Having left New York and its embrace of the World Cup I have had to leave behind the excitement and energy of watching the matches in pubs. Baton Rouge, Louisiana is barren of World Cup fever. There are no jersey of any stripe in sight. No one has a clue that there is a really big game of soccerball  going on. After seeing the ostentatious start of the Lakers and Celtics game last night, which seemed to include strobe lights, lasers, fog machines and video projected onto falling curtains (a World Cup match would have been 20 minutes in by this point) , I found this video extra hilarious:

No matter, I’ll be off to South Africa on the 23rd.

The road to sainthood is heavily mined and often in the modern era completely manufactured though not necessarily by the potential saint in question. The mold was temporarily broken in the sixties and seventies when rebellious and radical identities were sought and projected. Outlaws became a heroes again as they had in the Great Depression.

But then came the Reagan era and the Boomers who had been raised in much greater privilege than their parents now embraced the machinery of that privilege. Money was preferred to ideology, tie-dyes were exchanged for pin stripes. Obsessions became more temporal as television assured us that the body needed its comforts. Again we built saints.

In England there is a certain level of conduct and virtue expected from the captain of its national team and this apparent paradigm of virtue is born when appointed. Thus did John Terry enter this coveted position in English football. In America we manufacture these role models where we can find them and in the last decade that figure has been Tiger Woods. Both these men have lucrative sponsorships and both have, curiously, often appeared on the cover of the EA Sports titles for their respective sports. And both men recently fell from their assumed heights.

In England bad deeds seem to stick more readily to those who are caught in the public spotlight but in America something very different happens, the media often drives an aggressive campaign of downfall and redemption. Tiger Woods is set up as the boy saint with the proud father. When a celebrity fall comes the media does not appear to leap to outright condemnation but holds their collective breath to see how the public will react and if there is the least bit of hesitation they rush into the lacuna of judgment with a redemption song, eyes glistening with the thought of rating spikes. In the accelerated story arcs of television forgiveness comes swiftly.

Would these reporters forgive their own spouses so quickly for such transgressions? Probably not. But this is a different type of absolution. It is forgiveness as power play. They can humble the fallen star to come on their TV programs and deliver their higher ratings. This is akin to a triumphant Roman general parading through the street while a slave whispers in his ear, “All fame is fleeting.”

A recent commentary by Howard Bryant on ESPN starts with the byline, “Four rounds of high-quality golf at the Masters isn’t enough to earn back our trust.” Who is this collective he is referring to? Who among us has a need to trust Tiger Woods, John Terry or any other celebrity? And to do what? Watch our kids? Pick up the laundry? He goes on in the article to describe how the camera would zoom into “the once-inspiring-but-now-unsettling image of his face.” And what made that face so unsettling? Is it really that different? This just seems like the flip side of the media projecting the saintly image onto Tiger Woods for that past fifteen years. Bryant also points out that during the Masters’ news conference that Woods avoided the words “women” and “sex.” I don’t watch a lot of golf or more truthfully, any, but is it normal for sportsman to go on about women and sex at a news conference that is attached to a major sports competition? A little further in the article and Bryant mentions that the announcers at the Masters would only refer to Tiger’s ” ‘difficulties’, but on air never said the words. You’d never know, just by listening, exactly what those difficulties were.” Except for the fact that the media has inundated us with this story at the expense of anything that might be going on in, say, Afghanistan and if they ever actually veered away from the Tiger Woods’ story it was only to venerate that latest Apple product.

The fact is people don’t care exactly who has infidelities outside their monkey sphere as long as it is someone. They’re just here for the entertainment and titillation. Paris Hilton was an unknown before she made a sex tape and now she makes millions a year because she made a sex tape. Marion Barry, the former mayor of Washington, D.C. in the eighties and nineties was eventually reelected after an extremely unflattering video of him being busted doing crack cocaine in a hotel room. At the time, even though this man was responsible for running the city I was living in, I thought this was hilarious. Most of my friends shared this opinion. The Greeks gave us drama but the Romans gave us spectacle. And people are simply not as deeply invested in spectacle. They cheer, they scream, they shout, the argue vociferously but there is no deep schism created in their souls. There is no dark cloud that covers them when a celebrity falls.

All surprise at these spectacles is mock surprise. Putting young people with access to immense wealth and fame and all its trappings up on a pedestal of rectitude creates a ridiculous expectation that is merely used to generate the drama and the hollow outrage that follows it. These people don’t need your forgiveness. They don’t care. We don’t care.

Tiger will be redeemed because that is how the systems works in the States. How these celebrities find forgiveness with their own family and friends is almost irrelevant in this Circus Maximus. John Terry has a more difficult road for several reasons. He has been caught doing more scummy things over a period of time whereas Tiger got caught once for his multiple infidelities. England’s sports fans are a great deal more partisan and divisive so Terry will always have vocal detractors from the fan base, and lets face it – from partisan reporters, of all the other Premier League teams.

I suppose an argument could be made that this is all part of the story of football and sports in general. And I am not immune to it all. When Michael Vick was indicted on dog fighting charges I was incandescently angry. But I would have been just as angry had it been any other citizen of the planet. But as far as who screwed who it serves only to turn a sports competition into an episode of Big Brother.

