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The Soccer Gap: What conservatives are missing.
National Review Online ^ | May 31, 2002 | Robert Ziegler

Posted on 05/31/2002 9:28:33 AM PDT by xsysmgr

The most-watched sporting event in the world has begun, and most of my fellow conservatives in America are going to miss it.

While some of you no doubt are thinking that the Super Bowl and World Series are both months away, the event I'm referring to is the World Cup of Soccer, watched by an estimated 3.5 billion people around the world, including millions in the United States, almost all of whom are apparently liberals.

As a movement conservative and rabid fan of the beautiful game (that's soccer, by the way), I find myself as something of a de facto missionary for the sport to the political and cultural right. What is it about soccer that makes it (in America) the nearly exclusive domain of liberal sports fans?

Growing up in Ohio, I started following the game at age 12 via the weekly PBS program (should have tipped me off right then) Soccer Made in Germany, which featured a condensed match segment accompanied by English commentary. Youth leagues were just getting started in our part of the state, and my interest grew as I started coaching kids and playing in high school, but even then it was made clear that I was involved in an outsiders' game in a conservative area.

When I took an announcement of a big victory to my high-school principal one morning, I was greeted with a dismissive glare — it's not a real sport, after all. When my coach, the parish priest in a mostly Catholic town (and thus the only person for whom it was acceptable to be a fan) threw a party to view the 1982 World Cup championship match, only three players showed up. Once, before an afternoon match, my mom informed me that if I didn't cut the grass beforehand, I couldn't go to my own game. Does the high-school quarterback have to mow the lawn before his games?

As I became a more avid follower of the game during the '90s, I started wondering why all the soccer fans I was meeting were political and cultural liberals. I had moved to Washington, D.C. in 1994 to work for a member of Congress, and even the fans from the midwest, south, and west I was coming across via the vast and intricate underground soccer network (it exists, trust me) tended to be liberals. With conventional media coverage of soccer not abundant in America, soccer fans turn to the Internet for information. But a casual survey on the preeminent web gathering place for American fanatics — bigsoccer.com — again demonstrates an overwhelming presence of liberals among the rank and file. If I deign, on the other hand, to ask a fellow conservative about the game, I am treated to the usual pejorative responses.

For the uninitiated (those of you who don't persecute soccer, but just tolerate those who persecute it), such responses include "Soccer is not a real sport"; "Soccer is for girls"; "Soccer is a Commie game"; "Soccer is boring"; and the most damning of all, "So… you watch soccer… ?"

It is fair to note that soccer has had very mixed reviews from the American public in general, not just from conservatives. While the sport as a national youth activity has grown by leaps and bounds (an estimated eight million children are playing this year), the professional game has struggled to catch on. The U.S. went for almost 15 years without a top-flight professional league, and only time will tell if major-league soccer, the well organized and energetic effort to establish such a league here, will become an American institution. Soccer's TV ratings in the U.S. are low. While the women's national team attracted a lot of attention when they won the Women's World Cup in 1999, fan interest in that appears to have been quite specific to that event, much as it was for the Men's World Cup held here in 1994.

The main drawback to soccer for "traditional Americans" is that it is a game requiring some patience to appreciate. Baseball, the thinking man's game, has been affected by this national attention-span deficit to some degree, and traditionalists bemoan how the channel-surfing highlight culture has hurt the game. Turn on a soccer match and you are not likely to see something spectacular immediately (it's kind of like a Rembrandt in that way). While the seasoned fan can recognize the difficulty and artistry of a lengthy and complex buildup to an attempt at goal — often unsuccessful — much of modern-day, sports-viewing America wants feverish action, and wants it now.

There is, of course, huge interest in the game among many of our immigrant communities. Fans follow their homeland teams via satellite and cable telecasts of matches from abroad. In some cities, thousands of fans will gather at a theatre or recreational center to watch a closed-circuit pay-per-view match from South America, Africa, or Asia. Go as an American to a viewing place with a predominantly foreign clientele and you will still draw looks of surprise that a "Yank" or "gringo" would be interested in "their" game.

