Diving into the world of social media has its positives and its negatives. For every pithy comment of genuine wisdom or link to an illuminating piece, where you leave the day maybe a wiser or better person, you have to filter through a sea of brain deadening clickbait and whirlpools of gibberish, misinformation, and if you’re unlucky enough, general outright nastiness. You learn to take the rough with the smooth. If you don’t, you end up capsizing. But never fear. Armed with a thick skin and a reliable bullshit detector, you too can navigate these waters safely.
When it comes to bullshit, not many can lay it on thicker than some of Australia’s more pernicious football “bitters”. Unlike the sirens in Homer’s Ulysses, these “bitters” are far from good looking and their song doesn’t sound anywhere as sweet, but they know there are the gullible out there tempted by their broken record of complaints about the A-League and the Socceroos to shipwreck these lost souls on the jagged coast of bitterdom.
Bitters who delight in Socceroos losses and the concomitant plummet in FIFA rankings, yet are strangely mute, indifferent, even angry, at the sight of the Socceroos winning a major championship.
Bitters who highlight every relatively disappointing crowd figure and TV rating from the A-League, like a neon billboard in Times Square, while ignoring figures that don’t fit their agenda.
Bitters who spit the dummy like a baby about the poor standard of one game and keep oh-so-quiet during a good one. Considering they can’t stand the A-League, why do they bother watching it in the first place.
Bitters who rail against the FFA’s National Club Identity Policy, yet have no problem trolling people about their identity on social media.
Bitters who perpetuate a fantasy of how wonderful the NSL was, when in reality it was a lame, disease-ridden 27-year-old beast just waiting to be put out of its misery.
Bitters who have no interest in football becoming mainstream or popular, where new A-League fans who could not embrace or identify with the NSL’s community clubs are dismissed as “plastics”, and NSL fans who crossed over to embrace “plastic” clubs seen as traitors.
The Sirens and Ulysses by William Etty, 1837. (Note: Bitters not as good looking)
A writer is nothing but a thief who repackages stuff. Nothing comes from a void. You can trace it all back to stone tablets and cave paintings. But for this exercise I’m going to use something almost as culturally significant as a cave painting in the south of France, a Warner Bros. cartoon.
In amongst the social media viral detritus that swirls around cyberspace like “The Great Pacific garbage patch” I came across the rules animator Chuck Jones claimed he used for the Road Runner and Wile E. Coyote cartoons.
What remarkable symmetry. I have subbed off the Coyote, replaced him with “Bitter” and, with a few provisos, presto.
The Rules
1. “The Road Runner cannot harm the Coyote (Bitter) except by going ‘beep beep’.” (Beep beep, in this case meaning, facts and figures.)
2. “No outside force can harm the ‘Bitter’ — only his own ineptitude or the failure of Acme products.”
3.”The ‘Bitter’ could stop anytime — if he were not a fanatic.” A fanatic is one who redoubles his effort when he has forgotten his aim.” — George Santayana.”
4. “No dialogue ever, except ‘beep-beep!'” (More facts, more figures)
5. “The Road Runner must stay on the road — otherwise, logically, he would not be called Road Runner.”
6. “All action must be confined to the natural environment of the two characters — the southwest American desert.” (or in this case – social media)
7. “All materials tools, weapons, or mechanical conveniences must be obtained from the Acme Corporation.” (Material here includes crowd numbers and TV viewing figures)
8. “Whenever possible, make gravity the ‘Bitter’s’ greatest enemy.” For example, falling off a cliff.
Courtesy of http://blog.coyoteproductions.co.uk/
9. “The ‘Bitter’ is always more humiliated than harmed by his failures.”
Football, like politics, operates best as a dialectic, an open discussion where opposing ideas are discussed in order to find a truth, or a better solution. To get to sit at this table doesn’t require a golden ticket. All it requires is an acknowledgement of the past and a respect for the participants. Unfortunately, the most malignant “Bitters” fail on both counts.
In closing, I am going to use the current travails of the Central Coast Mariners and Newcastle Jets. They have both had difficult seasons punctuated by poor performances on the pitch and declining attendances off the pitch. But how bad are these attendance figures, which some bitters want to focus on like a malevolent kid out in the sunshine with a magnifying glass and a trail of ants at his mercy.
You want bad crowd figures. I’ll show you bad crowd figures. In case you forgot or are too young to remember why the National Soccer League had to be euthanised, this is what this elite, supposedly professional competition, could only attract in the populous heartland of the sport, New South Wales, in its final season.
NSL Season 2003-04 — 7 teams from NSW
84 regular season matches – Total attendance 211,000 (Average crowd 2,500)
“Powerhouse” teams like Sydney Olympic and Sydney United only averaged crowds of 3000.
In 2004, the 10 NSW NRL teams attracted 1,800,000 at an average of 15,000. No wonder other football codes enjoyed the spectacle of soccer being a perpetual basketcase.
