i'm glad josh wrote what he did, sicne where i grew up outside of munich, soccer (or more specific: 1860) is like a religion (sadly enough i have to admit though my own mother is a member of bayern munich and belongs therefor to the dark forces...) and a real part of our working class roots there...i don't think that stands in any way opposed to realizing today's world's problems...the contrary is true, it is a way for people to connect and if there's one problem with the world it's imbalance...but balance includes a good time with your firends and strangers and what provides that better than a good sprts match.
i consider myself a spiritual person (which includes not neglecting politics in my opinion), but i also see how important it is at the right time to not always overanalyze and to allow oneself to have a good time.
fight the good fight and be yourself.
haribol.
robert

i guess it was me who started that with my comment to the COWBOYS-thing...
so i'm glad i received an answer.
everything you say is true, yo, about connecting differnet people and stuff like that, but i still think all this professional sports-stuff is too much an industry-thing with too many evil companies involved.
i'm definitely not opposed to a good -since i'm from germany - soccer-evening in front of the TV with some friends and a case of beer, but i hate lots of the commercial stuff around it. i don't want my favourite players doing advertising for a company that just destroyed 2000 jobs in my hometown. so this is one thing why i have certain problems with professional sports.
the other is, that i still think it keeps some people from thinking, but i guess i overestimated that somehow. my sister(bayern fan, dark forces;)) is a really bad example for people who are only into sports and nothing else, so maybe i'm somehow prejudiced about that issue.

to robert: i was a bayern-fan for myself in my early teenager-days, but the toten hosen converted me into a bayern-hater. several bad toten hosen shows converted me into a toten hosen-hater. no i hate the hosen and bayern.
hope that 1860 will make it back to the bundesliga this year, though i'm a cluberer, when i allow myself to be...

holy shit the jets and packers both won. Miracle upon miracles.

also, hockey is the best sport ever.

danke andy,
meine loewen koennen die ermunternden worte gut gebrauchen...danke fuer deine antwort!!!
bis bald in deutschland...
dein robert

i love pro sports. and I don't think they are a distraction at all. people can focus on more than one thing at a time. you could just as easily argue that revolutionaries shouldn't indulge in food, movies, love, sex, family, TV, books, or music. All are just as, if not more, engrossing as sports.

As for the corporations involved in pro sports advertising. Just don't buy those products and then they will have wasted their advertising dollars on you. And you - by watching sports but not responding to their ads - will have cost them money and given them nothing in return, there for subverting their evil business.

Really, the advertising is just beer, viagra, and trucks. I find it fairly easy to avoid using those things anyway. So they are completely wasting their money on me. Although I have to admit I think the beer commercials are funny sometimes. If the stuff didn't taste like distilled cat urine I might consider a sip now or then.

I really don't think that sports are a right wing conspiracy. I doubt that Republicans look to installing a pro sport franchise to cover up stories and keep the workers distracted from their own needs. I don't know ANY families who would think, "I can't pay for health care and I can't put food on the table. I should protest. Oh, but the Cowboys won. Wait, what was I talking about?"

I think the "missing in Aruba" and "Gary Condit" stories are much more of a distraction from the real news going on around the world. Sports stays on the sports page and doesn't compete with the real news. This other stuff does.

Good night all.

i'm just stoked ben's ok. no steeler fan wants a season of maddox and charlie batch. when batch throws the ball, its like watching chris brown kick...you just close your eyes and hope for the best. holy shit! this is my first time making a comment.

GO STEELERS! Big Ben will rule the world.......

Nathan you're just saying that because Batch is black. You probably wanted John Elway to beat Doug Williams too, didn't you?

I watch football every single sunday. I better get ahold of my life. Next thing you know I am going to be cutting down rainforest, drilling tundra, torturing Iraqis, cutting jobs of the working class, and I won't even realize it because I will be celebrating a TD.

leave it to McNabb to pull the race card...still pissed about that shit rush said about you?

what the fuck are you guys talkin about? I'll keep having fun on playgrounds...haha!

Soocer > Football

Glad to see you fellas support the steal curtain. Go Steelers!!

Do you guys chant with those "terrible towels". I don't like the steelers, I'm a Pats fan. You know that team that continues to knock the steelers out the playoffs.

carlton!!!carlton!!!we love you!!!

The Pats suck this year.

aussie rules > soccer > gridiron

you know the old saying "if you dont have anything nice to say, dont say anything at all?" i dont believe in that shit.

sports died when the monster corporations bought all the arenas and sponsored all the players. pro-athletes make me sick to my stomach to think they get paid all that money, for what? to get injured and whine about it? pumping up with steroids and all that, come on. the last real major sport died 2 years ago when NEXTEL took over. even watching something like a professional boxing match made me LAUGH the other night, which is a sport i enjoyed watching as a kid (tyson era). this guy roy jones jr. i wont even say what i think of him out of FEAR that he might find out, hunt me down, and dance around me for 36 minutes. haha. i know that if boy sets fire came out on stage and ran circles around thier instruments for an hour people would be pretty fucking pissed.

sports are a huge deal to some people though, i guess everyone likes something different.

