http://football.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,9753,1343156,00.html I dunno if this has been posted already
It's in the daily news thread on the blogs and journals page, but there's probably no reason why it can't be here, too. I read that this morning after going to various places to read up on Liverpool's CL road victory. It's a... well, "curious" is the right word. There are some passages that seem to be pretty straightforward, but a fair bit of it also seems like satire, too. I mean, the last three paragraphs are either satire, or the guy is just pulling stuff out of his ass. It's like coca-colonialisation in reverse. Barely a week goes by without a local paper somewhere in America reporting that yet another high school has abandoned gridiron in favour of the beautiful game. The inevitable anti-soccer backlash has been as savage as it has been futile. High-falutin' neo-cons intellectuals and knuckle-dragging internet boo-boys have combined to claim that soccer is inherently gay, feminine and communistic. I think they're right. The rest of the world has been worried for some time that America will try and change soccer. The truth is that soccer is changing America. Socialist soccerphiles should take heart. The Presidential election does not tell the whole story. Inside the snorting, steroid-swollen, padded and armoured behemoth of George Bush's America - there's a gayer, girlier and more socialist America struggling to get out. And, (like John Kerry), it plays soccer. I mean... I wouldn't take this seriously if it was a bigsoccer post. Would anyone else?
Yes...I would...I really enjoyed the article although at least some of it was tongue in cheek. The rest of the world doesn't give a monkeys uncle about baseball and do indeed laugh themselves silly about the monika "world series" he's right also about "the miracle on ice"...this was obviously huge in the USA but was at best a footnote anywhere (except the soviet union maybe) else in the world. this past weekend my son-in-law ( a University of Texas ex )was in London and searched high and low for any information on the UT- colorado game...to no effect...he was back in Dallas sunday evening before he found out the score. for the most part English sports writers do not bash American sports...they do much worse...they ignore them as an irrelevence. Soccer gets bashed in this country a LOT more than all other sports combined...because the Jim Rhomes of the world are scared of it... A couple of years ago I was involved in a discussion on a local sports radio station (1310 the ticket) about the three greatest athletes of all time...the hosts insisted on including babe ruth....until I mentioned that if they asked anyone else in the rest of the world about babe ruth, they would respond as the kid in the movie "The Sandlot" did...quote, "yeah, but who is she".
By "not taking it seriously" I didn't mean "dismissing it as crap," I actually meant, "chuckling at the jokes." Including the funniness of Americans taking the "Miracle on Ice" to be the universal touchstone for sports upsets, for instance, as well as the author's directly satirical comments about US high schools dropping football for soccer... which really isn't happening very often. And the stuff about soccer being "gay" would... well, let's just say that some of the more insecure American fans would have their panties in a bunch over that part... which is what makes me think it's funny.
I agree and certainly in this area I'll be cold in my grave ( even if I live to a 100) before the high schools give up gridiron...gridiron basically runs the school district around here and I am not exagerating...the local high school had the new "field turf" installed about 9 months before the dallas cowboys. I do however remember this quote (from memory) from the Times of London just after the 1994 WC...."If Americans are not turned into soccer fans after this world cup, it's their own damn fault. let them languise in heathen worship of fat men playing rounders, freaks of nature playing glorified net ball, or wallow in the tedious travesty of rugby that is American football"...