Glenn Beck hates the World ... Cup
June 11, 2010 2:42 pm ET by Jeremy Holden
Today, national teams representing 32 nations gather in South Africa, where for the next month the best soccer players on the planet will compete for the World Cup. Team USA enters the pitch tomorrow for a highly anticipated match against England. Man, isn't that just like Obama -- what with all the riots and cramming stuff down your throat? Yeah. Knock me over with a feather, but Glenn Beck sure does hate soccer. And the World Cup. And he really hates Obama, who crams stuff down our throats. Just like soccer. And the World Cup. And there are riots.
On a day when Beck returned to musing on Obama's seeming racism and renewed his attacks against Obama's family, he managed to find time to launch a yawningly uninspired attack on the World Cup. Glenn Beck's problem with soccer? Why, it's the internationalism of it all.
From the June 11 edition of The Glenn Beck Program:
BECK: I don't get the baseball thing, but the soccer thing, I hate it so much -- probably because the rest of the world likes it so much, and they riot over it, and they continually try to jam it down our throat."
Now who are "they" that are trying to "jam it down our throats" anyway? Fox?
Beck expounded upon this process of jamming soccer down our throats during his temper tantrum:
It doesn't matter how you sell it to us. It doesn't matter how many celebrities you get. It doesn't matter how many bars open early. It doesn't matter how many beer commercials they run. We don't want the World Cup. We don't like the World Cup. We don't like soccer. We want nothing to do with it. You can package it any way -- you can spend all kinds of money. You can force it on our television sets. We will not enjoy the World Cup.
Well it turns out that 120 million Americans did enjoy the World Cup that was "forced" on their television sets in 2006; 17 million Americans watched the final match alone -- and that match that didn't even include an American team. That seems like an awful lot of people not enjoying the World Cup. For sake of comparison, the NBA Finals this year are averaging 15 million viewers per night. The 2009 World Series averaged 19 million viewers.
It turns out that there is a diverse market for televised sporting events. People watch all sorts of things -- after all, an ever-decreasing number of people still watch Glenn Beck's Fox News show.
Baseball is only one of millions of things you don't get, Glenn. They try to jam soccer down our throats?
Hardly.
We'll see how many folks watch U.S.-England tomorrow. I know I will.
Meanwhile, I wonder what the honchos over at Fox think of this little display of pique. Check this out:
"Fox Soccer Channel (FSC) is an American television speciality channel, owned by News Corporation's Fox Entertainment Group, that specializes in soccer. It formerly broadcasted rugby and Australian rules football, but is now dedicated strictly to soccer. The channel took its current name on February 7, 2005; before then, the network was known as Fox Sports World, launched November 1, 1997. In 2006, all non-soccer programming (other than Sky Sports News - see below) was dropped."
Thirty?
Just an FYI, in my part of the world, it is the wealthy conservative families whose children are on the soccer fields every Saturday. The poorer children play PeeWee football. Some do both. Soccer is seen here as a game primarily for the wealthy. It's expensive . . . that's why the elite teams are made up of children of wealthy families.
Just not real sure why this is a part of the silly "us v. them" game. Seems a little forced.
Besides that, Glenn is objecting for the dumbest of reasons. If I was an uber patriot, I would care so far as only rooting for the American team to win. Which doesn't go further than round two of the WC.
And while it was never the most popular sport, it really has gained popularity here, particularly with the younger generation. Like everything else, I think people like Beck rally against it because, quite simply, they just fear change and anything that isn't what they grew up with and like.
And I don't know anyone who thought we were doing a bad thing to host it that year, either. I thought it was one of our prouder moments.
Apparently Beck has an irrational fear of being gang raped by brown people.
Only a fool would dare enunciate this kind of screed. Or, a satirist, like Colbert, who pre-satirized this very stupidness several months ago.
Until Americans like Beck accept that we are just another region of the world, America will always have a problem.
There were riots in 1984 after the Detroit Tigers won the World Series, and another riot in 1990 after the Pistons won their last N.B.A. championship.
Basketball fans riot on the streets of Los Angeles after Lakers win NBA title
The Malice at the Palace
Celtics Fans (Predictably) Riot In Celebration
Shortly after I first arrived in Korea, they received the news that they were going to be cohosting the World Cup in 2002 with Japan. We were still in the country during 2002. It was so exciting. One of the first games included the Korean team against the American team. Of course, when they scored against the US, they did a little skating to jab at us for Apollo Anton Onho, but it was contagious and red shirts kept popping up all over the place. And the trash disappeared off the streets because Koreans didn't want the world to think they were slobs. We watched the game from our quarters on base, but there was a public park nearby, and they had set up a Jumbotron (one of several all over the city) and Koreans were gathering to watch and drink beer in the warm night air. We could hear the shout with every score. I don't like sports, but it was so much fun! Glenn doesn't like it because he can't make money on it, and it is truly international and tolerant.
Ultra St. Pauli
look us up.
fighting nazis, embracing multiculturalism, embarrassing the media, battling racism.
and let's not even talk about the soccer itself.
F.C. St. Pauli- non-established since 1910
Idiot.
Go USA!!!
World Cup = World Government
So beckster clearly doesn't get the fact that the majority of people on the planet DON'T LIVE IN AMERICA.. but have actually managed to pull together a rather nice existence for themselves elsewhere...Although some are better than others. He also has demonstrated that he clearly doesn't understand the FACT that the majority of the planet's population doesn't give a CRAP about what we or he thinks, says, does, or makes up.. To the rest of humanity - beck is a nit.... usually a real small nit..
So lonesome-roads, go clean your shorts out with your tooth brush and remember - we think about you less than we think about farting....
Though I hope we prove them wrong - GO USA! :)
"The word 'Soccer' starts with an S like in Socialism. And interesting, this so-called sport was presumably invented in China of all places. Not that the Communists had anything to do with it, oh no no no! No, Chairman Mao, the left's favorite leader, was conveniently not even born when Soccer was invented. Just like Obama was only 8-years-old when Bill Aires was blowing up the Pentagon, right? One having nothing to do with the other. Obama was just a kid, right? yeah right.
By the way, is it just me or does The World Cup sound a lot like the way to start a One World Government? I mean how would you go about getting people to think about the world as one? Soccer might be one way to do it."