And we’re back after a particularly drawn out motherboard death as well as a few curve balls thrown at us by the fates. We’ll be making a lot more updates from here on out and will continue to refer to ourselves in the first person plural when we are feeling lonely.

As most seasons draw to a close with the exception of the MLS we’ll be talking a lot about South Africa and the 2010 World Cup where I will be in attendance for the later half with my buddy from Melbourne, Australia.

So first I would like to draw your attention to this documentary on the current situation in Johannesburg, South Africa, a city struggling to get ready for the influx of visitors attending the World Cup this year. This putting one in mind of that.

Rob Schröder’s documentary Stayin’ Alive in Joburg is available in six parts on Youtube.

Three people died from this shooting and the team were understandably shaken up. Still, Caf has decided that because the government of Togo recalled the team after the tragedy that this somehow represents political interference from Togo on the competition itself. Fucking ridiculous.

Sure, ban the Front for the Liberation of the Enclave of Cabinda from ever fielding a team in the Cup but Togo? Why punish the players for being shot at by a rogue separatist group? This borders on the bizarre.

Perhaps this is a result of Caf having the same president for 20 years in the form of Issa Hayatou and he and his minions are out of touch dictators rather than leaders?

Last year Barcelona advanced to the final game of the Champions League after a last minute goal against Chelsea by Andres Iniesta. Nine months later a study shows that the birth rate in Barcelona has jumped to 45%. It would be interesting to see if the same could be said of Euro 2008 or how regional birth rates in Spain fared during the 80 years of La Liga. And what if they win their first World Cup this year?

Meanwhile Portsmouth, far more worse off than merely struggling with relegation this year, are in danger of being liquidated by the Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs department for being 97.2 million dollars in debt. As well as not being able to pay their players they had to shut down their website, at least temporarily, after being unable to pay their service provider. One senses a lot of laser tattoo removal in the future.

They are not alone at any rate as Crystal Palace has also entered into bankruptcy .

In the tabloid round up – Wayne Rooney generously recognized that there are ten other men on the field with Him .

Father of the Year John Terry as been been accused of having an affair with the ex-girlfriend of former Chelsea team mate Wayne Bridge.

And Sir Alex Ferguson is calling out Manchester United fans for taunting Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger with a chant that involves the word  ‘paedophile’  in it.  Now is that because he has such a young team?

Over at Kick the Balls, Alan Black tells of the dark agony of the missed sitter.  And check out his Hooligan Opera while you are there.

Cyrus Philbrick debates the different types of fandom on Footsmoke.

Since all the Craig Bellamy dust up footage has been yanked from the internet almost as soon as it was posted, I leave you with Brian Clough on the attack from a decidedly different era.  Here’s a kiss then.

How does small fry Stoke City prepare for their second year in the Premier League? Apparently they socialize and develop a tactical bond by playing Call of Duty and Gears of War according to the Guardian.

And before you laugh too hard consider that Stoke, having only been promoted to top flight football in 2008, currently sit at fifth position on the Premier League table. It’s no secret that the Army also uses tactical squad based video games to get its recruits bonding and working together. Not that any of this would replace slogging through the mud or being on the pitch. No one at Stoke is going to level cap a mage in World of Warcraft and then proceed to pocket the most Premier League goals for this season.

However, it does make one wonder about the effect of online bonding and how the player’s mirror neurons affect their performance when they are on the pitch. Since the exact same neurons fire whether we are navigating real space or simulated 3-D space and that the mirror neurons themselves are supposed to be responsible for empathy the team could be benefiting a great deal from their online interactions. Then again the studies are so new that Stoke’s gaming nights might simply enable them to perform better by keeping them out of the pubs.

For every study promoting the cognitive benefits of video games there are probably 50 articles that decry them as evil. The former at least has its basis in science and the later always in morality and almost always someone else’s morality; an outsider’s morality delivering the same vindictive condemnation that is usually found between competing religious fanatics.

For more on mirror neurons check out this Nova segment on them.

And Stoke City can be found playing against Chelsea this Saturday but without their grenades and plasma weapons and such.

If your delicate Western sensibilities are offended by a constant cacophonous drone that never abates then you had better bring earplugs if you plan on attending the 2010 World Cup in South Africa. That swarming, buzzing noise issuing from your television set during Confederations Cup coverage is here to stay according to FIFA.

The vuvuzela is a cheap, plastic horn sold at the stadiums in South Africa and has been accorded no small amount of cultural status by South African officials who have rather hilariously described it as South African Football’s beautiful noise.

Cries to ban the harsh wall of noise horn have been countered by accusations of cultural insensitivity and racism. Before the  latter chorus got as loud as the vuvuzela orchestra FIFA went ahead and made the decision not to ban the horn.

Considering my early exposure in life to the sounds of bands like Hüsker Dü and to industrial music I think I will fare well at the 2010 World Cup.  I might even buy a vuvuzela myself.  When in Rome. . .

Read arguments for and against.

And before you make up your mind you should let the Vuvuzela Orchestra make this argument.

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