Barça! Barça! Barça!

Barcelona beat Real Madrid 5-0 at the Camp Nou.  The world is good.

Cricket: Huh?

Today marked day four of the first Ashes Test between England and Australia.

If you understand those words but do not understand the context in which I wrote them  . . . well, join the club.  As near as I can figure, my first sentence means that there is an annual international tournament called the Ashes that takes place between the Australian English cricket teams.  The tournament is made of several days-long matches called tests.  Australia and England are currently playing their first test.  Please don’t believe my translation is necessarily correct; I have no idea what I am talking about.

Cricket may very well be the most confusing sport I have ever encountered in my life.  Like football (soccer) and rugby, it originated in England.*  It is played with a bat and a ball.  Some matches can go one for days, and some are limited to ensure that they do not.  I have absolutely no idea how to read a cricket score.  When I hear Sky Sports News or read an article reporting on cricket, the language seems completely foreign.  I can usually pick up the rules of a sport when I see it on television or on the Internet, at least enough to understand what is going on–not with cricket.  Cricket is what you get if James Joyce watched a baseball game once, wrote the rules as he saw them three years afterwards, and gave his rules to non-athletes in another country with no knowledge of baseball to recreate the game.  (Yes, I know cricket is older.)

Years ago, an obnoxious diplomat (I think he worked at the UN) wrote an op-ed in the New York Times trashing Americans for preferring baseball, and implicitly stating that we were not intelligent enough to understand the subtlety of cricket.  Obnoxious diplomats aside, there is nothing wrong with the bat and ball sport that Americans perfected, although I admit to not liking baseball (Go Phillies!).  Although I have very little interest in cricket, I am fascinated by foreign sports with large international tournaments.  I now have some familiarity with Rugby Union and Rugby League, and I even know a little about Gaelic sports, Australian Rules Football, and Netball.  Cricket, however, continues to elude me.  It is not because, as our diplomatic snoot implied, Americans are too stupid to get it, but because the sport is too complex to learn about from a Wikipedia entry and YouTube clips.  The truth is, cricket needs to be taught because of how needlessly complex the sport inherently is.  Usually one is taught the sport at a young age.  Since very few people in this country understand cricket, there is practically no one to teach it.  I think in the United States, cricket will be slightly more popular than polo and slightly less popular than professional lacrosse.  I may be giving a short shrift to polo.

Although football is the most popular sport in Britain, there is no sport more stereotypically English than cricket.  England presents a certain image of itself to the world: (1) the country is full of stodgy, snobby highbrows, and (2) it once ruled the world’s most expansive empire.  Cricket is the purest representation of this image.  If you have ever seen a test match, the uniform is, for both sides, an all white getup: trousers, shirt, and sweater.  (That the shirts are now filled with advertisements is a tragic reminder of the power of money over tradition.)  Even though football began its life in the British public schools (which are the equivalent of American private schools), it easily spread to the working class and poor in Britain and around the world because of how simple and inexpensive the game is.  Cricket is harder to play outside of the confines of the country club–or public school–because of all the required equipment.  The rules of football are, for the most part, simple to grasp; the rules of cricket are not nearly as intuitive.  Furthermore the top cricket nations are almost entirely nations that were a part of the former British empire: England, South Africa, Zimbabwe, the West Indies, Australia, New Zealand, and the entire South Asian subcontinent.  There are more countries, but I believe these are the main ones.

Even though I have very little interest in cricket as a sport, there is Cricket World Cup.  Therefore, as with all World Cup sports, men’s and women’s, it is inherently interesting to me on a sociological level.  With the exception of football, I think care less about international sport, than I do about the results of the sport’s World Cup (football excluded).  I think basketball is missing out on a golden opportunity to ditch the Olympics and World Championships and have a quadrennial international tournament of its own.**

Because there is a World Cup, I wanted to know how to play cricket.  What attracts so many people to such a nonsensical sport, at least to an outsider?  Cricket is especially popular in India, one of the few nations (perhaps most notably the United States) that football has been unable to conquer.  To add even more intrigue, cricket has been producing scandal after scandal which throws the integrity of the sport into question (take that, snooty diplomat!).  Given that the epicenter of these controversies is generally Pakistan, international political relationships are touched upon if not directly affected.

So I still don’t understand cricket.  I am not sure if I ever will, although I am going to keep trying, at least for the immediate future.   Meanwhile if anyone knows how to read a cricket score…

Footnotes:

*  The fact that these sports originated in England has led to a double standard of sorts.  Whereas in the Olympics (and the United Nations) England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland are all a part of the United Kingdom.  In football are four all individual countries with their own teams, the so called “Home Nations”–a sore point to some other countries who see this as one nation getting four bites at the apple.  However, this works against the Home Nations.  Rather than one strong side, there are four sides of varying strength.  As a result three of the four Home Nations will never again be competitive in international competition; the remaining country, England, has seen its standard of play slowly declining.  Rugby also maintains that double standard, but to a lesser extent.  Northern Ireland is part of Ireland in international test matches, and the British and Irish Lions tour the world.  Rugby is also far less popular around the world.  Cricket turns the double standard on its head:  in international tests, Wales is part of England, Northern Ireland is part of Ireland, and the tiny English-speaking countries of the Caribbean compete internationally as “The West Indies.”

**  Or perhaps not.  FIBA would expect to control an international competition, and FIBA, despite being the ruling body of international basketball, could never do anything of that scale without the NBA’s approval.  If FIBA tried to stand up to the NBA, the NBA could simply pull out all its players, thereby making a sham of the tournament (and a poorly watched one at that.)  So long as there is only one important basketball league in the world, the NBA will rule the roost.  This will not change any time soon.

Music I listened to while writing this: No music today.  Just podcasts.

So Bad But So Good

Burlesque, the new Cher/Christina Aguilera movie came out this week.  I am almost certain that I am not going to see it.  The reviews are split between okay, bad, and so bad that it is good.  In Salon one writer talks about why Burlesque is will not be a camp classic  (Spoiler: It’s bad but not bad enough, and the new generation of gay men doesn’t appreciate trashy diva movies the way previous generations do.  Damn kids!)

No description of divine trash is complete without referencing Susan Sontag’s famous and brilliant break-out essay “Notes On ‘Camp’”.  There, it has been referenced.  Sontag also describes the connection between camp and gay culture.  (I would love to describe my own take on camp and gay culture although it is not germane to this post, and I am trying to cut down on long drawn-out essays.  So another time.)

The quintessential so-bad-it’s-good movie is Showgirls, which nearly (and unfairly) killed poor Elizabeth Berkley’s career–if an actress can get work after Saved By The Bell, then awesomely awful movies should only make her stronger.  Showgirls is atrocious if you love movies; it is legendary if you love camp.  Joe Eszterhas, who wrote the screenplay also wrote Basic Instinct.  Basic Instinct is a far worse movie on every level, yet, for all the controversy that surrounded it, it created a star, at least temporarily, in Sharon Stone.  Yet, while Basic Instinct did not get the critical panning, it does not inspire the same kind of latter adoration as Showgirls.  Basic Instinct also lacks a gay following (probably because the lesbians in the movie are crazed serial killers.)