This perhaps touches near the heart of the issue for a lot of conservatives. Americans have typically come up with their own games to dominate. We invented football (even taking "soccer's" proper name and redefining it to an almost Orwellian degree), basketball, and baseball and made those our major sports. To the degree that these are played and/or followed elsewhere, they are American exports. While baseball is popular in Japan and parts of Latin America, and basketball in Europe and Australia, they are still "American" games first and foremost. Soccer will never be that. In fact, American football in part began, as legend has it, when a game of "soccer" became too boring, prompting a player to pick up the ball and begin running with it, and the rest is gridiron "pointyball" history.

Golf and tennis are also "foreign" in their origins, but they are not linked as closely to their international roots as soccer, and at any rate already had made deep inroads in the American cultural establishment by the early 20th century.

While eschewing anything deemed international or, worse, "European" suits the isolationist streak among certain conservatives, it seems to me that a much more proper Ameri-centric response would be to embrace the game for the purpose of demonstrating American superiority through it. For instance, doesn't saying "We play the best football in the world" kind of have a hollow ring to it? I mean, who else is there? But if the U.S. were to produce professional soccer leagues that rivaled those in Italy, Spain, England and Germany, and a national team that could defeat the likes of Brazil, Argentina, and France, how much crow would the internationalists have to eat then?

To be honest, my attraction to soccer is just that I like the game. But if the lure of American superiority is enough to get you interested in the game (kind of like when Americans get interested in things like bobsledding and Greco-Roman wrestling during the Olympics), so be it.

The time is ripe. Following the explosion of youth leagues, the quality of the American player development system has improved exponentially. We are even making some inroads on the rosters of clubs in England, France, Germany, and Holland. If American conservatives dedicate themselves to backing American soccer, the resultant energy and optimistic buzz might just push the U.S. men's national team to the final rounds of this summer's World Cup, or at least lower the percentage of the fans sitting next to me who voted for Mondale, Dukakis, and Gore. Help a brother out already! Strike a blow for federalism, apple pie, and the gold standard, and make a commitment to watch the World Cup this June.

By the way, the matches, played in South Korea and Japan, are airing live at 2:30 a.m., 5 a.m., and 7:30 a.m. EST. Happy viewing.

— Robert Ziegler lives in Northern Virginia with his wife and children, and directs media relations for a nonprofit public-policy group.


TOPICS: Culture/Society
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To: xsysmgr
Growing up in Ohio, I started following the game at age 12 via the weekly PBS program (should have tipped me off right then) Soccer Made in Germany, which featured a condensed match segment accompanied by English commentary. Youth leagues were just getting started in our part of the state, and my interest grew as I started coaching kids and playing in high school, but even then it was made clear that I was involved in an outsiders' game in a conservative area.

Hey, that was me too, but I grew up in Michigan. BUNDESLIGA, one of the first German words I learned. I started to get into it, asked for a soccer ball for Christmas, but NOBODY played it or had a clue how to play. Then a kid moved to town who had lived in England for a few years (he as American, just lived there awhile with his family) and he knew how to play!!! We kicked my ball around a bit, but that's about it, soccer is a tough game to play with just two people. That was my "youth soccer" experience in the 1970s.

Now, I coach my sons soccer team, I still don't know the game well, but we have fun, and I'm still sort of a fan, but my favorite spectator sport is college football. Michigan vs. Ohio State, you can't beat it (Auburn vs. Alabama is real close though) My favortie used to be basketball, but what they play now is a joke. Grew up loving baseball, now NEVER watch it. Hockey? playoff hockey is good, regular season, blech. Golf is still my game, and about the only thing I can still do as well as I did as a kid now that I'm in my 40's.

241 posted on 05/31/2002 12:49:19 PM PDT by machman
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To: Hotspur
It's the disconnect between our global pretensions and the lack of worldliness of our citizens that makes the rest of the world anti-American

My, how pretentious the soccer discussion has become some 200 posts later.

Anyway, I'll chime in so let me say this: Maybe it's qualities possessed by them ("the rest of the world") rather than by us which "makes" "the rest of the world" "anti-American".

For example, if "the rest of the world" is full of jealousy and resentment and a feeling of helplessness, then those very natural human sentiments alone would be enough to "make" them "anti" us. And this would be true no matter what Americans are like or how much "disconnect between our global pretensions and the lack of worldliness of our citizens" there is (or isn't).

There is nothing more annoying than when some know-it-all points to powerless, jealous people indulging in natural human emotions and then insists that those peoples' feelings are my fault. The feelings of other people are not my fault, sir. Can't they control their own feelings? Their jealousy, their resentment, their bitterness? Don't you think foreigners can control those feelings? (Do you think them animals?)

