LL-L 'Sports' 2006.06.20 (021 [E]

[Lowlands-L]

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L O W L A N D S - L * 20 June 2006 * Volume 01
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From: 'Ben J. Bloomgren' <godsquad at cox.net>
Subject: LL-L 'Media' 2006.06.19 (02) [E/German]

It surprised me that
they beat the Czechs, after their 3-0 victory over the US...

What about our US? Where the mother were they? They haven't scored yet in
the cup? I mean, God bless the Ghanaians, but goodly mother! What happened
to the best team we've ever fielded?
Ben 

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From: Helge Tietz <helgetietz at yahoo.com>
Subject: LL-L 'Media' 2006.06.19 (02) [E/German]

Leeve Lowlanders,
 
Just as an explaination, by mistake I clicked on the wrong email to reply to a
friend of mine yesterday who recently moved to Switzerland, well, at least now
you know what my opinion is about the latest football results from the world cup....
 
Groeten
 
Helge

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From: R. F. Hahn <sassisch at yahoo.com>
Subject: Sports

Hey, Ben, buddy!

Do I really need to remind you that soccer is a minor sport for men in the U.S.,
is seen mostly as as girls' sport by most Americans, as an "ethnic" sport if
played by men (due to being predominated by men born outside the U.S.)?  How much
soccer coverage is there on American TV?  (I'm supprised there's that much
coverage of the World Cup.)

Yes, folks, soccer is popular as a sport for girls in American schools.  Boys are
expected to play American rules football.

It's similar in Australia -- or it was when I lived there, though it wasn't a
girls' sport there.  "Real" Australian played and loved Australian rules football
("footy," which is tougher than American rules football, certainly is played
without protective gear and "wimpy stuff like that").  Soccer was for the "Poms"
(British people) and other "migrants."

I'm actually surprised the US and Australian teams did as well as they did at the
World Cup.  They'd be way better if this sport were really popular in their
respective countries.  Might it be because of the growing number of non-native
born populations in both countries?  Though I bet that at least as much effort
goes into preparing the Ghanaean team as into the American and Australian teams.

Soccer is very popular elsewhere in the world, and the beauty of it is that, at
least on the popular, everyday level, it requires next to no money resources. 
I've seen it played at all sorts of likely and unlikely sites in even the poorest
neighborhoods of the poorest countries.  I've seen it played in refugee camps
where people had next to no food, and I remember it being played on a
bomb-crater-riddled plot of land behind our place in Hamburg when I was little. 

In my opinion, the disadvantage of it, though not inherent in the game itself, is
that soccer culture tends to bring out the old rivalry spirit, even bellicose
sentiments, of which the dreaded hooliganism is one symptom.  If it wasn't soccer
it'd be something else, I guess, and the reason is that it is organized
geographically and "politically" (in terms of political borders) and thus serves
as a type of war substitute in many people's minds.  This is reflected in the
language even.  (Yes, there's a language twist to this as well.)  Polite talk is
"the Brazilian team," "the Polish team," etc., but popularly you hear "the
Brazilians" and "the Poles" respectively, and many or most people think in terms
of countries and other types of politico-administrative units.

Regards,
Reinhard/Ron

P.S.: Hi, Helge!  You know what they say? "It's not a matter of it but a matter
of when."  Count yourself lucky it was only about soccer that you talked ...  ;-)

P.P.S.: By the way, if this ever happens to you again, or to anyone else for that
matter, and you notice it after sending it off, please just follow it up with a
corrective message to the posting address and to my personal address.  It happens
rarely that I post submissions right away, and I can always erase them.  You are
not the only person this happened to, either, though in your case I thought it
was meant to be posted.  It happens all the time, but in most cases people inform
me or the messages are glaringly non-pertinent and quite private, in which case I
contact the originators, and I'm very discrete about it as many Lowlanders can
attest.

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