What I want to know is what defines a campy movie.  What criteria make a Douglas Sirk melodrama a classic, but calls a movie like Mommie Dearest, with the same kind of complete over-the-top emoting, a camp classic?  Why are Fred and Ginger movies with incoherent and ridiculous plots not camp even though they are a lot of fun to watch?  Why is All About My Mother, one of the finest movies ever made and one of my all-time favorites, considered a “legitimate” movie that wins awards when the film (and director) is steeped in gay culture and camp.  All About My Mother owes its existence to All About Eve, another one of the greatest films of all time and one with a huge gay following (It should be a law that every young gay boy be able to recite Margo Channing’s famous line “Fasten your seatbelts, it’s going to be a bumpy night!” on demand.)   And that isn’t even the most over-the-top of Bette Davis’s great movies–we exclude her bad ones; they’re not camp, just bad.  Davis’s campiest movie is Whatever Happened to Baby Jane (“But y’are, Blanche!  Y’are in that chair!”), a movie in which Davis and Joan Crawford, two of Hollywood’s most legendary divas, try not to let their hatred for one another outshine the hatred their characters feel for one another (not always successfully).

So why are All About Eve and All About My Mother classics but Showgirls, Whatever Happened to Baby Jane, and Mommie Dearest camp classics?  What is the difference between a great movie and great awful movie?  Is there one?  I feel like there is, but I am not yet able to define it.

Maybe I need to reread my Sontag.

Who Are You?

At the current time, I have 61 hits.  I have told only one person about this blog, so it seems like other people are randomly wandering over.  I am curious as to how you discovered this blog.  Was it through Google or something else?  And if it was through a search engine, what were you looking for?

In any case–Welcome, Friend!  I hope you enjoy.

Dancing With The Stars As Political Metaphor

You probably heard something about North Korea bombing a South Korean island, killing two people and bringing the countries closer to war than at any time since the end of the Korean War.  But the American media doesn’t care about that.  So, since you probably won’t hear much about it in the coming days, let me tell you how this will play out.  South Korea will make idle threats.  The United States and Japan will condemn North Korea.  China will protect North Korea from any real retribution.  The United States, Japan, and South Korea will look weak and impotent.  New six-nation talks will be called for (Russia will be the sixth nation.)  Money will be secretly exchanged in the North Korean direction.  The talks will be held but called off by the North Koreans early in the process.  The insane, suicidal North Korean regime will continue, and the North Korean people will suffer.  Then the North Korean government will run out of money and bomb South Korea again.  Rinse, wash, repeat.

Now to get back to something the American media cares about…

On Tuesday night Jennifer Grey won Dancing with the Stars.  Bristol Palin did not win on Dancing with the Stars.  The latter statement is far more significant.  For the past three months, Dancing with the Stars has become a stand-in for the political fractures in American society.

I have a confession to make.  I do not like Dancing with the Stars.  The title is deliberately misleading.  There are no “stars” on that show.  There are musicians, actors, entertainers, athletes, models, and random famous people who dance with professional ballroom dancers.  None of these non-dancers are in the public eye anymore, and some never were.  If the title were accurate the show would be called “Dancing with People Who Wish to Recapture the Spotlight”.  Any actual stars who appear on the show are the musical guest stars (some famous, some flavor of the week) that ABC gets to perform on elimination nights.

I have a second confession to make.  I like watching people dance.  When talented people are able to express themselves with their bodies in a graceful way the effect is heart stopping.  I love watching the old Fred Astaire/Ginger Rogers movies, and it isn’t for the ridiculous, paper-thin plots.  For that reason, even though I hate the show, I watch clips on YouTube of the performers who are actually good.  This season I watched Jennifer Grey, she of Dirty Dancing and Ferris Bueller’s Day Off fame.  There were honestly times I could not tell whether she or her partner was the professional.  I am sure part of that was the choreography, but it was also her talent.  (It’s probably inherited.  Her father is Joel Grey of Cabaret fame and her grandfather was the bandleader Mickey Katz.)

In the past I have watched clips of some other excellent celebrities, especially Kristi Yamaguchi.  The celebrity who moved me the most was Marlee Matlin. Her technique was far from pristine, but she is a very talented actress; she could convey emotion with her body in a way that most cannot.  When she danced the Viennese Waltz to Billy Joel’s “She’s Always a Woman,” I felt a lump in my throat and tears in my eyes.  I was not the only one; one of the judges broke down and cried.  It was a stunning performance.  What makes Jennifer Grey great is that she is both actress and dancer.  She has the technique, and she can convey the emotion.  I have watched each of her dances.  Multiple times.

I always thought Dancing with the Stars got their whole premise wrong.  Some fans complain about the show using “ringers,” but I would prefer seeing more stars who are trained dancers.  I think it would have been great if the show existed decades ago.  Can you imagine a show where the stars were Fred Astaire, Gene Kelly, Ginger Rogers, Judy Garland, Ann Miller, Eleanor Powell, Donald O’Connor, Debby Reynolds, and so on and so forth?  I am not sure who would today’s Astaire or Kelly, but there are certainly celebrities with dancing backgrounds.  Bebe Neuwirth and Kristin Chenoweth?  Madonna?  Perhaps Chita Rivera would come out of retirement.  (Maybe after a Broadway performer is a guest on the horror that is Glee, he or she can sign up for Dancing with the Stars.)  The joy would come from seeing great performers make great art rather than seeing mediocrities dance tepid tangos.  Judging and choosing a winner would be much harder when everyone is spectacular.

Which brings me to Bristol Palin.  I cannot think of a more cynical move on ABC’s part than asking Bristol Palin to be on the show.  The network was trying to capitalize on Sarah Palin’s fame, and they succeeded.  At the outset, I confess that I don’t like Sarah Palin (Like most of America, I have no opinion of Bristol whatsoever.)  Her battle against the “elites” smacks of anti-intellectualism.  She is a toxic, ignorant, shallow, vicious Know-Nothing who is even more cynical than ABC.  She preys on people’s fears and personal demons for money and her own fame.  Woe to this country if she becomes President.

Bristol was nothing more than her political prop, as all politicians’ families are merely props for political campaigns (I include Sasha and Malia Obama, Chelsea Clinton, and Jenna and Barbara Bush in this statement.)  Knowing this, ABC gambled that any Palin would come with a built-in audience/fan base.   Bristol Palin is a star in the same way that Paris Hilton is a star–in other words, not at all.  The people who voted for her do not know anything about her other than the whole Levi Johnson love child debacle.  To her fans (if that is the right word), Bristol was a stand-in for her mother, and they were voting for Sarah Palin.  It was a proxy vote: Bristol Palin for the trophy = Sarah Palin for President.  People suspected this weeks ago, but it was not confirmed until last week when Bristol beat out former television/singing performer Brandy (Norwood), who was far superior in every possible way.  So of course the political left got involved and voted against Bristol because voting against Bristol was a vote against her mother.  Jennifer Grey won; Bristol came in third.