Ten years later how do those paltry, pitiful, NSL numbers compare with the A-League in NSW.
A-League Season 2013-14 — 4 teams from NSW
55 regular season matches – Total attendance 753,500 (Average crowd 13,700)
In 2014, the 10 NSW NRL teams attracted 1,820,000 at an average of 15,200. Conclusion: 10 years later soccer is no longer seen as a perpetual basketcase.
Now, how about a closer look at the two clubs who have hogged the off-field bad news A-League headlines this season.
A-League Season 2013-14 — Central Coast Mariners & Newcastle Jets
28 regular season matches – Total attendance 298,852 (Average crowd 10,670)
Two regional teams in the A-League attracting almost 80k more spectators in 56 less games than the seven teams from NSW in the NSL ten years earlier.
And despite the travails of the Jets and the Mariners this season, they will still end up with over 220,000 spectators attending their 26 home games at an average of 8,500. Sure, an unsatisfactory result compared to seasons past, and it is almost everyone’s, bar the bitters, hope those numbers rebound next season, but they really are chalk and cheese compared to the competition that preceded the A-League.
“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” — George Santayana
“Beep, beep!” — The Road Runner
Pathetic troll piece
Horses for courses, Jaryd.
Our Twitter reaction includes, “Piece of writing to savour. Brilliant @ArtSapphire” “Some mindfulness in a mindless row, finally via @ShootFarken”
Thanks for stopping by.
As someone who gets labelled a bitter but does not practice any of the above all I can say is what an absolute wank of a piece this is.
Good read. Well written.
Beep beep!!
Beep beep!
Even though many Australian soccer fans on the net fall into either new dawn/bitter camp (whether willingly or not), I’m disappointed to see this website dip its toe into the new dawn/bitter partisanship nonsense. The fact that this site has existed outside of that framework is one of the things that appealed to me. Hope it’s not the start of a new trend.
One opinion piece reflecting on observations from social media does not constitute a trend, Paul.
Super piece. It describes well the small but loud minority who have polluted the internet for well over a decade now with animosity toward anything achieved post 2004. There is criticism or angst, but then there’s what the author here has described – which we’ve all witnessed since the day the A-League commenced.
Boric would have us believe he has never decried the path the game took in 2004, nor has he ever mocked and slated the A-league. Some of us know better.
The “3 years tops” brigade, who of course can no longer talk about the league being destined for the tip, are the same people repeated the same old tired arguments. But instead of telling us how it’s all destined for failure (as they did 10 years ago), these days they just shift the goal posts of disillusionment from one issue to another, week by week or month by month.
The idea (suggested by Paul) that this site and the author has played the ‘new dawn/bitter’ card is preposterous. This site (and like minded) are *always* straddling the line between the old and the new, respectful of the past (indeed, part of the past) but all the while acknowledging and applauding the changes the game had to have back in the early 00’s.
Like myself, I am sure Athas has been equally critical of people who are so called “new dawn” who denigrate the past and the wonderful contributions old-guard clubs have made (and continue to make). If anything, it’s those of us that have a foot in both camps (largely due to age!) that think the ‘new dawn/bitter’ dichotomy should be thrown away. But sadly we’re still infected by the malaise and see it all too often on our respective timelines.
What Dave said.
Perhaps Dave S would like to tell me what my opinions are because he apparently knows them better than I do.
A false dichotomy. For those of us who are ‘traitors’ living in ‘the grey’ is dismissed by the haters – but like most things in life, this is where the complex truth lives. Viva football.
Nice trolling.
meh. Rubbish. Bring back Footscray JUST.
You cant just tear up 50 years of sockah kulcha and replace it with something that appeals to the masses of white Australia and not get one or two peoples backs up. Shame on you Arfas.
You’re right in that changes, for better or worse, have put some peoples “backs up” and there will always be issues about how football is run in this country. The real shame lies in people who should know better using social media (mostly anonymously) as a vehicle to abuse and denigrate at every opportunity. It’s utterly unproductive.
The Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz League is dying in the arse, the novelty is gone, straya is voting with its feet and with its TV buttons…..
To Sultan Sapphire, apply some water to the burnt area my friend, people have different opinions to everyone else, this article just screams of a whiny cry baby who has been on the end of defeats in arguments and feels the need to respond by bashing every NSL/State league club supporter.
Pretty pathetic, and i agree with a poster above and say this is unbecoming of ”shoot farken” a disgrace
You see it as “screams of a whiny cry baby” others see it quite differently. FYI I had drinks with the poster you mention last night. You should read Paul’s work on Shoot Farken. He’s a damn fine writer.
We need more teachers in big boy sockah. We should be tying to take the HAL global like the AFL does in order to cap as many refugees as we can get. The next big thing in Australian football has yet to be born in South Sudan yet. We need to get them before the AFL steals them. Going to Khartoum with a Perth Glory highlights reel is imperative.
Beep beep
Great writing
Keep it up