So I'm driving through the Virginia countryside today, and my brother calls me from NYC. He's watching the Germany-Port game, which I have on XM. He says "I know you love soccer, and I like it, too, but it will never really take off here until the diving and acting shit stops. Did you see #13 for Germany? He deserves a fucking Oscar. THAT'S why it will never be popular here."
Ugh.
Note: my brother grew up playing the game, though he gave it up ~14 for the other football. He's a big hockey fan. Loves baseball, too.
I explained to him that while I, too, hate diving and acting, it's not the only American sport in which this happens. I asked him if he's watched Lebron or the entire Duke Blue Devils team flop. He said it's different. I said "how?" He had a problem in particular with the overreacting to a foul, made up or not.
I told him that, to begin, the problem isn't the game itself, but rather the masses who see soccer as a threat to an American culture that celebrates "world champions" in sports in which really no one but Americans compete. After explaining to him that I'm not going to abandon a sport with problems, as every sport has, of course, I moved on. BTW, his first example of a heroic, non-acting sport was hockey. I didn't want to argue, so I ignored it - but do find it funny that a sport that for years (and still does, to an extent) embraced fighting as part of its culture (though fighting has nothing to do with hockey skill) is seen as superior ethically, morally, and by every other metric in the eyes of many Americans like my highly educated, sport loving brother.
