Recently, some conservatives who hate soccer and some leftists who love soccer have been engaged in a cultural battle over soccer. This is what I expected back in 1976 when a soccer team first came to my home town of Minneapolis. I expected “open-minded” leftists to love it, and “closed-minded” conservatives to hate it. But instead of finding myself in the company of my fellow leftists when I attended games, I found myself surrounded by people in the middle and on the right.
And that’s the way it has been for thirty-four years: conservatives supporting soccer and leftists generally shunning it. In fact, I got so angry at the way that leftist magazines like The Nation and In These Times treated soccer that I stopped subscribing to them. I am no longer surprised when the U.S. Marines are among the advertisers of televised games; at this point what would be surprising would be some lefty entity like Whole Foods joining in.
So here’s my advice to conservatives who are bashing soccer: go ahead if you wish, but also bash those leftists who bash soccer. And there are plenty of those people around.
Why fight the left with one hand tied behind your back? Why not take advantage of leftist hypocrisy?
And of course read my book for more ammunition:
And that’s the way it has been for thirty-four years: conservatives supporting soccer and leftists generally shunning it. In fact, I got so angry at the way that leftist magazines like The Nation and In These Times treated soccer that I stopped subscribing to them. I am no longer surprised when the U.S. Marines are among the advertisers of televised games; at this point what would be surprising would be some lefty entity like Whole Foods joining in.
So here’s my advice to conservatives who are bashing soccer: go ahead if you wish, but also bash those leftists who bash soccer. And there are plenty of those people around.
Why fight the left with one hand tied behind your back? Why not take advantage of leftist hypocrisy?
And of course read my book for more ammunition:
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