Is It A Good Thing For Australia?

[KraftyPg]

We seem to be getting bombarded with ads telling us that we are putting in a bid for the World Cup 2022 yet every time the World Cup is played it is hounded by reports of fan violence and stupidity which makes it hard to consider such an event can be worthwhile to any country. Sure they can sprout figures of how good it is for the economy, (like the Vic gov does with a GP that looses $50million) but is financial gain really worth the reported violence and stupidity or is the media beating up the wrong stories and the World Cup will be a huge winner for this country?

Not being a football/soccer fan I don't care either way and the hopefully this wont turn into a "Soccer sucks football rules" thread but even at our local games the supporters put stupidity ahead of common sense. This past weekend saw several fans at a Melbourne game arrested for lighting flares in the crowd and throwing them on the field, but previous to that fans had been lighting flares on crowded train platforms. Can our country really support this kind of stupidity on a grand scale if we won our bid or is this just a small few spoiling it for the majority?

At the moment I tend to think the expenditure (on the ad campaign mainly) doesn't justify the reward we are going to get but what do others think, should we be going for this whole heartedly or drop it and run away from the idea?

 

[Dave]

If the goverment and police control things then things shouldn't be to bad.

It will bring in alot of money as the soccer fans are fanatics.

Id rather play soccer then watch it, same with league.

Dave.

 

[Jason]

Can't stand watching soccer, the whole diving/"simulation" thing shits me.

Good for Australia? Probably. Shows us off to the world and should be put together better than the shamozzle put on by India at the moment.

 

[Navara09]

I dont want the world cup to come because it will effect the afl season and being a big afl support i dnt want that to happen at all it might be the same for rugby it might interfere with that too.

 

[Dave]

Soccer is the most popular football in the world, its hard to turn down the ammount of money that comes with the game.

Dave.

 

[KraftyPg]

Yeah I'm not overly worried if it interrupts aussie football but Dave's right the reports state its a huge money spinner and the number of fans seem to go some ways to making that seem true but I'm still not sure if we can afford to have it. Or if we can afford to spend such a large amount on the campaign to get the thing only to be screwed at the last hurdle like we were supposedly screwed last selection time.

 

[Old.Tony]

Television news programs are always going to beef up the bad side of things so that people get more excited by the news. People love incidents and want to know all the gory details.

On the other hand, advertisements will pump up the good side of things in the hope that the good stuff you hear outweighs any thought of the bad stuff.

Should it happen? Sure. Just make every single seat in the stadium electric and hook 'em up to the Snowy hydro grid. Fans start mucking up, throw the switch. That'll teach the f*ckers.

I'm not a soccer fan. The sport is great, but the hooligan fans detract so badly from it that the sport is not worth it. I would never go to a stadium without a silenced 5.56mm subby and would probably want an XM107A in case I spotted something on the other side of the ground.

And as for vuvuzelas ... I'd like to see if they can make it sound just as loud when it's shoved in the other end.

 

[KraftyPg]

I reckon those vuvuzelas should be introduced into parliament question time, it's the one place they'd actually sound better than the crap that's coming out of the place. And the headlines would be much better "Gillard blows her own horn" "Abbott realise PM's horn too big to compete" "Abbott named biggest blowhard in parliment" "truth about Gillard's horn exposed"

But on a soccer note the one thing that really irks me (and this may have people label me a racist but too bad) is the way suburbs become little countries and those who aren't of the group get driven out. Lygon St in Carlton is one such area (and there is no doubt a Lygon St in every city) where the crowds become so one sided that tension eventually builds and bullshit happens. I'm all for passion and supporting whatever it is you support but there is no reason that a mass of people have to turn into idiots.

And Lygon St is only one example there is other suburbs in Melbourne where the same stuff happens, then these two subrubs meet at the game all fired up and stupid and it turns into a bitch fight of one fan nation against the other.

It's been creeping into the tennis at Melbourne park over the last few years I can't imagine what will happen with millions of soccer fans in the same area at once.