Jennifer Grey deserved to win, which was the popular assessment since Week 1.  No dancer on that show has been as good as her.  Nevertheless, the whole experience leaves a nasty taste.  ABC was the real winner because people watched its tacky show.  But in the process, it brought to family television (not journalism or opinion television) the already raging political and cultural war that is being waged across this country.

The media, across the board, continues to exacerbate these tensions solely for ratings.  Bristol Palin is not a star; she’s a prop.  Her mother, possibly the most divisive figure in the country, is the star.  Every time Bristol Palin appeared on stage, she was a stand-in for her mother.  Every vote for Bristol or against her was a vote for or against her mother.  I have no idea what Bristol got out of this, but I know what ABC and her mother did.  ABC got television money.  Sarah Palin got even more exposure.  One television show was not enough; Dancing with the Stars gave her a second one.  She is also a contributor to Fox News.  She has a new book out.  The rest of the media covers everything she does.  And I feel dirty because I wrote about her.

In the meantime, North and South Korea are on the verge of war, and the European Union is facing serious financial issues…

Music I listened to: Robert Schumann “Fantasy Pieces, Op. 12″ No. 3, No. 5, No.7; Billy Joel “She’s Always a Woman”.

Harry Potter

Yesterday I saw Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part I for the first time.  I plan to see it again.  It was good.  I was also a little sad about seeing this movie.  For a little over a decade, Harry Potter has been a part of my life.  When Part II is released, it will be the end of the journey.

I got into Harry Potter as a sort of protest.  It was my senior year of college.  The first three books had already been published, and the fourth was almost ready to be released.  The evangelical Christian fringe decided that Harry Potter promoted witchcraft and began a campaign full of ignorance and deceit to get the books out of the classroom.  The real reason for the hatred was because the books were popular and protesting brought those people attention.  I had already decided to read the books because I didn’t want to be completely excluded from a clear cultural phenomenon.  However, I wanted to wait until all seven books came out first.

The Christian right made me realize that I could not afford to wait, and I found an opportunity to start reading.  I was friendly with a graduate student at the time, and I babysat her two children from when she needed help.  Both children read the books, but the younger one wanted me to read it to him. (I recently discovered his profile on a certain social networking site, and it depresses me how much older he is.  He was such a cute kid.  I’m depressed.)  As I read the first book to him, I became hooked.  I borrowed the first two books (they did not have the third) and read them in a couple hours.  I then went out and bought the first three books for myself and read them over and over.

Every time a new book was released, I barely slept the night before.  When the book arrived, I would lock myself into an empty room and read.  No matter how long the new book was, I finished it within 24 hours of its arrival.  Then I would reread the entire series up to that point.  What struck me as I got into the later books was how much more mature the tone got.  The character grew, and so did the author.

The movies have almost always been disappointments.  Unlike the Lord of the Rings movies, the Harry Potter movies do not stand up to repeat viewings, even the best ones.  (Also unlike the Lord of the Rings movies, the Harry Potter movies are not as good as the source material.  Part of the fun in Harry Potter is the clever writing.  Tolkien’s writing is something of a drag even though the story has no peer.)  None of the Harry Potter scripts have done a good enough job of translating the novels.  To truly understand the movies, one has to have read the books. Otherwise the movies make no sense.

Nevertheless, I saw each one in the theater dutifully, always within a week of the opening.  The only films I have seen in the theater over the past few years are from the Harry Potter series (I have lost faith in the movies, but that is for another post.)  Often I have seen them twice in the theater.  I even saw the last movie twice, and I thought it was terrible

I love Harry Potter, but he is coming to the end of his journey.  Christopher Robin went to school, Wendy Moira Angela Darling got married and had children of her own, Jackie Paper came no more to Honalee, and the children that I once adored are growing up into adulthood.  Now Harry must wait for the next generation to find him.

And I have to grow a little older again.

Music I listened to while writing this post: Stevie Nicks “Rooms on Fire”; Five for Fighting “The Riddle”; The Seekers “Georgy Girl”; Elton John “The Bitch is Back”; The Beatles “Girl”; Arabesque “Midnight Dancer”;  Patricia Klaas “Faites Entrer Les Clowns”; Henryk Górecki “Symphony #3, Op. 36, ‘Symphony Of Sorrowful Songs’” Lento E Largo, Tranquillissimo; John Denver “Dreamland Express”;

In Treatment

I said before that I am not good with therapy.  I actually have a background in a therapy-related profession, so I know that I don’t like being in therapy or being a therapist.  As much as I don’t want to talk about my problems, I don’t want to hear about a stranger’s even more.

It is therefore somewhat odd how intrigued I am by In Treatment, the HBO show which is really just four (abridged) therapy sessions every week.  Good acting and good writing have something to do with that.

I am intrigued by In Treatment, but the truth is that I am really only interested in one of the story lines and that is Jesse, the gay adopted teenager.  Jesse absolutely fascinates me for so many reasons–not the least of which is that while I was a therapist-in-training, I worked with gays, teenagers, and gay teenagers.   Jesse is a gaping pit of unending need, which brings out something paternal in me.  He’s extremely bratty, but also incredibly lovable.  Despite everything, he’s just a kid.  (Dane DeHaan, the actor who plays Jesse, is amazing.)

Jesse has created a fantasy for himself that everyone wants to leave him, so he acts out to drive them away first.  He’s like walking raw nerve, and everything sets him off with the slightest provocation.  His therapist Paul has made a lot of mistakes with Jesse.  Paul and Jesse have a combative relationship fed by Jesse’s desire to be Paul’s surrogate son.  Paul has not really explored the roots of Jesse’s abandonment fantasies or why Jesse pushes people away.  No doubt this stems from Jesse being an adopted child and from being a gay son in a working-class Catholic family that does not completely accept him, but is trying.  Jesse has two session left this season, and I am curious where the show will go from here.

Music I listened to while writing this: Elis Regina & Tom Jobim “Triste”; Belle and Sebastian “Waiting for the Moon to Rise”; Miriam Makeba “The Click Song”;

The Difficulties of Recording My Thoughts

I have a confession to make.  I am not good at this blogging thing.  If you have been reading this blog from the beginning, which (with one exception) you have probably not been, then you already know that I am not good at this.  If not, here is my warning.  My posts are way too long.  I don’t want to make them shorter thought.  There is so much out there that needs to be said.  Everything has a context, and context makes for a richer experience.  I want to give the richest experience possible.

I’m not exactly looking for readers.  I was a writing major in college, and I discovered that sharing my work with other people leads only to heartache.  Every writing major is both afraid to be hurt their friend/classmate’s feeling and terrified that said friend/classmate is a better writer.  It makes for some pretty awful (and contradictory) critiques.  I fear that actively seeking a readership will be a repeat of a college nightmare I have tried very hard to forget.  Besides, most of the people I know (again, with one exception) don’t particularly want to read blogs anyway.

There is another reason for blogging even though I am not good at it.  Every November I feel guilty that I neglect to write a novel for NaNoWriMo.  I started this blog this month because I thought that maybe writing every day would alleviate the guilt I feel.  I feel less guilty, although not completely absolved.  Perhaps if I wrote every day rather than most days I would feel better.  My last post could have been a novella all on its own if it were fiction.