And the corresponding implication, that there would be less anti-Americanism if more American citizens would just become more "worldly", is just silly and I can't believe you actually believe it. Furthermore, what exactly would it mean for us to be more "worldly"? That we watch PBS more? That we embrace socialism more? What?

Oh let me guess, it's all about the soccer... We need to watch soccer, is that it? Like I said, so many "reasons" why we should watch soccer, yet none of them having very much to do with how entertaining the sport is....

Soccer is just one of many examples where silly, annoying American "exceptionalism" displays itself.

Let's parse this. Mr. Joe American dislikes soccer. This is "annoying" to foreigners. Therefore those foreigners, being so "annoyed", dislike America in general.

And this is Joe American's fault, for being "silly", and "exceptional". Therefore he should like soccer (among other things).

This is just nonsense. It's a weak and cowardly argument.

If some foreigners are so "annoyed" by the fact that I don't like soccer, did you ever stop to consider the possibility that maybe this is a psychological issue for them, and not me, to work out for themselves? After all: why the hell do they care which sport I like?

Tell me please, are soccer fans really so insecure?

How can a nation deign to dictate to the world when something on the range of half of the members of its parliament have never held a passport?

Your socio-political comments about the U.S. might be more interesting if you were aware that we don't actually have a "parliament". Best,

242 posted on 05/31/2002 12:49:50 PM PDT by Dr. Frank fan
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To: Hotspur
How can a nation deign to dictate to the world when something on the range of half of the members of its parliament have never held a passport?

1) We are NOT a parliamentray majoritarian democracy. We are a democratic republic. We have a congress NOT a parliament, comprised of a house of representatives and a senate.

Americans don't need passports or anyone's approval. We can be arrogant because we can be. That is the privilege of power and empire.

All sports are alright if one is a participant. It is moronic to be merely a spectator. Much like sex, I would rather be doing the act than watch someone else do it.

The function of sports until modern times was to prepare young men for the skills of war and combat. Few modern sports achive this with the possible exception of rugby and football.

Running around on a pitch in your underwear for 90 minutes kicking a ball may prepare you for running (usually away from the battle) but it does nothing to prepare young men for the rigors of combat nor to steele them for the hardships to be endured.

As a conservative my preference is for blood sports such as gladiatorial combat which I feel should be brought back as a way to empty out our prisons on a yearly basis.

I think most people would pay good money to watch convicts fight to the death so they may live to fight the next day. It would increase the revenue to the state thereby allowing for a lowering of taxes and minimize the cost of keeping convicted criminals incarcerated.

It would also desensitize us to the blood gore and brutality and therefore prevent us from becoming wimpy afeminate liberals.

243 posted on 05/31/2002 12:57:06 PM PDT by Cacique
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To: Methos8
The USA-Brazil game in 1994 was not a semifinal. After the first three round-robin games, the USA finished second in its group and advanced to the single elimination rounds (along with 15 other teams).

I believe that the furthest that the USA has ever advanced was a semifinal, but it was a LONG time ago.

D'oh! Open mouth insert foot. I remember it was on the July 4th and the platoon watched it in Skopje, Macedonia. Why I thought it was the semifinal match? Hmmm. Might have been the Skopsko beers. ;-)

244 posted on 05/31/2002 1:01:53 PM PDT by Prodigal Son
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To: Dan from Michigan
How can a Wings fan EVER forget about the Jerkalanche? BTW - I wonder how that Colorado radio station likes their billboard they put up in Detroit...the one where someone spraypainted AV'S SUCK on it.

Actually, they spraypainted 'AV'S SUCKS' on it. Apparently, English isn't a strong forte of the person who spraypainted...

245 posted on 05/31/2002 1:02:29 PM PDT by Nate505
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To: Cacique
The problem with your wanting gladiator fights in America is that in Rome, after so many victories the gladiators were given their freedom. I don't want them roaming the streets.

Other than that, BRING IT ON!

Imagine the pay per view money that could be made or the ratings if they were broadcast on TV.

UFC was the closest thing we had to it, and it has been wussified a great deal and barely resembles its former glory.

