Robservations: Freedom to toss jerseys can’t be lost
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And, while celebrating those freedoms, we often can’t help but feel sympathy for those in foreign lands who suffer under the oppression of their leaders.
It’s hard to imagine, I know. But in certain countries, not even hard-working athletes are allowed to enjoy the basic human rights we as Americans so easily take for granted.
Not the least of which is the right to whip off one’s jersey during on-field celebrations.
Ask any true patriot, and he or she will be able to recall exactly where they were on that Saturday afternoon in 1999, when U.S. women’s soccer player Brandi Chastain demonstrated her right to freedom of expression.
As for your friendly neighborhood sports editor, I was in the conference room in the offices of the Murfreesboro Daily News Journal — watching with baited breath the thrilling shootout that ended the international tournament, then watching with a dragging chin as Chastain exercised the freedom our forefathers fought and died to win from our own tyrannical oppressors.
Upon scoring the game-winning goal in Team USA’s World Cup championship win over China, Chastain slung off her jersey, sank to her knees and raised her arms victoriously, signifying in that one instant the joy we all felt as Americans.
But now, a foreign power is trying to rein in those types of symbolic expressions of freedom.
The executive committee of FIFA — the F?d?ration Internationale De Football Association — decided last weekend that players must keep their shirts on during games — including a ban on stripping to celebrate scoring a goal.
“There were several awkward situations at the Confederations Cup,” FIFA president Sepp Blatter told the Swiss newspaper Blick. “One player needed five minutes to put his jersey back on because his vest was sewn into it.”
Well excuse me for living, mister president. But five minutes is a small price to pay when you’re talking about a player’s rights. Where would this country be if Paul Revere had decided not to go on his famous ride, claiming “I need five minutes to saddle my horse.”
To be blunt, it’s a travesty. It’s a crime against everything that protectors of freedom have fought to gain for centuries.
And, as Americans, especially in this time of great patriotism, I say we stand up against these foreign tyrants just as our ancestors did over 200 years ago.
Where they cried, “No taxation without representation,” I say, “No goal celebration without clothing relaxation.”
They had the “Boston Tea Party,” I say it’s time to throw the “Boston T-shirt Party.”
And who are we, as Americans, to take orders from FIFA? Look at their name, for liberty’s sake. They can’t spell “federation” without putting those weird little accent marks over it, and what’s that extra “E” doing at the end of the word “International?”
I won’t even get into the whole “calling it football when it’s obviously soccer” thing.
Of course, according to Blatter, players will now be penalized for ignoring the new, freedom-restricting regulation.
Oh, how I can’t wait to hear the songs of future generations, as they sing the praises of that first patriotic soccer player who flung his (or her, if you know what I mean) jersey into the air, crying “Give me liberty, or give me a yellow card.”
What a hero he (or she, if you follow my train of thought) will be.