Finally, one last confession.  The reason I am not good at blogging is the same reason I am not good at being in therapy.  I don’t want to talk about myself, and I hate telling stories.  In fact, I talk relatively little.  This post is really painful to write.  Sure, all my posts have been from a first person perspective, but the posts are fundamentally about other things: sport, politics, television, LGBT issues, etc.  These things orbit my life but keep a respectful distance.

So why am I telling you this?  Well, dear reader, I feel we have begun a relationship of sorts.  If you have stuck with me thus far, I do feel like I want to tell you a little about myself and where I am coming from.  You will not however, know much more about who I am as a person–at least not from me explicitly.  This seems only fair.  I will most likely never know about you, but you are doing me a service by reading what I write.  I appreciate it, so I thought I should at least introduce myself to you.

The Messi Side of Football

I.  Introduction: Brazil v. Argentina

On November 17, 2010, I watched the Brazil National Football (Soccer) Team outplay traditional rival Argentina but lose 1-0.  The match was an international friendly held in Qatar; only prestige was on the line.  Argentina had not beaten Brazil since June 2005.  In fact of the five matches played between the 2005 victory and this one, Brazil won four and drew one, outscoring Argentina 13-2.  The winning goal in this most recent match was scored in stoppage time at the very end of the match.  It was scored by Lionel Messi, probably the greatest football player in the world.

II.  Football and Me: A Love-ish Story

My love of football (sorry fellow Americans, I reclaim this word for what you call soccer) is a relatively new thing, but my awareness of the game goes back to when I was seven years old.  My parents signed me up for a local league, and I played all of one match before quitting–Saturday cartoons were far more important.  In retrospect, I wish I could have slapped some sense into my younger self, but at time football did not seem like much fun.  It was the mid-1980′s when I turned my back on football.  At that time most Americans had yet not realized that the sport was not just some novelty game that little children played only until they were old enough to play a more American sport (or could get a college scholarship for playing.)

At some point between age 7 and 1994 I learned four, and only four, facts about football: (1) the rest of the world loved it, but Americans did not because it is boring and our sports are better; (2) there was some competition called the World Cup and Uruguay won the first World Cup; (3) Pele was the best player ever; and (4) in 1950 the United States won the World Cup by beating England 1-0, but the English thought they won 10-1.

Before I continue with this post, I feel I should deconstruct and correct these four “facts” for any soccer newbie.  (1) Football is indeed the world’s most popular sport.  It is not however, the most popular sport in every country.  As a whole, nations that had once been part of the British empire favor other sports such as cricket (India), rugby (New Zealand), ice hockey (Canada) or their own weird variation of football (Australia, the United States).  Given that England is the home of football (the word ‘soccer’ is British slang, a nickname for Association Football), maybe the former colonies’ preference for other sports is a form of imperial rejection.  Some of the Caribbean islands and Venezuela prefer baseball.  (This is wise for Venezuela.  If you play football in South America, there is far too much competition.  Better to learn another sport that your neighbors do not play.)  Also, football is a very interesting sport, but like any language, you have to learn it before you can understand it.  And although Americans experience a strong feeling of exceptionalism, Americans are in no way objectively better or no worse than football.  (2) This is true.  I have no idea how or why I knew that Uruguay won it, but I knew they did.  It may be the only thing I knew about Uruguay at the time.  (3)  Pele’s status as “the greatest ever” is very much debatable.  Argentinians will tell you it is Diego Maradona.  The sniping that goes on between Pele and Maradona because of their narcissism and jealousy is embarrassing, but they need the attention and newspapers love it.  More on this later.  (4) Please, please, please do not think the United States won in 1950!  They did beat England, and that did shock and embarrass the English players, people, and press, but the Unites States team did not even make it to the next round.  I have no idea where I learned such a ridiculously false fact except that I probably thought there would be no reason to care if the United States did not win.  For the record, Uruguay won in 1950 (again).

In 1994, the World Cup came to United States and for about a month Americans deeply cared about football.  Partially this was because the American sports calendar is at a lull during the World Cup.  Of the big three American sports (and ice hockey), only baseball is in season, and baseball has not yet reached its full intensity.  The 1994 World Cup was a big deal for the United States, as it is for every host, but it was a big deal in a different way.  Before 1994, every World Cup had been held in a nation that loved football.  Each nation already had its own professional league and an international team that carried the hopes of a nation.  The United States had no major league of its own, most of the players were not connected with a club (just contracted to the national team), and most importantly there was no real football culture and very little interest in starting one.  After 1950 the United States did not qualify for a World Cup until 1990.  So little faith was put in the United States team that they were expected to be the first hosts not to advance out of the first round.  Despite all this, the crowd support turned out to be excellent, and the United States did advance to the second round (at the expense of Colombia, which sadly cost Colombian defender Andres Escobar his life–probably the first time the American public were confronted with the deadliness of football.)  The success of the Americans led to the birth of Major League Soccer.  All the gains made by American football and American football culture are directly traceable to the 1994 World Cup.

Ironically by 1994 the American women had already won a World Cup–the 1991 Women’s World Cup in China.  For all the attention paid to the men’s team success in 1994, practically no one knew or cared about the triumph of the women’s team three years earlier.  It would not be until the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta when the women’s team won the gold medal that people started to notice.  In 1999, the United States Women’s National Team won the World Cup in front of a home crowd of 90,000, and, for a brief shining moment, Americans cared about women’s soccer.  This has yet to be repeated despite a track record that the U.S. men could only dream of.

III. Becoming a Brazilian Nut

One of the great joys of football fandom is rooting against the teams you hate.  It is a wonderful sensation of schadenfreude; all the more so at the national level–when a national team loses, an entire population is devastated.  There are so many good reason to hate a national team, not all of them necessarily football related.  For example, I detest the English media and take great joy in seeing England lose.  I cannot root for any team from a nation under totalitarian control.  Conversely, I root against the Italians for purely football reasons. The Italian team is made up of cheaters and divers; their World Cup victory in 2006 was like torture for me.  However, when they bombed at this year’s World Cup, I could not stop smiling for three days.

Sometimes tastes change.  I hated Brazil in 1994 for eliminating the United States (who played far above their talent level in that match) and I rooted against Brazil for the rest of the tournament.  Still bitter in 1998, I was glad when France crushed Brazil in that year’s final.  I rooted against Brazil all throughout the 2002 World Cup qualifications when the Brazilians almost missed out on qualifying.  I rooted against Brazil all tournament.  In the final match, however, Germany had become the focus of my ire for eliminating the United States in the quarterfinals, an unfair result given the way the Americans played (and I also rooted against Germany because I am Jewish–an irrational hatred that I no longer feel.)  For the first time I cheered for Brazil.

Following the 2002 tournament I was momentarily hooked, and I tried to learn as much as possible about the sport.  That was when I learned about club football, the Premier League, the rivalry between Pele and Maradona, and Spain’s woeful record in international competition.2002 was also when I first heard about Jogo Bonito, futebol arte, and the legend of Brazil.  Ironically by 2002, Jogo Bonito had long since passed; the Brazilian game focused on strength and speed than creativity and beauty.  The rest of the world say this in 1990 but thanks to Nike marketing, I would not learn for another five years or so.  I warmed to Brazil because of  Jogo Bonito.

