Egypt soccer riot: Why don't Americans kill over sports?

By: Alain Sherter
Topics: Soccer

Egyptian fans clash with riot police following a soccer match in Port Said

Egyptian fans clash with riot police following Al-Ahly club soccer match against Al-Masry club at the soccer stadium in Port Said, Egypt, Feb. 1, 2012.

(Credit: AP Photo)

The tragedy in Egypt, where a riot following a soccer game on Wednesday left more than 70 people dead, highlights what may strike many fans around the world as a curious fact of life in the U.S.: Americans generally don't kill each other over sports.

Why not? The answer is complex. It's not that violence at athletic contests is unheard of in this country. At a Major League baseball game last April, for instance, two Los Angeles Dodgers fans brutally beat a man wearing a San Francisco Giants jersey. Several months later, two people were shot outside San Francisco's Candlestick Park after a preseason NFL game between the local 49ers and the archrival Oakland Raiders. Fans here can also get downright ornery. So Jacksonville Jaguars players learned in December, 2001, when Cleveland Browns supporters pelted them with bottles and other debris over a controversial refereeing decision, forcing the game to be temporarily suspended. And any hockey fan brave (or nuts) enough to parade around in New York Islanders gear at a New York Rangers game in Madison Garden should bring an umbrella to guard against beer showers.

Egypt army, police blamed for soccer bloodshed
Gallery: Deadly Egypt soccer riot
Major soccer stadium disasters

Still, the U.S. has never seen the kind of lethal free-for-all witnessed in Port Said yesterday that followed an Egyptian league match between home team Al-Masry and Cairo's Al-Ahly. Nor, as this list of major soccer stadium disasters shows, has their been anything on the scale of the 96 deaths at an infamous 1989 soccer game in England between Liverpool and Nottingham Forest. And it is unthinkable that a game could spark an actual war, as a series of World Cup qualifying matches between El Salvador and Honduras did in 1969.

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Deadly Egypt soccer riot

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In addressing why sports-related violence is common in some countries and not in others, including the U.S., it's important to understand that games reflect the social, political, and economic tensions of the places where they are played. In a hotbed of political ferment like Egypt, clashes on the soccer pitch aren't games at all, but rather another forum for the kind of hostilities currently refacing society.

For instance, hardcore Al-Ahly fans known as "Ultras" (a name originally used to describe the rabid, often violent "hooligan" groups that support professional soccer teams in South America and Europe) were heavily involved in the Tahrir Square demonstrations last year that led to the downfall of former president Hosni Mubarak. Critics are also pointing fingers at the Egyptian police and military for failing to stop the mayhem, with some suggesting that the country's military leaders may have allowed the riot to escalate as a pretext for consolidating their grip on power.

In short, organized sports as it is played around the world is often explicitly political. While there may be something of a blue-red state divide in the rivalry between professional franchises in, say, New York and Texas, Yankees and Rangers fans are unlikely ever to to throw down over the forthcoming presidential election.

Yet that is exactly what happens in a country like Argentina, where sports and politics are deeply intertwined. As two sociologists who have studied the subject write, "[W]hat is distinctive about Argentina is that sport and politics are inextricably linked. [Soccer] is an extension of politics; it is part of the political system, and anything that begins as a sports issue rapidly becomes politicized."

In the U.K., by contrast, soccer culture is defined more by class (although right-wing political movements, such as the National Front, have sought to align with some clubs). Fans that support teams from traditionally working-class districts in London's East End, such as West Ham United and Millwall, to this day ridicule the "posher" cultural identity of fans of teams like Chelsea, which is situated in the city's more upscale West End.

Even a team's ownership plays into that dynamic. Manchester City, which currently tops the top-flight Premier League in England, is often mocked for being controlled by an United Arab Emirates oil billionaire, while Chelsea is derisively dubbed "Chelski" for its ownership by Russian businessman Roman Abramovich. With professional soccer (or football, as it's called just about everywhere but in the states) in Britain dating back to the 19th century, this influx of big "foreign" money in the game is regarded as vulgarly arriviste. Not so in the U.S., where a mogul like Mikhail Prokhorov, owner of the NBA's New Jersey Nets, is welcomed as a savior.

Soccer violence in other countries may also be rooted in religious differences. In Glasgow, Scotland, for example, fans of Rangers typically are Protestant, while backers of the team's main foe, Celtic, are usually Catholic. The threat of violence, tinged by Scotland's long history of sectarian conflict, is always in the air when the "old firms" clash. Religious-themed discord in soccer also has flared in Northern Ireland.

