A defence of football

I'm not very good at writing serious things.

Some of you may be thinking I could have stopped that sentence before the word 'serious'. Or even before the word 'at'.

Most of you are probably thinking I should have stopped it before 'I'm'.

But I didn't. I just kept on going.

The trouble is, sometimes I have serious arguments running through my brain. I go over them again and again, and get myself all worked up. But I can't write them down.

As soon as I start to type, I feel like my attention is being yanked by a novelty magnet. That's why most of my blog posts are about nonsense. I've got to stay one step ahead of the magnet.

I worry that this would hamper my chances of becoming a professional writer. If I can't stick to one subject for more than a paragraph, how am I going to write a four-page article on the Suez Canal for the Independent on Sunday?

With great difficulty.

So I'm going to try and train myself. That's what this is now. I need to get the rant out of my head and onto the screen. I need to do it quickly before the magnet exerts its u-shaped influence on my fragile brain.

Of course, it's not Israel/Palestine I'm going to talk about, or abortion, or Nick Clegg. It's football. A thing much less important than all those things (except perhaps Clegg).

So, here we go.

A defence of football

Immediately, I'm starting to doubt my ability to do this. It is defence rather than defense, right? That 's' is an Americanism, right? Like flat sausage and The Honeymooners?

This came up when talking to a friend of mine. Well, I say friend. I mean acquaintance. Or colleague, perhaps.

Enemy. Let's settle on enemy.

Now I don't know how seriously to take her comments. She does have a habit of being as offensive as possible. But I'm going to use her as the Straw Woman for this argument.

This isn't really a response to her, but to a general criticism of football that you hear a lot.

(I might tell her about this, so she can read it. Hopefully she can then post a long-winded response refuting my claims and possibly raising doubts about my personal hygiene)

I like football. Some people don't like football. That is entirely fair and good. It takes all kinds to make the world go different strokes (I think that's the expression).

I'm totally happy for people to dislike it. I dislike other things.

What I do have a problem with, is the complete dismissal of it. This happens all the time - football is just one example. It's a symptom of something a bit more insidious. But I'll get to that later.

(I should have planned this. Like in exams. I should have planned them too.)

[Disclaimer: this doesn't really have much to do with the Andy Gray/Richard Keys misogyny furore. They were rightly punished for ridiculous views.

Whilst people are quick to draw unwarranted parallels with race in some other arguments, here it is entirely appropriate. If they remarked that black people were unable to understand the offside rule, and referred to Uriah Rennie as hopeless on those terms, they would be sacked.

The trouble is, sexist views are much more acceptable in public discourse than racist ones. Racism is obviously a huge problem, but it's not so common to see it splashed around the mainstream media. You get tits on Page 3. The racism has to wait until the opinion columns.

So it was surprising and gratifying to see Sky make a stand and send a clear message. End of disclaimer.]

I really should have planned this.

Where was I? Ah yes, the dismissive football criticism. I'm sure you've heard it before. It goes something like this:

"Football? It's just a bunch of whiny, overpaid prima donnas kicking a ball around a field."

Now that is almost the definition of a reductive argument.

Let's do the first part. If whiny, overpaid prima donnas are a problem then I hope you also dismiss popular music, television, film - basically all art.

It also reduces all football to the Premier League. It doesn't take into consideration the majority of footballers. If you're playing for Havant and Waterlooville or Dover, you're probably not overpaid. (Though I'm sure being a whiny prima donna is always an option)

And of course, people like to play football. In the park.

If you 'like football', it encompasses a wide spectrum of watching and playing. No-one ridicules you for liking music if you play the harmonica, just because U2 are shit.

(This is sounding defensive now - not defencive - but I'm not really offended by any of this. I'm just stating my argument in strong language to add to the power of my argument. I'm also putting these little disclaimers in to completely ruin the power of my argument.)

You can't necessarily judge a pastime by the people that take part in it. Chances are that something you really like is predominantly done by tools.

The second part of the dismissal is that 'all they do is kick a ball around a field'.

Well, sort of. But that doesn't really work as an argument. That's just saying what it is. It doesn't tell us anything about football that isn't encoded in us by the very comprehension of the concept.

You could criticise anything like that.

"Music? It's just a bunch of whiny, overpaid prima donnas eliciting various sounds of varying pitch in accordance with a rhythmical structure."

"Poetry? It's just a bunch of layabouts putting words together in a particular metre to convey meaning."

"Tables? They're just a bunch of rectangular nonces, sitting on supportive legs, with the capacity to allow objects to rest on them."

The good thing about humans is we can ascribe meaning to things. That meaning isn't inherent in the things themselves (and I'm sure there's a dissertation's worth of debate behind that blanket claim).