My interest eventually waned.  I drifted away from football because (1) I could not understand what I was reading (no Football for Dummies), and I knew no one who could explain it to me; (2) the European game was interesting but the American game was far slower and sloppier.  I knew of no channel that showed the European game; and (3) Philadelphia did not yet have a team, and the only American teams I cheer for are Philadelphia teams.

In 2006 I caught the World Cup fever again.  Thanks to his status as the world’s greatest player, I focused on Ronaldinho.  I could easily find highlights on the Internet, and I watched as much of Ronaldinho as I could.  I was hooked; through Ronaldinho I found FC Barcelona, his club at the time, and the best club in Europe.  Because I had lost touch with football in 2002, I had thought that Barcelona was just the second best team in Spain after the Real Madrid juggernaut.  In 2006, I learned about Barça’s success and its history (the Barça good/Real Madrid evil version; it would be a few more years before I learned the more rounded picture.)  Although I no longer have illusions about Barça as the team of the angels, it is still my team and always will be.  Years after Ronaldinho squandered his talent and left for Milan, I still root only for Barcelona.

I cannot profess the same devotion for Brazil.  For four years they were my second team behind the United States.  The more I watched Brazil though, the more my feelings changed.  In qualifying for the 2010 World Cup, Brazil were very successful but not spectacular.  Individual players could do amazing things, but as a whole the team was more respectable than lovable.  I was especially annoyed at Robinho; his blatant diving was aggravating and his juvenile antics at his club were disgusting.  Moreover, I can never love any team that has Kaka; his holier-than-thou evangelizing grates every one of my nerves.

I cannot stay mad at Brazil forever.  I feel a connection to that country, despite never having been there.  The people are beautiful, the movies are enjoyable, the music is spectacular, and the language is sensual. I also have distant relatives in Brazil, and I would like to meet them one day.  Following the 2010 failure, Brazil are starting to play creatively again, which is very nice to see.  Given that the next World Cup is in Brazil, the squad will face more enormous pressure in 2014.  The last time the World Cup was held in Brazil (1950) the national team lost in the (de facto) final.  The nation mourned as if struck by an actual disaster.  The 2014 Brazil national team will need all the support it can get.

IV.  The Thrills and Dangers of Flair

I am a Barcelona fan and a United States National Team fan.  Beyond that I root for teams that play beautiful football.  It is a loyalty to the game than to any particular one team.  ”Beautiful” football means a clean, high scoring game, intricate passing and dribbling, and goals that belong on a highlight reel.  Brazil played like that from 1958-1970 and again in 1982.  Despite not playing that way anymore, Brazil are still considered the foremost example of that style.  Conversely, a team that is associated with a defensive style of play can also never shake it.  Italy is most famous for using an ultra-defensive style called Catenaccio, which literally means door bolt and is designed for the lifeless 1-0 win.  Although true Catenaccio died by the early 1970′s, it is forever associated with the Italians (although it was originated by the Swiss and brought to Italy by an Argentine.)  The Italians national team today does not help its cause.  Every tournament, the Italians employ an overly defensive style, but with so much diving, fouling, and play acting that they are more spaghetti western villains or a bel canto divas than footballers.

Since 2008, that team that played the most interesting and beautiful football has been Spain.  I was ecstatic to see Spain finally win the World Cup in 2010 and end decades of national frustration.  The Spanish win was more than a joy; it was a relief.  Football fans, particularly those who follow the international game, know that the best team does not always win the World Cup.  In fact, there is a running list of magnificent losers.  This list is topped by the three most famous sides not to have won–Hungary 1954, Netherlands 1974, and Brazil 1982.

The 1954 Hungarian team conquered all who played them.  Most famously, they humiliated the English 7-1 at Wembly, the first non-British side to beat the English on home soil (and then beat them again 6-3 in Hungary.)  En route to the World Cup final Hungary became the first team to beat reigning champion Uruguay at the World Cup.  A Magyar victory seemed inevitable, but they lost to West Germany (a team they decimated earlier in the tournament) in the final round.  So unlikely was the German victory that it is referred to as “The Miracle of Berne”.

The Dutch team of 1974 was similarly legendary and even more beloved.  Led by the great Johan Cruyff, the team introduced “Total Football” to the world, a style that involved players taking over their teammates positions at any time so that formations were constantly in flux.  Like Hungary, the Dutch–in a fit of hubris–lost to West Germany in the final round.  Although the Dutch stopped playing Total Football decades ago, the style is so associated with the Oranje that most (lazy) writers call any attacking Dutch play Total Football.  The 2010 Dutch team disappointed the world by choosing a thuggish defensive football over a free-flowng attack.  To fans of the Dutch teams of the 1970′s, the 2010 squad betrayed their heritage.

The 1982 Brazilians were the quintessential practitioners of  Jogo Bonito/futebol arte.  Even their names were cool: Zico, Falcao, Socrates.  They played free-flowing attacking football with lots of crowd-pleasing tricks.  To say they had flair is an understatement.  As they swept through the early rounds, their victory seemed a foregone conclusion, but mid-tournament they lost to Italy in one of the great World Cup matches.  Sadly, this was the match that destroyed Jogo Bonito.  No Brazil team since the 1982 squad had as much panache and élan, and most likely none ever will again.

Given this history, I was terrified for months that Spain 2010 would be added to the list of beloved losers.  All the signs pointed to a loss.  First, Spain always failed at the World Cup.  Reasons given for this were as poetic as a Quixotic national ethos and as prosaic as the players could not get along with each other (the ethnic and regional rivalries in the Spanish dressing room mirror those that fracture Spain.)  The 2008 European Championship win, which was nothing short of magnificent, was hoped to be a turning point, but by the World Cup, most people (including in Spain) thought a solid Brazil would beat a stylish Spain.

Second, Spain played by using a specific style called tiki-taka.  Tiki-taka is a nonsense phrase that describes a style in which teammates exchange the ball to one another via rapid short passes, thereby dominating possession and creating a quick tempo.  It is a game of patience as well as speed, as the offensive constantly probes for weaknesses in the opposition defense.  Tiki-taka is also Barcelona’s style, no surprise given that so many of the Spanish first team played for Barcelona or trained at the Barcelona youth academy.  The problem is that a distinct attacking style does not necessarily usually translate into victory at the international level.  Teams with an attacking style garnered but generally few titles.  Argentina’s early sides had La Nuestra, Hungary had its domineering style, Austria’s Wunderteam of the early 1930′s pioneered in attacking play in Europe but came in fourth in the 1934 World Cup, the Netherlands had Total Football, Brazil 1982 had Jogo Bonito.  The exception to this rule was Brazil in 1958, 1962, and 1970, but those Brazil teams had Pele,  Garrincha, or both.

