper connection to the Brazilian team and a greater font of knowledge about Brazilian soccer history than many Brazilians born there. He's a true fan: he loves his team, he knows about it, he can shed light about it to people who want to learn about it, welcoming all who are willing to listen. Contrast tpmazembe with yourself. You were born in America, support the USMNT, declare yourself a true fan, thump your chest, scoff at others who have passion for a different team, and yet, for all that hotheadedness and all that huffing and puffing and chest-thumping, what sort of a fan are you? None of your posts is intelligent. None is knowledgeable, enlightening, interesting, fair-minded. You call yourself a true fan of the beautiful game, but you know nothing about it. The best you can do is cling to hateful distinctions that mean nothing and are significant only in their vast emptiness. Are you really a model for other fans? Hardly. In the grand scheme of things, you're the plastic--the fan who's shallow, facile; small-minded. Look back at your posts, and ask yourself if anything you've yet written has enriched the minds of anyone who's troubled to read it. Think deeper. Being a true fan has more to do with knowledge and faith and passion than chest-thumping and nationalism. This is the one point you have not yet grasped, but it is the only point worth knowing.
It is more fun for me and my friends to bitch at each other on whether Italy or Ireland is better. Where we live, cheering for the US seems to be not fun, and rather boring. I guess thats what happens when you live near where the major populations of your ethnic group are. I dont turn my back on the USMNT, because I never faced them in the first place. We were never on the same page. Soccer is becoming more and more american. But that does not mean that I need to support the US team to make it any more or less american. The diversity in this country is what makes it great.
All Yes. Except I'm usually at the games. I organize my entire life around traveling to US games. Don't insult us. It's easier to be passionate about a national team that already has had passion for decades. We are the ones who had to create the passion ourselves for the USA. It's the cool thing about being an American that supports the US. You can actually go to most of the matches.
Okay, but not everyone here can say they take US soccer to the degree that you do. You have to understand that this is how we were taught. Love where you live but never forget where you came from. My ancestors would be very dissapointed in me if I didnt care what they did for me.
I do think it would make it about 1/280000000th better if you supported them. Come on! Do your part! I'm having to cheer like 1/10000 over here to pick up the slack for all you Italians.
No prize. Same point I've made all along. UnAmerican when it comes to soccer. Perpetuating the foreign sport myth.
Which is why you watch international football, right, jackass? Then stop watching international football. In fact, stop watching sports, because by supporting a club you're being provincial. Take it from a fecking immigrant, America is a great place. I came from a town with a fair bit of poverty. I was lucky - my (American) father was a professor and we didn't experience the hardship others did - but I grew up with a lot of kids whose fathers didn't have jobs because Maggie Thatcher closed the mines, an act of personal and deep treachery to South Walians that you frankly have never had to face as a spoiled American. America is a land of special opportunity, and it's really true. It gave me a degree, it gave me a home and a wife. To do what I do now would simply not be possible in the region where I was born. So what if America have an asshat for president. Italy's in Iraq too, and Berlusconi is a self-absorbed dick of the highest order (as well as the president of the rossoneri). This is called the human experience. There is nothing unique about this. My mostly Irish family does the exact same stuff. I despise Ireland in sport. I loooooved it when Wales kicked their arse in rugby and won the Grand Slam. Support whoever the hell you want, it doesn't matter to me. I personally find something fundamentally plastic about it, but it's different to preach when you have a pair of passports and utter confusion about who to support in the rare times when United States meets Wales/Great Britain in anything. I'll generally support Wales over the United States - it's where I'm from, the language I speak, the accent, the culture. Rugby in South Wales is quite possibly even more important to the Welsh psyche than football is to Italians. Yet, I'll probably support the USA over anything vs Great Britain, and as long as John Toshack manages Wales, I'll probably be supporting the USA if they play against each other. The world is confused like that. E.u.r.o.s.n.o.b. The beautiful game is a good lark though - from a supporter of the team that's known around the world for winning ugly!
The thing is is that im not rooting against them. I just am not rooting for them. The absolute worst thing for the USA is lukewarm fans. I dont care if its unamerican. Do you support everything that the USA does? If you do, then you are being unamerican. Its not a foriegn sport if enough people watch soccer here, no matter what team is supported.
