Making Us Look Worse Than We Are

[kevin_standlee]

The Super Bowl is one of the most watched sporting events in the world. It's not the World Cup final, but it gets a lot of coverage. And that means it's shown in places where American football doesn't appear that often, and watched by people who aren't necessarily big American football fans. So I expect that the crowd reaction to the introduction of Chicago Bears co-Captain Muhsin Muhammad took a lot of people, particularly those watching from outside the USA, aback. The Bears fans in the crowd called out, as they apparently do whenever he's introduced or makes a good play, "Mooooose!" as a play on his first name.

To anyone who doesn't know that's what's going on, it sounds like they're booing, and it probably takes little more to assume that they're booing him because his name is Muhammad. I certainly saw that popping up on blogs yesterday. Not having followed Da Bears that much, I wasn't aware of it either, but I figured that must have been what was happening, as I did not think the fans could be that crass and stupid. But I suspect that the worldwide audience expects American to be that crass and stupid. Cheryl says the announcers on her coverage didn't explain what was happening. I doubt many others were either.

Sigh. Americans cannot necessarily be proud of themselves for many of their actions, but this was not a racist act by Stupid American Football Fans.

Ironically, according to his Wikipedia entry (which can't necessarily be considered authoritative), he's apparently a Christian.

Comments

[timill]

Stats on the UK broadcast reckon one-seventh of the world population was watching.

I don't believe a word of it, mind you, but...

(Mike Mussina gets the same reaction, of course)

[thirdworld.livejournal.com]

You you know if the FA cup is bigger or smaller? I know it gets broadcast all over the globe and there are far more soccer-football fans out there than gridiron-football fans.

[timill]

Haven't the foggiest. It's not foreign, so we don't care who else is watching. Or something. Possibly that I rarely watch it myself.

[thirdworld.livejournal.com]

I was amazed how big it is in the Far East, but also in most areas of the Commonwealth. Bloody Anglophiles! ;)

[garyomaha.livejournal.com]

I am not a football fan and rarely watch any of the SuperBowl. However, having purchased a new HDTV last year, I felt *obligated* to tune in for a few minutes. (Y'see, people who love sports cannot understand how we, a couple of non-sports-lovers, would need or even want an HDTV. To watch what? **sigh**)

Anywho, I tuned in during the introductions, saw the scene you described, and yes, my first reaction was "OhMyGosh, they're booing him." Then I did analyze the situation and came to a different (correct) conclusion, but still...

I guess that proves that a non-fan should not watch.

[mkillingworth.livejournal.com]

He probably is a Christian. And Americans (or any one else, for that matter) should not have to censor everything that they say out loud based on how other people might mis-hear it. That's just silly. It was pretty obvious to me that they were cheering, though.

[thirdworld.livejournal.com]

Yes, there is often a tendency to assume the worst about Americans. This became far worse in recent times, but existed before as well. I would not have made that assumption, since there are a bunch us Muslim players out there aside from Moose, and since that sort of behavior is rare in stadiums here. What did bug me was articles that said things like, "Manning succeeds on the world's biggest stage!" Um, no. It's not the world's biggest stage. Even at the level of Clubs the English FA cup used to (and I believe still does, though I'm really not sure why) have a bigger worldwide audience, though Cheryl could speak to that. But of course there are other stages like, oh, the Olympics, The Football (soccer) World Cup, The Commonwealth Games and The Rugby World Cup.

[ex-frankwu.livejournal.com]

I remember at my brother's high school graduation, my mom was wondering why people were booing him, when he was a big long-distance running track star. I had to explain to her that they weren't saying "Boo" but "Wuuuuuuuuuuuu." I don't think she got it.