As before, I’ve not much opinion on Brexit. I understand why a lot of Brits might want out of the EU; it’s a bureaucratic nightmare, for starters. And there are economic reasons for staying in, though how many of these are “real” reasons and how many are “EU officials making sure to punish Britain” reasons, I don’t know. But there are some downright silly reasons given by both sides.
Some days back I heard a piece on NPR about one of the supposed down sides to Brexit: it’ll become more difficult for non-British athletes to come and play on British teams. Special reference was given to some English football teams (note: in this context, “football” refers to the specific form of sportsball also known as “soccer,” a crime against humanity that is used as a form of psychological torture against the audience. The game is so mind-snappingly dull that often the observers are driven to psychological breaks that cause them to go on rampages).
The idea seems to be that with travel restrictions in place, it will be difficult for, say, Germans to come play on an English team. While I suppose that’s probably true… it’s also true that so what? Shouldn’t an “English team” be made up of, you know, English people?
This is of course not an issue limited to denizens of the future European Caliphate, nor solely to fans of waterboarding soccer. But it seems like maybe this might be an opportunity for the Brits to actually make British sportsball teams British. Because if you are rooting for your local sporting collective, shouldn’t they actually have something to do with the local area other than drawing their paychecks from local property taxes and local ticket buyers? Imagine if the US Olympic team was composed not of the best mutants the US gene pool has to offer, but from people around the world brought on board for a payday? Would it really then be the *US* team?