Jon at Back Seat Drivers takes me to task for taking the Pittsburgh letter writer too seriously as the writer obviously had his tongue in his cheek. And, he's probably right. I should have waited and read that letter again later as I was punch drunk at that hour, having been up watching baseball all night (see below). {Still, people from the Pittsburgh area do take their football very seriously indeed.}
However, I still contend that FIFA's attempts at getting soccer to take off in the US are as much cultural imperialism as what Hollywood does in Europe. He says that Hollywood doesn't promote cultural imperialism, which is true. Only, there are many people in Europe who rant and rave about cultural imperialism as if MGM, Disney and Time Warner were all following some master strategy. And, again, I agree with Jon about FIFA's motivation for promoting soccer in the US - MONEY. That just happens to be exactly the same motivation for promoting Terminator in Europe.
Jon takes issue with my description of soccer as politically correct in the US. Well, that I stand over. Soccer is loved by those who would prefer the US to be less "American" and more like everywhere else. I've often heard people in America pining over soccer because it's "the global game" as if baseball and football are too parochial.
Youth soccer is generally mixed gender (which I suspect stunts the development of the American men's game, but is a great explanation for the success of American women). Boys and girls compete on the same teams under rules that, from my observation, make the game much tamer over there than what I've seen in an average school boys or school girls game over here.
Jon also says that soccer is the sport of choice where he grew up, attracting the best athletes. That could be true of my town too. I don't know the current situation there, but when I was a kid the town funded soccer, but not baseball, because soccer was mixed gender. If that isn't politically correct, then what is? I don't know if this happened (or happens) in other towns today, but that memory still rankles.
Soccer is almost non-existent in the inner cities (other than immigrant communities) or small towns from where most of the top basketball, baseball & football players come. {Last night, the NY Yankees fielded a team with 6 non-Americans and only 3 Americans in the starting line-up. Baseball is actually the sport of choice in much of Latin America and in the Far East.}
I have no doubt that as the US population continues to grow, soccer will find a niche for itself among immigrants. I applaud that. That many of these immigrants will go to see their "national" team play rather than the MSL is hardly a vote of confidence in the sport in the US.
In time, soccer may even grow into a full time big league sport. But, it's way short of that now. Although the average MLS game attracts "more than 14,000" people, the average NHL game attracts 16, 500. Each NHL team plays 40 home games (as opposed to 15 home games per team in the MSL). Total NHL attendance is close to 20m per season, whereas it's nearer to 2.2m for the MSL. {Note: there are 6 NHL teams in Canada.}
