World Cup Soccer: Why Americans Should Give a Damn!
I played my first soccer game when I was 5 years old. To say I was underwhelmed doesn’t quite capture my reaction; after the first half, I walked over to my father and told him “I hate this. Can I play football please?”
That was my attitude for most of my life. I’ve never had much interest in soccer, instead preferring (American) football and baseball. But the 2006 World Cup captured my imagination partially because of Italy’s run and eventual victory. My roommate at the time is also Italian, so he and I watched nearly every match together, including the finals. It just made me excited and I really enjoyed feeling as though I was participating in something global. That enjoyment made me really wish the U.S. was part of the festivities.
Now, I am well aware that soccer has struggled to gain much appeal in the U.S. despite the fact that nearly the entire world lives and breathes soccer. I think that those struggles owe significantly to the decline in the expression of nationalism; 30 years ago, when the U.S. faced down the mighty Soviet Union in hockey in the Olympics, there was a dense subtext to the competition. It was as though these athletes were battling each other in the only substantial confrontation between the two super-powers during the Cold War. We identified with this miracle team, placing our hopes and dreams for peace and global dominance onto their shoulders. And when they when, a jubilant feeling swept our nation while an overwhelming sense of defeat and impotence invaded Soviet society and politics. And while the Berlin Wall was not felded by a hockey puck, the perception of invincibility that the Soviet Union once enjoyed began to crumble and this televised defeat cannot be discounted in the history of the Cold War.
Today, however, most people could care less about the Olympics. They don’t care how we fare in international competition and have little interest in staking up against other countries to see which one is better at a particular sport. Further, globalization has opened other countries to the U.S. economy, making it possible for athletes from Russia and Japan and Korea to come to America to play for professional sporting teams. And as a result of the fall of the Soviet Union, the U.S. has become the only super power around and, thus, our politics and economics have become increasingly unilateral and self-centered. All of this has contributed to a decline of goodwill towards our country; we’re viewed as self-interested, lazy, arrogant fools. This trend has only intensified in the last decade amidst wildly unpopular wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Now, when this World Cup started, I was floored by the inclusion of the U.S., relishing our opportunity to participate in this truly-global event watched by billions of people.Our matches have been maddeningly-entertaining. Perhaps the most infamous will be the controversy surrounding our second match against Slovenia, when a referee from Mali nearly cost us the game. Such malfeasance would’ve been a serious blow to FIFA, who would’ve had a hard time continue to sell soccer to this country if we had been jobbed out of the next round by a handful of atrocious calls by 2 utterly underqualified referees.
So what does this all mean? It’s my supposition that it is good for soccer that the U.S. is having some success this year. And, you know what? It’s good for us to finally have some fledgling interest in the most popular sport in the world. We should be involved. You might not like soccer–any mention of it and my father will immediately say “soccer sucks”– but it’s good for the US, after nearly a decade of paternalism and unilateral interference in the politics and economies of the entire world, to participate in something that brings us all together. We should be excited and thrilled and engaged in this event because it truly is an equalizer. Small nations like the Republic of South Africa can beat France, one of the finalists in the 2006 World Cup. It’s an opportunity for fellowship and camaraderie between countries whose relationships would otherwise be only about money and war.