Why do attacking styles fail at the World Cup?  If I had to guess I would say there are two reasons: (1) Attacking requires a stronger team both in terms of players and overall ability to work together.  International teams are made up of players drawn from multiple clubs (sometimes worldwide) who play together only a few times a year.  International teams are not as good as clubs because players do not have the same time together.  (2) Styles change in football as opposing teams uncover exploitable weaknesses.  Styles start at the club level, and by the time a World Cup arrives coaches know how to structure defenses against these attacking styles.  International tournaments, by virtue of being so short, do not allow for tinkering, especially with an attacking game.

Third, defense usually wins the World Cup.  When Spain lost to Switzerland in the first match, it looked like the World  Cup was about to claim another victim of style.  Every team that Spain faced, with the exception of Chile and possibly Germany, chose to concentrate on defense and counterattack.  All of Spain’s matches were low scoring for that reason.  The commentators missed an important part about Spain’s game–although Spain played an attacking style, tiki-taka in inherently defensive.  True, Spain were constantly on the attack, but there is no counterattack if Spain keeps possession.  Opponents could only defend, not score themselves.   Holland came closest to disrupting Spain’s style in the final by forgetting the ball and attacking Spanish players.  It was awful to watch.

Ironically, Spain’s style owes its existence to Holland.  Barcelona plays tiki-taka.  Barcelona is managed by Pep Guardiola, who, in his Barcelona days, played for and was mentored by Johan Cruyff, the prophet of Total Football.  Cruyff’s arrival at Barcelona as coach (he played there too) was the beginning of Barcelona’s Renaissance as a stylish team.  Before Guardiola, the Dutchman Frank Rijkaard managed Barcelona.  Rijkaard’s first played football at Ajax Amsterdam, the ground zero of Total Football.  When Cruyff played at Ajax in the early 1970′s, he led them the club to three straight European Cup victories.   In his final seasons at Ajax, Rijkaard too was managed by Cruyff.

Spain’s dominance is ending.  They have had a tremendous run, and will go down as one of the great international sides.  Bad losses to Argentina and Portugal show that Spain’s run may have ended.  Although tiki-taka may no longer win tournaments, the resurgence of the stylish attacking game as spearheaded by Spain is showing itself in the most unlikely of places.  At the 2010 World Cup, Germany played an elegant attacking game.  Over seven matches Germany were a joy to watch.  Should they continue to play like this, I will gladly root for them at Euro 2012.

That any non-German could love Germany is surprising.  That Germany play a beautiful style is downright shocking. Germany is the quintessential solid team, respected for their mechanical work ethic and domineering style, but never loved. Germany are also the most consistent performer in the world game.  Germany/West Germany won three World Cups and three European Championship, which is impressive enough.  At the World Cup, no team–not even Brazil–has Germany’s consistency.  In seventeen appearances, Germany won three times, came in second place four times, and made the semifinals five other times.  The last time Germany did not make the quarterfinals was 1978.  The only time Germany lost in the first round was 1938.

Germany’s beautiful game reminds the football world of how fluid national styles become in an age of globalization.

V. Don’t Cry for Argentina

Of all the national sides, I am most ambivalent about Argentina.  Since 2006 when the team shamefully started a fight with the Germany after being eliminated by them, I have rooted against Argentina.  That particular loss was difficult for Argentina.  In the group stages they played like the were destined to win while their rival Brazil (who, as we were told over and over was full of the best players in the world) played without passion.  Argentina outplayed Germany, the home team, for 120 minutes but could not break down the German defense.  Poor coaching decisions took their toll, and Germany won on penalty kicks in front of an ecstatic home crowd.  Some Argentine players started a brawl, which humiliated both teams. Argentina’s coach, José Peckerman resigned as a result.  Right then and there I decided I could never be an Argentina fan.

The truth is though I cannot completely hate Argentina the way I can Italy.  I rooted against the Albiceleste with satisfaction when it looked like they could miss the World Cup.  I especially wanted them to lose once Maradona came in as the national coach.  When they were eliminated 4-0 by Germany (again), I practically danced for joy.  On the other hand, I have difficulty rooting against a team from a nation that is so so progressive on LGBT rights.  Moreover, as a Barcelona fan, I cannot in good conscience root against Lionel Messi.  In 2010 my distaste for Maradona won out–El Diego makes himself so easy to hate–but now that he is gone, and Messi is still there, the balance is starting to shift.

Argentina has been a powerhouse in world football for decades.  They were runners up to reigning champions Uruguay at the 1928 Olympics and lost again to Uruguay in final of the first World Cup in 1930.  The Italian side that won the 1934 World Cup played Argentinian expatriates (who played in for Argentina in 1930) whose ancestors had left Italy for Argentina.  Argentina and Uruguay pioneered the South American style that enchanted Western European audiences–an attacking style that showed off passing, dribbling, quick reflexes, creative thinking, and dazzling individual talent.  Argentina’s stylish attacking play (called La Nuestra) found its apogee in the legendary River Plate side of the early 1940′s, La Máquina (a side perhaps more mythical than anything else–the five forwards who made up La Máquina only played together about 18 times.)

On the heels of La Máquina, River Plate produced Alfredo Di Stéfano, another candidate for greatest player of all time (my pick) and the icon of Real Madrid.  Di Stéfano briefly dominated in Argentina before a football strike led him and fellow players to leave for Colombia where they essentially built Colombian football.  Barcelona tried to sign Di Stéfano in 1953, but due to very controversial circumstances Di Stéfano ended up at arch-rival Real Madrid.  It was there that Di Stéfano reached his apex.  Already dominant in La Liga, Di Stéfano and Real Madrid essentially built the pan-European game by winning the first five European Cups (the forerunner of the UEFA Champions League.)  Two things keep Di Stéfano out of the Pele/Maradona debate: (1) a poor international record; and (2) lack of television exposure.  Both of these strikes against Di Stéfano boil down to bad timing.  Television coverage as we know it did not come about until after Di Stéfano retired (the 1970 World Cup was the first time that tournament was broadcast in color.)  Di Stéfano was a just plain unfortunate in international play.  There were no World Cups held in the 1940′s.  Argentina did not enter the 1950 World Cup, FIFA declared Di Stéfano ineligible for the 1954 World Cup.  By 1958 Di Stéfano played for Spain but Spain failed to qualify for the World Cup.  Di Stéfano led Spain to qualification in 1962 World Cup, but an injury kept him out of the tournament.  Di Stéfano retired from international football shortly thereafter.

Following the 1940′s Argentina, while successful in South America, underperformed at the World Cup or did not appear at all.  To add insult to injury, neighboring Brazil surpassed Argentina.  Part of this was Argentina’s own fault; while Uruguay fielded black players as early 1924 and Brazil also integrated early, Argentina maintained teams as white as any found in Western Europe.  (Race is a touchy but important subject in world football that requires far more room than I can give it in this post.  Suffice to say that just because Brazil and Uruguay integrated early does not mean that racism vanished there.  Nor is racism simply black and white.  Argentina has a long and unfortunate history of prejudice toward mestizos and immigrants from neighboring Latin American countries.  In 2006, the Argentina was led by a proudly Jewish coach in Peckerman, and fielded a Jewish left wingback named Juan Pablo Sorín who was deeply ashamed of being Jewish.)