246 posted on 05/31/2002 1:02:33 PM PDT by Phantom Lord
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To: Dr. Frank
And the corresponding implication, that there would be less anti-Americanism if more American citizens would just become more "worldly", is just silly and I can't believe you actually believe it. Furthermore, what exactly would it mean for us to be more "worldly"? That we watch PBS more? That we embrace socialism more? What?

A good start would be that you not immediately deem unworthy that which you have not taken the time or effort to explore the worthiness of. Which is how the soccer discussion dovetails with the political discussion.

247 posted on 05/31/2002 1:12:59 PM PDT by Hotspur
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To: Phantom Lord
Extreme Chainsaw Soccer
Arena Kick-Golfing
Nude Full Contact Gymnastics
Texas Barbed Wire Cage Match Figure Skating
The Boston Irish Whiskey Marathon
248 posted on 05/31/2002 1:12:59 PM PDT by IowaHawk
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To: keri
Soccer really is a great game. It does require some smarts and creativity, though.

Which is why the typical poster here is trashing the game. they know nothing about it, but because it's big outside of the US, obviously it's a communist plot meant to infiltrate the youth of America to make them gay AND communist. Oh, and squat while they urinate.

The typical anti-soccer poster in this thread is the mental match of the typical soccer hooligan. Maybe.

Jeez, people, it's a GAME, not a political philosophy.

Ugh, what a terrible thing it is for the kids who play the game, teaches things like teamwork, sportsmanship, gets the kids some exercise, gets them away from the TV/Computer/Game machine.

Myself, ambivalent to the game, have coached my kids soccer teams in the past, but any time you can get them into a healthy thing, it's good. Not that some of the Neanderthals around here recognize it (perhaps the Neanderthals will need reparations after being compared to some of the not-so-deep thinkers commenting on this thread).

249 posted on 05/31/2002 1:22:14 PM PDT by dmz
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To: Dr. Frank
Oh let me guess, it's all about the soccer... We need to watch soccer, is that it? Like I said, so many "reasons" why we should watch soccer, yet none of them having very much to do with how entertaining the sport is....

I could care a fig leaf whether you want to watch, like, or even care about soccer. But when people start calling it a "fag" sport, a "gay" sport, and making hackneyed observations such as the link between soccer enjoyment and socialist tendencies, those of us who see how ridiculous those sentiments are have every right to log on and tell you so.

And when people start criticizing other peoples and countries for their love of soccer when they have no interest in any of those peoples and countries, or the world outside provinical America, those of us who see how ridiculous those sentiments are have every right to log on and tell you so.

How can a nation deign to dictate to the world when something on the range of half of the members of its parliament have never held a passport? Your socio-political comments about the U.S. might be more interesting if you were aware that we don't actually have a "parliament"

As should have been obvious, I used "parliament" in the generic sense--small, rather than large "p." I did so only because I wasn't sure if the numbers worked if you counted the Senate. If you insist on literalness, I'll use the more clunky "House of Representatives" next time.

250 posted on 05/31/2002 1:22:52 PM PDT by Hotspur
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To: sphinx
When I put on my sports-purist hat, however, what does bother me about soccer is too many games (not to mention tournament games and championships) being decided by penalty kicks and/or those shootoffs.

I agree. Shootouts suck. I imagine that will be eliminated by FIFA sometime.

251 posted on 05/31/2002 1:26:28 PM PDT by cruiserman
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To: Colonel_Flagg
They should just move the Rockies to American League, home of the 17-16 nailbiter.
252 posted on 05/31/2002 1:37:41 PM PDT by GoreIsLove
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To: dmz
All the kids I know love playing the game. If you ask why they like it they'll say it's fun. It's interesting to note that kids will kick cans, rocks, or whatever's in front of them when walking, as if the desire to kick something is ingrained somewhere.

I don't see Soccer ever replacing Baseball or any "apple pie" sport, but it is up and coming and the people who fear it need a grip;-)

You are right. It's just a game, not politics.

253 posted on 05/31/2002 1:39:53 PM PDT by keri
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To: Hotspur
A good start would be that you not immediately deem unworthy that which you have not taken the time or effort to explore the worthiness of.

And what is strange is that you assume this is what I, or anyone else, has done. "Immediately deem unworthy"? What makes you think I haven't seen many, many matches?

Anyone who doesn't love soccer must never have seen it - is that it?

