Who here does not care about the World Cup.

I am not into sports, even when I was stationed in Europe I couldn't get excited about it.

The Olympics at least tries to bring people together. The World Cup tears them apart.

The Olympics puts all the athletes together in a village with 50,000 condoms. The World Cup brings us chants such as "give the jews to the gas" and calling blacks, "monkeys."

As far as the sport goes, I won't go out of my way to watch it. I played it in the adult leagues in my twenties so it's not because I don't understand the sport. My personal preferences for spectator sports just tilt towards college football followed by college basketball followed by the NHL/MLB playoffs.

I will pull for the US, and will probably watch a little of it. It's fun to play, not so great to watch on TV.

It is the one event where a large part of the world population is enjoying the same thing; unlike the Olympics, it is not a cold-war relic about which system can take the most medals. I see that the US is somehow left out of the general fun about the event, but well, it's fun anyway.

You can rest assured that you won't hear chants like yours during the world cup; there are idiots chanting filth like that, but that has little to do with socccer; it usually happens with a few infamous clubs if at all.

My comments were based on what I've been seeing in the media.

European Union Distressed by Pre-World Cup Racism
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5450741

Racism threatens to tarnish the World Cup and there’s a lot of talk about what FIFA officials are and aren’t going to do about it.
http://timbayly.worldmagblog.com/timbayly/archives/024813.html

Concerns raised over racism during Cup
http://www.usatoday.com/sports/soccer/worldcup/2006-06-01-intolerance-cup_x.htm

The reports are not about international matches. There is a racism problem in several areas throughout Europe and naturally that is visible at soccer matches in those areas.

The incidents are regrettable and it is a good thing that FIFA and UEFA are finally acting on them; especially the use of racial slurs as psychological foul is damnable.

It's just that those things don't get created by a game - they get visible during a game. Not during international games and not more frequently, though.

Cote d'Ivoire declared a cease-fire in their civil war for the duration of the World Cup, to cheer on their team. And it can serve as a proxy for war, in a lot of cases, how much aggression have England and Argentina taken out on each other, following the Falklands/Malvinas war, on the football pitch?

Sure, soccer has hooligans, and racists, and assholes, in general proportion to the number in the general population. But on the other hand, the fans, and the teams, represent the overall culture of their countries quite well, Germany plays grinding defense, Holland has meticulous, opportunistic midfielders, England has high hopes, and underachieves while being the best at set plays, Brasil plays with reckless abandon, the US tries to outwork people, Italy likes to think it's brilliant, but plays defensively on the world stage, Spain can never seem to keep it's act together under pressure, Argentina has a punishing defense combined with individual flair on offense...it's all great stereotypes.

the olympics tries to being the athletes together with the whole village thing, but the world cup brings the fans together. it's a working class sport, played by both multimillionaires and relative paupers, on the same pitch. For every clash you hear about, there are 50 incidents of fans from opposing countries engaging in good natured ribbing. it's multi-ethnic, more so than any other single sport in the world, which is one of the things that brings out racism, no doubt. US sports are remarkably segregated, when you think about it. But soccer? outside the US, it has undeniably working class roots, a symbol of changing societies. how great is it that a closed society like Holland, for instance, cheers on african players?

Is that a new athletic supporter size? ;) :P

But I'm not a sports fan so that's to be expected. :shrug:

I almost got into a fight when I sayed it is just people running around kicking a ball, don't say that in Europe.

I can get excited about soccer, but that's the only sport i like to watch and i never pay attention to those games anyways.

I try to follow sports, and I used to have to, for my job, basketball, football, tennis, even hockey, but this was not one of them...:shrug:

Even more than that, I can't stand the prevailing attitude which is forced down our throats over here that "everybody" is interested in the World Cup. I - and there are many many others - really don't give a monkeys about it, I couldn't tell you naything about how it works, who is in it &c.&c. but it is given total wall-to-wall coverage and infects just about everything.

I'm tempted to find a rock to hide under until the whole thing is finished.

I have no idea who played or won and don't care.

:hi:

Usually preempting GOOD programming.

on DU, lately?!?

You don't like soccer- got it-

You're in the minority-

NEXT-

but, whatever floats your boat...:)

I don't hate it, either, I'm just apathetic. :shrug:

I was listening to Radio Nederlands (in English for a change). They were talking about the World Cup. Basically, it's war - without death and blood. But since Holland is peaceful and tolerant, they shouldn't win. But if they do, the guy said he'd stand up and cheer with everyone else.

I don't care for sports, but come World Cup time, I'll check now and then to see who's making it up the ladder. Especially when a small country survives to one of the final matches.

Can you imagine the drinking that's going on right now!

don't give a hoot. :shrug:

It was really exciting, as Trinidad and Tobago is the smallest nation to ever make it into the World Cup, and they fought the top-ranked Swedes to a 0-0 tie, a victory for Trinidad because it gave them a point in the competition.

Very fun to watch, very gutsy players.