As Argentina continued to fail on the world stage, the pleasing but now ineffective La Nuestra associated with River Plate was replaced by the more brutal style (called anti-football) most associated with South American villains Estudiantes de la Plata, who won the Copa Libertadores in 1968, 1969, and 1970.  At the 1966 World Cup, Argentina and England’s match produced enough bad blood in both nations to fuel a bitter rivalry that continues to this day—although that dislike intensified into hatred after the Falklands/Malvinas War.

In 1978, Argentina hosted the World Cup for the first time.  At the time Argentina was ruled by a military junta.  It goes without saying that totalitarian regimes do not protect human rights.  FIFA has an appalling human rights track record (that is why their campaign against racism, no matter how noble, also rings hollow), but even by FIFA standards, allowing the World Cup to proceed in Argentina was a horrific decision–a move that equalled allowing Mussolini’s Italy to host the 1934 tournament.  Under dubious circumstances, Argentina won the tournament over a Cruyff-less Netherlands.  The victory is suspect thanks to possible junta involvement and Argentinian gamesmanship, but the 1978 Argentina squad is fondly remember thanks to great players and a lovely attacking style instilled by football philosopher/leftist coach César Luis Menotti.  Although not a return to La Nuestra, Menotti understood the spirit of the old style.

Menotti omitted a teenage Maradona from his squad, and that ate at future star for years to come.  In 1982, Menotti gave Maradona his chance, but to no avail as first Maradona met his match in Italy’s Claudio Gentile and then Brazil’s team tore apart their traditional rivals.

By 1986 Argentina’s junta had ended, Menotti was gone (replaced by Carlos Bilardo, former Estudiantes villain and right-wing doctor), and the national side was, by all accounts, mediocre.  Maradona, the one superstar of the team, almost singlehandedly willed Argentina to a World Cup triumph.  In the match against England he scored both the famous “Goal of the Century” and the infamous “Hand of God” goal.  The 1986 tournament secured Maradona’s legacy as both a god and a demon depending on which nation you lived in.  What Maradona achieved with Argentina he repeated on a lesser scale with his new Italian club Napoli leading them to two Serie A titles and a UEFA Cup title.

From this the Maradona/Pele debate was born.  Pele won three World Cups (except that he was injured and barely played in most of the 1962 Cup—Garrincha carried Brazil to victory), but he was the superstar of great teams.  Maradona won one World Cup, but he won it in spite of his team not because of it.  Maradona played (and won) for clubs in Europe while Pele only played in Brazil (discounting his NASL years which were a glorified retirement.)  However, when Pele played in Brazil Brazilians rarely went abroad so the competition was fiercer (although a national league did not exist.)  Pele won two Copa Libertadores with his club Santos while Maradona’s only international club victory was in Europe’s second tier tournament.  Just as Pele benefitted from television coverage that his predecessors did not have, Maradona benefitted from more comprehensive coverage that Pele did not have during his best years.  The arguments go round and round with no answer.  The debate is tiresome and fraught with nationalism.  (The greatest ever debate also generally overlooks defenders, a thankless job in football.)

What is not debatable is that Pele controlled his image far better than Maradona.  While Maradona’s teammates loved him, Pele’s merely respected him as a player.  Nevertheless, whatever Pele’s personal failings, he has largely smothered them through the image of himself that he puts out: smiling Brazilian ambassador of football, specifically futebol arte.  Maradona has no such self-restraint.  He is a creature of contradictions driven by pure id.  He was a superstar who could not play with other great players yet is beloved by his teammate.  He is an avowed leftist who talks about oppression, yet he pals around with dictators and tyrants.  He wants what is best for the Argentina national team yet would not step aside gracefully long after it was clear that he was not that solution–part of the problem in fact.  Maradona’s personality is a very difficult to tolerate, but to Argentinians he is a deity.  There is actually a church of Maradona in Argentina.  Both Pele and Maradona show that the kind of person you are can be overlooked if you played a great game of football.

VI. A Messi Sport

For years top Argentinian players fell under the weight of the title “The Next Maradona.”  In that context it is no surprise that Argentina has not won a senor title since 1993 despite the steady stream of talented youth.  It virtually certain now that Maradona’s true successor has emerged in Lionel Messi.

Messi was born in Rosario.  At the age of 11 he was diagnosed with a growth hormone deficiency, and his family could not afford treatments.  FC Barcelona, aware of his talent, brought Messi and his family to Spain, and the club paid for his medical treatment.  Messi trained at La Masia, Barcelona’s famed youth academy which also produced legends such as Pep Guardiola, Xavi Hernandez, Andrés Iniesta, and Cesc Fabregas (among others).  Messi synthesized his South American creativity with the European structure he learned  at La Masia to become the best player in the world and the sharpest sword in the attack that won Barcelona its historic Sextuple.  Every match he plays adds to his legend.

What Messi is not, at least not yet, is a leader.  At 23 this is understandable.  The only club he knows is Barcelona which has formed a structure he fits well into.  Messi can create chances and goals out of nothing, but he needs the support of a dominant midfield and the constant rhythm of tiki-taka.  Take these factors out, and Messi’s sting is not so potent.  Maradona, as Argentina manager, could not understand that and saw Messi as fulfilling his role.  In 2010, Maradona did not understand that Messi could not do it alone, especially against an organized German counterattack.  Messi had to be everywhere at once, an impossible feat for anyone, but especially one marked as closely as he was.  Germany exploited each one of Argentina’s weaknesses, and the result was utter humiliation.

VII. World Cup 2014 Fever Begins

On November 17, 2010, Lionel Messi beat a senior level Brazil squad for the the first in his career.  Despite Brazil’s technical superiority, Messi worked his magic at the very end the way he has done so many times for Barcelona.  His goal was a thing of beauty, but beautiful goals are normal for Messi.

How did Argentina succeed?  Argentina’s new manager Sergio Batista is trying to mold the team to suit Messi’s needs–something Maradona could never learn.  Although the team will be not be as skilled as Barcelona, it need not be for international play.  All Argentina need to do is give Messi the space and support he requires to work his magic.  Batista, who coached Messi and Argentina to the 2008 Olympic gold medal, understands this, or at least appears to.  Messi will be 27 at the next World Cup.  It will be held in South America where no European team has won before.

If Brazil is not careful, 1950 could repeat itself.