Of course I don't support everything the USA does. Blind loyalty is stupid! Soccerwise, I do. That's just the kind of sports fan I am. Totally don't agree with you as far as foreign sport goes. You honestly think our mainstream culture won't view soccer as foreign if all we do is watch EPL, Serie A, Azzuri, El Tri, Brasil, etc...? You've made it perfectly clear that soccer is a connection for you to Italy, a foreign country. That's the way it is for a lot of people, and that's why the sport is viewed as such.
But if enough people watch it here, no matter who they support, it is something that Americans of all colors, backgrounds, shapes, and sizes can share.
Yeah, but they won't really be sharing it. It's not a uniter. It's a connection to the old country. It's playing a completely different social role than football and baseball do in uniting and assimilating different American cultures. A strong and well supported MLS and national team would bring us all together no matter the color, background, shape, or size. The Azzuri play a huge role in uniting Italians since Italians are quite a diverse and regionalized people amongst themselves. That's what soccer does for you. It united you to people that live in a country that your ancestors lived in. It's not something you're sharing with me.
Well, I watch the occasional MLS game, and have tried to get into it about every year for the past few. Sadly, it cant hold my attention for more than 2 games. Thats their problem. They need to stop being horribly boring. Soccer probably will never have the same assimilation as football or baseball. Soccer wasnt created here. Soccer is a world thing. It is meant to be. American fans need to know that. Until the American population can get off their high horse and respect the rest of the world more, then it can be OUR own.
You'll have to elaborate on that because I have no idea what it means? To be honest, if America is going to make soccer its own. I think it will probably take more of a typical American scew the world attitude...we're going to kick every one's ass in this sport. It's sports anyway. Wouldn't you want to be on a high horse as far as sports goes? If your point is that if we gave more of a crap about the rest of the world we might realize that soccer is a great sport, I think that's correct. I don't see how we would get the millions of people like you who love the sport, but not in America, to embrace the game as being American by doing that. Being a regular in the WC hasn't done it. My feeling is that the more the sport gains a foot in the mainstream American landscape, the more people who have well established roots in this country will support American soccer over their long gone relatives' soccer. There will always be immigrants who support their homeland just as on baseball with the Dominican, PR, etc...But I think soccer is slowly making itself more American, which is fantastic.
America isnt looked upon nicely by alot of the world. The world does not want us to succeed in sports. We are to be beaten. The better we are, the harder they will try to defeat us. If people watched the news and didnt make stereotypes about every person in the world that isnt exactly like them, then we would be better off. Soccer definitely helps this. The thing about people like me is that for the most part, we arent the people you are going to, or are even supposed to convert. You are to convert the American kid that does everything american. He dosent have as much of a connection to his roots, and dosent really care about them. You need those people, but you need to show them that the rest of the world is okay. That america is just a piece to a beautiful puzzle we call the world. By telling Italians or anyone else that they arent patriotic because they arent supporting the country's team will not get you far. Soccer isnt american. Soccer isnt English. It isnt Italian. It isnt French. Soccer is the language of the world. It is the politics of the world. It is the world. You cant make it american. It has to gain a foothold here, but without Americans thinking that they are hot shvt and superior to everyone else, and that no one is worth their time. That is where prejudice develops. Respect the Italian fans and what they believe in, they have nothing against your squad.
Probably the truest statement in the whole thread! Yeah, I also found this funny. To use the word beautiful in relation to a nation that has given the world Gattuso, or C. Gentile for that matter, is pretty damn amusing Look, I am not a fan of the Azzuri and find it funny that many fans born in America find that is the team that pulls at their heart. So be it. I can understand it to an extent (as stated in a previous post), but most importantly, who the hell am I to tell someone who to support. For Christ's sake, I am a Golden State Warriors fan; it that does not defy explanation or demonstrate how illogical sports fans allegiances are, nothing else will PS. One of the most entertaining days I have spent was getting drunk in North Beach, San Francisco after Ireland had taken care of the Italians in 94. Good times!