Why the dislike of the word 'Soccer'?

[SouthsideOwl3940]

59 minutes ago, Maddogbob said:

It's very much soccer here. I still don't use the term. Although I find if I'm talking to football people. They will use "football" rather than soccer.

 

Using Footie/football tends to end up in an NRL or AFL miss communication. With fans of other codes. 

 

All three games are good fun imho.

 

 

 

 

We run with football for soccer, and footy for the afl. Then there is League and Union. I am teaching my son to say football without the t or the lls. Kinda like foobaw  

[Maddogbob]

Just now, Owl.1867 said:

 

This is another great point; I hate the whole "my sport is better than your sport" rubbish. I love loads of sports and I dislike many others, but why get in an argument about how someone likes to spend their leisure time?

 

Football (soccer) is awful at it when it comes to bragging on the global popularity, ice hockey and the rugby codes are awful when it comes to bragging about physicality, cycling and endurance sports when it comes to fitness metrics etc. Just let people have fun.

Being he gives you the opportunity to have a look at other sports you wouldn't normally consider.

 

Of the two, I enjoy the RL more personally, than AFL. But like I say both entertaining games.

 

I like team sports, I'm not a huge fan of individual sports. 

[Maddogbob]

13 minutes ago, SouthsideOwl3940 said:

We run with football for soccer, and footy for the afl. Then there is League and Union. I am teaching my son to say football without the t or the lls. Kinda like foobaw  

That's probably because your in Melbourne.

 

Footie, tends to be NRL in Queensland. From my limited understanding.

 

I don't dislike the term soccer, I just don't use it.

Edited February 9 by Maddogbob

[Owl.1867]

2 hours ago, Maddogbob said:

Being he gives you the opportunity to have a look at other sports you wouldn't normally consider.

 

Of the two, I enjoy the RL more personally, than AFL. But like I say both entertaining games.

 

I like team sports, I'm not a huge fan of individual sports. 

 

I'm in NZ, played league at a decent level in England and here so always been a fan. I'm a Warriors member and taking my boy along to that this season, no doubt it'll be a hell of a lot more enjoyable than the current 4am wake ups I do to watch Wednesday.

[Geörge Whitebread]

2 hours ago, Owl.1867 said:

 

It takes some doing, but this is one of the most confidently incorrect answers ever given on this site.

 

The "football" part of the word has nothing to do with kicking the ball. Football - as it was and as all other codes of football worldwide continue to be - involved having the ball in hand originally. The name refers to being on foot, rather than on horseback. It's to distinguish from polo, with nothing in the name having any relation to not using hands when in possession.

 

Soccer is the code which doesn't involve possession with the hands and therefore has a handball rule. The OP is correct in terms of soccer's English origins.

 

However, language is fluid and so yeah, in England it is unusual to hear soccer used. It's actually quite jarring from an English accent, because we're not used to it. However, when I'm talking to people back in Ireland, or in the rest of the anglophone world, I'll often use soccer when I'm trying to be clear what my meaning is.

 

Context is everything with language.

 

 

 

Nothing in your post contradicts what I said, save for my tongue-in-cheek use of "handegg", maybe.

 

At no point did I "confidently" claim the origins of the word football came from kicking the ball. I believe there is actually some debate over conflicting explanations, so it may include a reference to kicking. But I know your version of events is among those explanations and agree that it is probably the most plausible, particularly when referencing the mob version of the game that predates what we now know and love.

 

I also did NOT say the word soccer didn't originate in England. I said exactly the opposite!

 

We also agree that it is unusual to hear soccer used in England (in 2024, at least), and that it's actually quite jarring from an English accent, because we're not used to it. 

 

As I said, it's more widely used in America because they have an alternative game that they call  "football". The same is true (albeit often with prefixes, as in Rugby) in other countries alternative football games, such as Ireland and Australia. So, again, we agree.