Music I listened to while writing this post: World of Tears “Don’t Look Now”;  Gypsy (Original Broadway Cast) “Baby June and Her Newsboys”; Zoltan Kodaly “Háry János Suite” Entrance of the Emperor and His Court; Roger Cicero “Frauen regier’n die Welt”; Johann Sebastian Bach “Orchestral Suite #4 In D, BWV 1069″  Overture; Fleetwood Mac “Everywhere”; Franz Joseph Haydn “Symphony #85 In B Flat, H 1/85, ‘La Reine’” Adagio-Vivace; Carl Nielsen “Rhapsody Overture: An Imaginary Journey to the Faeroe Islands”; Modest Mussorgsky “Pictures at an Exhibition” Promenade 2; Alessandro Marcello “Concerto for Oboe, Strings & Basso Continuo in D Minor, Op. 1″ Presto; Europe “The Final Countdown”; Ma Rainey “See See Rider Blues”; HMS Pinafore “Farewell, My Own!”; Sergei Rachmaninoff “Piano Concerto #1 In F Sharp Minor, Op. 1″ Vivace; Värttinä “Pihi Neito”; Johann Sebastian Bach “Goldberg Variations, BWV 988 – Variatio 24 Canone all’Ottava. À 1 Clav.; The Jacksons “Shake Your Body (Down to the Ground); Max Bruch “Violin Concerto No. 1 in G minor, Op.26″ Adagio; Sergei Rachmaninoff “Piano Concerto #3 In D Minor, Op. 30″ Finale, Alla Breve; Enrique Iglesias “Be With You”; Miriam Makeba “Pata Pata”; Sarah Vaughan “Goodnight My Love”; Arnold Schoenberg “Concerto for Piano and Orchestra, Op. 42″ Andante;  Giuseppe Verdi “Otello” Già nella notte; Dana International “Diva”; Howlin Wolf “I Ain’t Superstitious”; Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov “Sadko, Op. 5″ Ho! My Faithful Company (sung by Vasili Damaev); Johannes Brahms “German Requiem, Op. 45″ Herr, Lehre Doch Mich; Frédéric Chopin “Mazurka #23 In D, Op. 33/2, CT 73″; Mika “Grace Kelly”; Aaron Copland “Appalachian Spring” Subito Allegro; Chicago Broadway Revival Cast “Mister Cellophane” (sung by Joel Grey); John Coltrane/Classic Quartet “One Down, One Up”; John Coltrane/Classic Quartet “Your Lady”; Jennifer Warnes “Right Time of the Night”; Dusty Springfield “In The Winter”; Johann Sebastian Bach “Cello Suite #2 In D Minor, BWV 1008″ Menuetto; Rosa Passos “Duas Contas” Virginia Rodrigus “Uma História de Ifá”; Janis Joplin & Big Brother and the Holding Company “Down on Me’: Tanja Solnik “Zing Faygeleh Zing”; Camille Saint-Saëns “Carnival of the Animals” Fossils; Charlie Christian “As Long as I Live”; Johann Sebastian Bach “Concerto No. 3 in G major BWV1048″ Allegro; Ludwig van Beethoven “Piano Sonata #3 In C, Op. 2/3″ Scherzo: Allegro; Nina Simone “To Love Somebody”; Gioachino Rossini “William Tell Overture”; The Four Tops “Left With A Broken Heart”; Gyorgi Ligeti “Sonata for Cello Solo” Dialogo; Three Dog Night “Black and White”; Harry Belafonte “Sylvie”; Enya “One by One”; Ella Fitzgerald “How High the Moon”; Johann Sebastian Bach “Magnificat In D, BWV 243″ Gloria Patri; Ludwig van Beethoven”String Quartet in C-sharp Minor, Op. 131: Allegro.

Is It Better Yet?

David Cameron, the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom recently recorded a video for the “It Gets Better  Project,” the worldwide video collection aimed at helping LGBT teenagers by reassuring them that their lives will improve after they get out of high school.  Cameron is the latest big name politician to record a message; previous politicians who have recorded videos include Barack Obama, Joe Biden, Nancy Pelosi, Hillary Clinton and the Finnish Foreign Minister and Minister of Justice.  Cameron’s video is unique because he is the first politician from the right side of the political spectrum to record a message.  These politico videos have been joined by messages from actors, singers, performers, and ordinary LGBT folk from all walks of life.

This project has been great, and the support has been fantastic.  So it is with a heavy heart that I say I believe it has failed.  Dan Savage deserves nothing but praise for starting the project.  I have been a fan of his since my sophomore year of college, and have read his column every week since then.  I believe however, that the project has gotten too big for him, and it lost its way.  Cameron’s video shows that the emperor has no clothes.

The It Gets Better Project started in reaction to a rash of gay teen suicides that were first reported in the gay media and then in the mainstream media (it is not that the number of suicides went up, it is just that they were finally being reported.)  The reasoning for the project was that we, LGBT adults, are not allowed to go into schools and houses of religious worship and tell gay youth that their lives will get better even they are awful now.  The videos were put on YouTube to circumvent the anti-LGBT–or fearful–teachers, administrator, parents, religious leaders, and policy-makers.  The LGBT community made so many videos that YouTube could not hold them all.  Some of these videos are extremely personal and moving.  They were made by gays for gays.  Naturally straight allies could not resist getting in the act; usually they came from the entertainment field.  Then the politicians followed–first liberals, now conservatives.  The project is now officially a sacred cow, and a sacred cow with a book deal.

So if everyone is holding hands and singing Cass Elliot’s “It’s Getting Better” then why is the outreach still limited to the Internet.  Why are we not allowed in the schools?  Policy makers–national leaders in at least countries–are saying they support us.  Why are they not doing more?  The problems with sacred cows is that no one questions or challenges them.  These videos from entertainers and politicians, no matter how well-meaning, are not outreach; nor are they targeting LGBT youth.  The real audience is LGBT adults and what they are really saying is, “Buy what I’m selling.”

I do not wish to sound as cynical as I do, but I find activism through social media problematic.  It is far easier than the old-fashioned get-out-and-make-a-difference model.  It is also more distant, more hands-off, and ultimately, I think, far less effective.  It is much easier to record a YouTube video and say “I’ve done my part.”  There is no blood, sweat, or tears involved in a message on Facebook or Twitter.

The person who has made me suspicious of these entertainers and politicians is actually another entertainer: Lady Gaga.  Lady Gaga is the most iconic singer in the gay community since Madonna.  In my mind she deserves every bit of the adulation she gets because she gives it back in a meaningful way.  Lady Gaga spoke at the March for Equality in October 2009.  When a Don’t Ask Don’t Tell repeal was up for a Senate vote earlier this year, Lady Gaga went to Maine and actively lobbied (and encouraged others to lobby) Republican Senators Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe to vote for repeal.  I cannot think of any gay celebrities who have done as much for LGBT rights as Lady Gaga.  That, kids, is real activism and a real friend.

I do not want the It Gets Better Project to shut down shop.  I believe that there is still a purpose for it.  If it gets people to donate to the Trevor Project, that can only be a good thing.  Nevertheless, for the project to reach its full potential it needs to do more than just be an online video repository, especially if the policy-makers are listening.  Now the policy-makers have to do the hard part–change things for the better.  The It Gets Better Project needs to hold their feet to the fire.

Music I listened to while writing this post: Bad English “When I See You Smile”; Carole King “Way Over Yonder”; Frederic Chopin ” Waltz No. 1 in E-Flat Major, Op. 18 ‘Grande Valse Brillante’”; Queen “I Want It All”; Lady Gaga “Bad Romance”; Patty Griffin “Tony”; Jennifer Warnes “Right Time of the Night”.

Edited 12/24/10:  Because this post in particular attracts so much spam, I am turning off the comments for this one to see if that will reduce the spam load.  Sorry.