on a different note, having a space to speak thoughts that boy sets fire read directly is amazing, and i wanted to say thanks to you guys for being a band and getting your ideas to the public. if there were only more bands like y'all

good to know, that you guys are into sports, too! here in germany, you might earn some strange reactions, if you tell people, that you love punk music and soccer! many "punks" even hate people who are into soocer, they say they´re just stupid buttholes! doesn´t stop me from supporting my team from cologne, 1. fc köln! hoffe, sechzig ist nächste saison wieder dabei, verdient haben sie es!! greetz timmy

Go Broncos!!!! 15 and 1 baby!!!

http://www.edgeofsports.com - weekly, must read column for every sports fan who also happens to be a leftist. Dave Zirin (the author) also just put out a pretty good book on sports and resistance. Go Bears, I hope the Packers go 1-15.

i definately agree that that roy jones jr. fight was a fucking joke. he was such a big deal when i lived in pensacola, fla. what a clown.

yeah, if i had paid 50 bucks for the pay per view i'd have called and asked for my money back!!

well you think he's a clown, and i think hes a great dancer, maybe he should join cirque du soliel so he can dance around in vegas every night...oh wait, i bet that doesnt pay 5 million dollars..oh well.

i agree, boxing is one of the greatest things on earth and all it became within the last couple of years is a joke, which really sucks...the last brewster fight was pretty good though.
maybe this iron age of boxing will see another real champ sometime soon...
it's never to late...but i'm afraid boxing needs more than a handfule of redemption.

Boxing isn't as big a joke as some people make it out to be in the past few years. The heavyweight division is absolutely horrible. Because most people who aren't huge fans pay most attention to hw, they think boxing overall is bad. The lower weight classes are still great.

Oh, and how is Denver gonna go 15-1 if they're playing my Pats this week.

November 15 in Boston. I can't wait to see you guys play again

I though there were only 3 people who still cared about boxing. Apparently there are 4.

Let's take the boxing back from large corporations!

Who wants to box me? I will crush you with my kryptonite fist.

December, Japan, São Paulo FC beats Liverpool!

And the crowd goes crazy...

Just wanted to tell you guys I'm Center-Right (Progressive Conservative so i'm no fan of Bush at all) but I love you guys, you have the right message...

Hey guys

I don't know if you remember me but i interviewed you in Portugal back in May. I left you a myspace comment with the link.

Yeah I totally agree with what you're saying. Coming from Portugal, its really difficult to actually not like soccer...

It's fun that Robert supports 1860 Munich... I support Sporting Lisbon myself. Didn't you guys use to have that bulgarian, Daniel Borimirov, like what, 10 years ago?

Anyways, it just probably feels good somewhat for a person to be self-righteous and disregard sports as a whole, but this is a totally mimetic procedure (which is what scene kids are really good at, mimicking): you have 2 inches of a brain, you think that because you believe certains things you shouldnt like sports, then someone else thinks its a cool thing to say and imitates you.

To me, thats all it is. And there's too fuckin much of it in this world.

Antonio

OK, sports time is over. Let's get a new post on here.

I was raised in Munich, and 1860 was/is my life.

Einmal ein Loewe, immer ein Loewe!

btw: now that im in the US (Go: Jets,Mets,Kings!)

The Pats still rule the football world until someone else wins a championship, period. With the injuries that they have had, it is a truly amazing feat to win some of the big games they have this year.

Oh, and by the way, BSF rocks. This is my first time checking out the site, but have listened to the band for a couple of years now. Rock on boys, and keep fighting the good fight. Us lefties in MA love to hear it.

Great post about sports, and I couldn't agree more about how the Left treats professional sports.

I genuinely encourage everybody including the guys in BSF to read Dave Zirin's new book What's My Name Fool: Sports and Resistance in the United States, published by Haymarket Books, it is fantastic and will give you a whole new perspective on viewing sports, unions in sports, racism/homophobia/sexism in sports, and resistance by athletes to this sick system we live in.

Fight for socialism.

Have you seen this before? It's a number guessing game: http://www.amblesideprimary.com/ambleweb/mentalmaths/guessthenumber.html. I guessed 47245, and it got it right! Pretty neat.

hello everyone.
this is just me trying to write some nice notes. i`m pretty glad at this moment, cause my boyfriend just made me a beautiful present: a ticket for your concert in germany (in march). your music just means so much to me and i can`t wait to see you on stage. my first bsf-concert impressed me that much, cause i was amazed about the energy you`re giving to the audience (and especialliy to me)! that was a few years ago and i try to see you, whenever your here in germany. last time was on the hurricane festival last year. at the meet&greet place we took some photos but i assume that you won`t remember all the fans you met :O).
nevertheless you should know, that your music stays always in my heart and supports my mind!
and please excuse my english, but i didn`t use for such a long time.
"try to convince me that you care"
love. sonja

amunsing story^^
by the way the site is awesome.
just like bsf!

Take it from a union ironworker we definetly dont support the war.At least in jersey we dont!!any way nice article(Jets all they way) and cant wait until you come back to jersey you guys fuckin rock!!