 

When I said it is not "our" word, adding the caveat "if you call yourself a football fan" (which made it necessarily correct to the point of being almost tautological), I was referring to English football fans. The people that tend to use it regularly are generally not English and/or recognise other games as being a form of football too. Again, we seem to agree.

 

And, I'm not saying that any of the other Football Codes are not forms of football either, by the way. I'm claiming, as a very biased "proper" football fan, that "our" game, the OG, is the best one and, therefore, the only one that deserves the unqualified title of "football".

 

Again, this is a little tongue-in-cheek because I really like the American game and look forward to watching the Superbowl in the small hours of Monday morning.

 

So, as I said, the abominable term "soccer" (from association, as we all agree) was initially used to distinguish it from "rugger", among other variants.

 

There may be some debate about whether the origin of the game Rugby Football really was derived from an individual pupil at that school opting to disregard the "no running forward while carrying the ball" rule of the Football Code being played at the time; but however that (and other "carrying" Football Codes) came about, the term "soccer" wouldn't have been necessary without them, and use of the term "football" to describe games in which the ball was kicked forward rather than carried, predates it by hundreds of years.

 

 

[Owl.1867]

I'm not quoting that.

 

Just to point out that soccer is not "og". Gaelic football and AFL are far closer to any semblance of what "og" football would have been.

[Geörge Whitebread]

2 hours ago, Owl.1867 said:

 

This is another great point; I hate the whole "my sport is better than your sport" rubbish. I love loads of sports and I dislike many others, but why get in an argument about how someone likes to spend their leisure time?

 

Football (soccer) is awful at it when it comes to bragging on the global popularity, ice hockey and the rugby codes are awful when it comes to bragging about physicality, cycling and endurance sports when it comes to fitness metrics etc. Just let people have fun.

 

 

In the spirit of letting people have fun, maybe don't take life so seriously.

 

Bias is all part of the fun when you're passionate about something. Or, at least, it should be (admittedly it can go too far at times). 

 

People making claims about their sport being better in some way than another is only the same as the fans of any given club singing that theirs is "by far the greatest team the world has ever seen". A cursory glance at the matchday section of this forum will tell you that none of us think that's true of Wednesday, but we've still sung that song.

 

[Geörge Whitebread]

3 minutes ago, Owl.1867 said:

I'm not quoting that.

 

Just to point out that soccer is not "og". Gaelic football and AFL are far closer to any semblance of what "og" football would have been.

 

They are, tbf.

 

I nearly deleted that because I thought you might pick up on it. But I stand by it because "soccer" has global popularity.

 

[Owl.1867]

34 minutes ago, Geörge Whitebread said:

 

 

In the spirit of letting people have fun, maybe don't take life so seriously.

 

Bias is all part of the fun when you're passionate about something. Or, at least, it should be (admittedly it can go too far at times). 

 

People making claims about their sport being better in some way than another is only the same as the fans of any given club singing that theirs is "by far the greatest team the world has ever seen". A cursory glance at the matchday section of this forum will tell you that none of us think that's true of Wednesday, but we've still sung that song.

 

 

Nah I'm more talking about some of the real vitriol you see towards other sports, more than anything tongue in cheek.

[Maddogbob]

2 hours ago, Owl.1867 said:

 

I'm in NZ, played league at a decent level in England and here so always been a fan. I'm a Warriors member and taking my boy along to that this season, no doubt it'll be a hell of a lot more enjoyable than the current 4am wake ups I do to watch Wednesday.

Eldest lad is a Bronco's fan. He's been teaching me the game. For a kid that was all football two years ago, having been exposed to the game, he's really got into it, all his mates are league fans.

 

It's actually a really action packed game. 

 

He still plays football and we still go and watch football.

 

He's a half decent touch player by all accounts as well.

Edited February 9 by Maddogbob

[owlinexile]

Words evolve.

 

'Soccer' is an infantilisation of 'Association' originally used by posh public schoolboys to differentiate it from the other sports they played like 'Rugger' and the soggy biscuit game.

 

These days it is more usually used by Americans to differentiate it from the eleven minute long (3hours with ad breaks) thing they call 'football'.