Painting isn't just colours and textures combined to create an image of something. It's more than the sum of its parts. People get moved by paintings. People get moved by abstract paintings, which aren't easily explained with reference to the material world.

There's such a thing as subtext.

And I'm sure you're wondering where I'm going with this pretentious ramble. I'm going back to football.

Football isn't art. But sport and art are both parts of the same thing: an attempt to create something from nothing. It doesn't have anything to do with the "real" world, and is in the grand scale of surviving as organisms not that important - but because humans are amazing, we can make these things important. We make them even more important than the "real things. People have died for art. Religion is probably the most impressive of these creations, and a shit load of people have died for that.

Films make people cry. Music makes people cry. Football makes people cry. That may seem pathetic, but it's true and it's a glorious thing.

So. Football.

I've probably gone a bit too far with this analysis, so coming back to the minor importance of football seems a bit stupid.

But I've come this far.

Football is more than people kicking a ball around a field. It is to some people aesthetically pleasing, and it speaks to deeper human emotions, like passion, teamwork, the struggle against odds, community, athletic prowess, the underdog, the journey, the rise and fall, heroic failure and a load of other archetypes that get discussed in big books.

Now I must stress this: I'M NOT SAYING YOU HAVE TO LIKE FOOTBALL.

You can be bored by football, you can dislike aspects of it, you can have no interest in it whatsoever. But don't just dismiss it as though everyone who likes it has been fooled in some way.

I don't like ballet. I find it a bit boring. But I don't think the people that do like it are idiots. I don't revel in the closing of a theatre.

I don't like cricket. But the idea of saying to a cricket fan: "It's just a bunch of people in pyjamas hitting a ball with a bit of wood" wouldn't cross my mind.

It is possible to dislike things, but for them still to be worthwhile.

One other objection to football is to do with the negative things associated with it: hooliganism, anti-intellectualism, homophobia and, yes, misogyny. These things do all exist, and they need to be changed. And all these things (except maybe the homophobia) have improved and will hopefully continue to improve.

But there's nothing innately wrong with football. (It's just people kicking a ball around, after all...)

Ballet is associated with eating disorders. Film is associated with crass commercialisation and sexism. And eating disorders.

Music is associated with drug addiction. And eating disorders.

But that doesn't make them worthless as pursuits.

There's something beautiful beneath the occasionally ugly shell in all of these, and it's worth finding.

(That last sentence seems to be encouraging some sort of eating disorder. Find the beautiful thin person beneath your big fat ugly shell. Go on.

I think I'm going off-message here...)

I don't mean to be unsympathetic. It must be frustrating to see so many people, and so much of the media, obsessed by something in which you have no interest. It's only natural to hit back against the grain in these situations.

Everyone loved Inception. And as a result, I've managed to convince myself that it was the worst film ever made, even though it was actually a quite good film.

But despite what Daniel Kitson says, just because a lot of people like something doesn't mean it's pointless.

Plus, so many people like football that the chances are someone you really respect likes it. (Not just me, I mean. I'm sure you all respect me.) Your favourite writer or singer or teacher at school probably likes football. And they're not idiots. Except me.

(I'm really sorry about this whole thing. I'm terribly embarrassed. Never mind - we're nearly there.)

To recap:

1) I'M NOT SAYING YOU HAVE TO LIKE FOOTBALL.

2) It is possible to dislike things, but for them still to be worthwhile.

That second point relates to the insidiousness I mentioned way back at the beginning.

I think in all areas of public discourse, people feel compelled to pick sides. It's seen as cowardice to sit on the fence, so you have to put all your weight behind one particular point of view.

But there's nothing to be gained from this. You can still live a life of cultural and political integrity without resolutely sticking with one camp.

You're not going to get to the gates of heaven and have your allegiances tallied before you're let in.

Conviction is a worthwhile and necessary force for change. But it means nothing without reason.

***

What was all that about, then? It was just a whiny, [unpaid] prima donna making football seem more important than it is.

Or was it?

(Yes)

I'm going to post this anyway, because it's long.

I'm definitely not going to tell my enemy about it, though. She would relentlessly tease me about my bluster and earnestness.

But I know! I know, everybody!

I know I got all worked up about a minor subject, then leapt about a bit to politics and aesthetics (neither of which I did justice to)!

I know I've covered this topic in previous blogs!

I know my message was lost in a sea of brackets and diversions!

...

But when you think about it, isn't awareness of one's faults tantamount to being faultless?

I think it is.



This has been long.

Sorry again.

Next time I might do that argument I've been thinking about where a discussion on maternity leave leads to supporting eugenics.

Why not weep at that thought? Or distract yourself with a Mussolini ashtray.