In the U.S., by contrast, games remain games. However bitter the rivalry, professional sports still mostly function as a refuge from everyday concerns, rather than a place to act out out social frustrations, fly political banners, or perpetuate age-old feuds. In part, that may be because most Americans don't define themselves by class, as polls indicate. Teams here also aren't religiously identified, even at the college level at Catholic institutions like the University of Notre Dame. Fighting Irish fans come in all creeds and colors, an echo, perhaps, of the freedom of religion on which this country is based.

U.S. fans are bonded less by socioeconomic status or party affiliation than by the simple desire to root for the home team. Winning and losing remains thankfully confined to the gridiron, field, court, and rink. That's no small victory.

Alain Sherter
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Alain Sherter is an award-winning business journalist who has written for The Deal, MarketWatch and Thomson Financial Media. Follow him on Twitter at @Asherter.
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by bread58 February 13, 2012 1:07 PM EST

Or it could just be that the problem is soccer itself, in which the boredom of low scoring is aggravated by frequent ties. If I had paid good money--hell, even Euros--to watch that crap, I'd want to riot, too.

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by lashrito March 15, 2012 1:13 PM EDT: Yes, in the article Mr. Sherter repeatedly attempts to make the issue generic "sports", when all the bloodiest riots are always at soccer games. What makes soccer fans in particular more prone to mob violence should be the focus of attention and study for the sake of prevention.


by Ourania13 February 9, 2012 8:53 AM EST: Americans don't kill over sports, because they do enough killing all over the world and within their own country i mean how many other countries in the world have metal detectors in the schools?????; Reply to this comment


by kobidobidog February 4, 2012 3:53 PM EST: When you think about it sports is a my side, and your side not thinking of the other human as being better than you are. Thinking a human is beneath you less than you can spark a war. The Egyptian police already think mistakenly that they are better than anyone that is not called a police man, and as a result will kill another human as if they are swatting a fly.; Reply to this comment


by LincolnSharp February 4, 2012 2:29 AM EST: I think it has to do with the sport on display. With the contact sports like NFL, Ice Hockey, baseball (at least the striking of the ball with high energy) and rugby, the passion of the crowd is spent on the field. With football/soccer, it is all pent up and let lose on the streets/stands.; Reply to this comment


by benp28 February 3, 2012 3:13 PM EST: I know I wouldn't have wanted to be out and about in College Station as a Texas fan after this years Thanksgiving game...

It is also disgraceful that you use the example of Hillsborough in a story about fans killing each other over sport when it was security and police incompetence that led to the awful tragedy of the 96 fans losing their lives!!!

I think this article completely underestimates the violence attached to sport in the USA because it is often non-lethal and shows a high level of incompetence in reporting disasters from around the globe. Very disappointed; Reply to this comment


by fredisalive February 3, 2012 11:10 AM EST: because we are killing enough overseas already. One has to rest!; Reply to this comment

by Turbidite February 3, 2012 9:30 AM EST

I detect a somewhat racist tinge to this article. Mr. Sherter imples in his title that the Egyptians were "killed", i.e. murdered in the riot, whereas most all were trampled. Not an unfamiliar scene in Latin America and parts of Europe, especially England. The US and Canada have had their fair share of dangerous riots in the past two decades (see ESPN's Page Two for detailed accounts of the many domestic riots). The fact that 74 people perished in Egypt is more due to poor exit facilities and police incompetence. Whhether Mr. Scherter's pointing at egypt was intentionally biased or simply a matter of subconscious discrimination is unknown, but it might be worthwhile checking one's basic motives in reporting.

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by way_out_there February 3, 2012 9:55 AM EST: Police incompetence = unable to stop thousands of people who WANT to riot from rioting.


by guyfrompa46 February 3, 2012 7:21 AM EST: I guess we're excluding Philly?; Reply to this comment


by johnsmith9875 February 3, 2012 1:32 AM EST: I was once threatened by a cashier at a restaurant for wearing a Texas shirt (I was in Oklahoma at the time).

Yes, americans are a peaceful bunch.; Reply to this comment

by hdc77494 February 3, 2012 12:17 AM EST

This incident had very littleto do with sport. According to news reports, thugs with weapons arrived at the stadium at the end if the game, and were allowed in by the police/military, the exits were closed so no one could leave, a large majority were crushed in a stampede to the exits. Lastly, the day before the incident, the military lost a parliment vote to continue martial law. Some believe the incident was staged to make the public fear life without military control. Dig a little deeper CBS, the BBC and NPR had these details 12 hours ago.

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by Egyptian_Reader February 6, 2012 11:38 AM EST: That was exactly what my comment was going to be. