Dalrymple on soccer

Theodore Dalrymple writes:

On the subject of football, I am a snob. I do not detest the game as such, for I accept that it can be played with skill and achieve a kind of beauty, but rather the excessive importance attached to it by millions and hundreds of millions of my fellow beings. Try as I might to expunge the thought from my mind that this enthusiasm is a manifestation of human stupidity, I cannot.

I agree 100 percent with Dalrymple’s last sentence, with the exception that I do not try to expunge the forbidden thought from my mind. I simply, without embarrassment or guilt, think that thought.

- end of initial entry -

July 6

Blogger Snouck Hurgronje writes from the Netherlands:

LA quoting Theodore Darymple: “Try as I might to expunge the thought from my mind that this enthusiasm is a manifestation of human stupidity, I cannot.”

Dang! It must really hurt to lose to Ghana.

Let’s see what happens tonight (Netherlands vs. Uruguay)

LA replies:

First, Dalryple is British. But regarding the U.S. loss to Ghana, I think that was the game that the New York Post headlined this way on their June 27 front page (the headline was not in their online edition, but it is quoted here):

This Sport Is Stupid Anyway

Of course, some of us knew that already. There’s a man who is controlling a ball between his two feet, and another man with his feet wrests control of the ball from the first man. And then the first man tries to get control back. And this, with variations, goes on for hour. And people are supposed to be interested in this?

I don’t mind people playing soccer if they want. But Dalrymple has hit the nail on the head: the intense interest in soccer as a spectator sport is a manifestation of human stupidity.

Posted by Lawrence Auster at July 05, 2010 02:54 PM | Send