MASCULINITY PART 1

The staged masculinity has different rules and conditions. Many can be named.....but it can be especially interesting to study a few...

I can often think about Sports and Nationalism.....and Masculinity...

Football (Soccer) is a perfect example. This sport is a world wide connection between people but also a release for nationalist, masculin pressure. Football/Soccer, in fact, is a playful staging of fake identities. And most certainly when you speak about the followers, the fans.....all the people that identify themselves through fotball...through belonging to a team....or to a national team....

When I speak about this, I focus particularly on the young men who express their love for the group (the "team") through activism, hooliganism and drunken disruptional behaviour. And, just for a moment....try to REALIZE the fact that this is a game....with intentionally created teams, team-colors, names, symbols, songs....myths... This, in certain crowds of young men (in particular), means everything....this is their identity!!! It becomes a tradition, and becomes normalized in future generations of young boys....and what will the sport mean in 500 years? How deep will the traditions get rooted? Will the teams get more power than they are supposed to have?

Instead of war, football has become a way to conquer pride....and respect as a nation. In 1954, for example, there was a very important game held in the World Champion football-competitions, West Germany VS. Hungary... Germany won that game, thereby winning the title of world champions. This, after World War 2 was a HUUUUGE "rise-up" for the entire German population...the only thing the country (left in pieces) could joy themselves over was this victory.

But really.......my God.....