 

We don't need to differentiate it from anything, so we just call it football.

 

 

 

 

[Owl.1867]

3 hours ago, owlinexile said:

Words evolve.

 

'Soccer' is an infantilisation of 'Association' originally used by posh public schoolboys to differentiate it from the other sports they played like 'Rugger' and the soggy biscuit game.

 

These days it is more usually used by Americans to differentiate it from the eleven minute long (3hours with ad breaks) thing they call 'football'.

 

We don't need to differentiate it from anything, so we just call it football.

 

 

 

 

 

This is the exact attitude that Brits accuse Americans of, but which Brits show enough of themselves.

 

The UK is the only anglophone country which exclusively refers to association rules as football. The only one.

[owlinexile]

34 minutes ago, Owl.1867 said:

 

This is the exact attitude that Brits accuse Americans of, but which Brits show enough of themselves.

 

The UK is the only anglophone country which exclusively refers to association rules as football. The only one.

 

Yes.  Because we are right.

[Ever the pessimist]

I suspect it’s a) because it’s predominantly heard from Americans, and

b) linked to the above, often used my YouTube bods when talking computer games 

[edmontonowl]

10 hours ago, Owl.1867 said:

 

This is the exact attitude that Brits accuse Americans of, but which Brits show enough of themselves.

 

The UK is the only anglophone country which exclusively refers to association rules as football. The only one.

 

 

That's because other anglophone countries were colonies in the 19th century and the game then had stunted growth thereafter, unlike in Britain where it became the opiate of the masses.

 

 

In North America, ice hockey is called hockey and hockey is called field hockey but rugby is rugby and lacrosse is lacrosse. TLDR...pet shop knows.

 

 

 

Anyway what has changed in recent years is that North American sports reporters, as 1 example, are referring to soccer as football, and teams that score 'zero' are now said to have 'nil'. A lot of this is to do with being seen to be on the same level as the rest of the world, and the growing number of former UK broadcasters and pundits who cover the game for N. American broadcasters, like ESPN.

[The Wall]

On 08/02/2024 at 23:43, Owl.1867 said:

 

The "football" part of the word has nothing to do with kicking the ball. Football - as it was and as all other codes of football worldwide continue to be - involved having the ball in hand originally. The name refers to being on foot, rather than on horseback. It's to distinguish from polo, with nothing in the name having any relation to not using hands when in possession.

Decent fact, I never knew that

[edmontonowl]

 

The definitive explanation?

 

 

 

[Cpt_Hatstand]

Generally you can refer to any sport as "football" if it involves kicking a ball into a goal for points

e.g.
Footie
Rugby
American
Australian
Gaelic

etc

[Utah Owl]

All anyone needs to know is that there are two clues in the name.

 

Foot and ball!

[San Clemente Owl]

On 09/02/2024 at 17:47, edmontonowl said:

 

 

That's because other anglophone countries were colonies in the 19th century and the game then had stunted growth thereafter, unlike in Britain where it became the opiate of the masses.

 

 

In North America, ice hockey is called hockey and hockey is called field hockey but rugby is rugby and lacrosse is lacrosse. TLDR...pet shop knows.

 

 

 

Anyway what has changed in recent years is that North American sports reporters, as 1 example, are referring to soccer as football, and teams that score 'zero' are now said to have 'nil'. A lot of this is to do with being seen to be on the same level as the rest of the world, and the growing number of former UK broadcasters and pundits who cover the game for N. American broadcasters, like ESPN.

 

I've seen the zero to nil change in some places but it tends to be the commentators rather than the studio presenter, maybe because of NBCs coverage.  The other one I hate over here is when they refer to a penalty as a PK, really grates on me when I hear that!!

 

With regard to the word soccer, its not going away here, the NFL is far too entrenched in the American sports culture to be replaced by proper football.  I used to refuse to use the word soccer but I have much bigger language issues with the Yanks use of the English language that I use it now.  If I don't then I end up having to revert to it to be fully understood.