254 posted on 05/31/2002 1:40:00 PM PDT by Dr. Frank fan
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To: Hotspur
I think I finally figured it out. People in foreign countries resent the lack of interest in soccer in the U.S. for one simple reason -- they found one thing that they can do better than the U.S., and they can't stand the fact that we never really cared all that much about it to begin with.
255 posted on 05/31/2002 1:44:54 PM PDT by Alberta's Child
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To: Dr. Frank
In other words, Americans hate soccer because they suck at it . . . . [credit to the poster above that said it first]
256 posted on 05/31/2002 1:50:10 PM PDT by 1rudeboy
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To: xsysmgr
My Brother succinctly described soccer in his sports commentary column as, "The ultimate athletic endeavor for slow, skinny, white kids."
257 posted on 05/31/2002 1:50:44 PM PDT by N. Theknow
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To: 1rudeboy
I think you got it backwards: Americans suck at soccer because we hate it.
258 posted on 05/31/2002 1:51:37 PM PDT by Alberta's Child
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To: xsysmgr
"The following exchange appeared as part of an interview with the folklorist Alan Dundes (authored by Virginia Matzek) in the CALIFORNIA MONTHLY (September 1993), the UC Berkeley alumni magazine:

Q. I know people who say that, for them, you have singlehandedly ruined football.
A: People assume that I'm somehow against football, or that I'm saying everyone who plays footbal is a homosexual, and none of this is true. Hey, I'm a football fan. I was devastated when the Raiders moved from Oakland. What I argued is that in footbal you have two groups of males, and the idea of the game, even as articulated by people who know nothing about psychology, is to get into the other team's *end* [all "italics" are the author's] zone more times than they get into your *end* zone. Not only does the field have have ends, but the line has ends, now called *tight end* and *wide receiver*, which helped my theory even more. The purpose of the game is to establish your masculinity, but you do so on a field where women are not welcome. So you establish your masculinity by making the other men into females, because the female is the one that "takes it," in normal biology.

Q. You've said this is part of a larger theory of male sports.
A. It's the same whether you're putting a ball in the hoop or a puck in the crease. The slam dunk in basketball is the same as the spike in football--exacerbating the humiliation of the opponent by making them take it in the end zone, forcefully. It's the same with a man versus an animal in the bullfight, where Spanish machismo is tied to whether the man is going to penetrate the bull or the bull is going to penetrate the man. If the bull is properly and deftly feminized, then the victory is signaled by symbolically castrating th bull by removing its hooves or tail. The cockfight involves men sitting around all day manipulating and caressing their, uh, *roosters*, which go out and fight. Of course the cockfight is illegal, just as normally caressing your rooster in public all day would be illegal, and that's part of the thrill of it--having this phallic combat in public.

Not only is this symbolism found in games, but it's actually the basis of warfare. Regardless of what the political scientists and eonomists tell you, warfare is basically a male ritual combat, where the idea is to penetrate and feminize another group of males. We had a perfect example of it in the Gulf War, where all the folkore that came out was telling Saddam to *withdraw*. There was a joke about *Kuwaitus interruptus", and Xerox lore that had the Iwo Jim flag being planted in Saddam's rear end. So people may be offended by my analysis, but it explains an awful lot. It explains the coninuum between war and games: Even in footbal you have things like the "blitz" and the "bomb". And it explains why women are not welcome in the military, and certainly not in combat. The whole symbolic nature of the game indicates that you must feminize your opponent, and you can't do that if you're already feminine! And the whole question of gays in the military. Why re these military types so afraid of gays? Because if you're homosexual, you might be willing to take it in the end zone!

Q. Aren't you reaing a little? Isn't it just a natural feature of games to have a goal to reach and territory to defend?
A. I don't believe something is "just a game" any more than I believe something is "just a joke" or "just a story". Hey, I didn't invent "protect the end zone"--or, as they say in business, "cover your ass". You shouldn't blame the messenger for the message."

(For the record: source of above quote here)

259 posted on 05/31/2002 1:55:14 PM PDT by Revolting cat!
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To: Cacique
The function of sports until modern times was to prepare young men for the skills of war and combat. Few modern sports achive this with the possible exception of rugby and football.

I would certainly prefer soccer or rugby players next to me in the hole. Unless, of course, combat consisted of 3-4 second intervals separated by whistles, and readily-available oxygen tanks every 40 yards.

260 posted on 05/31/2002 1:56:20 PM PDT by 1rudeboy
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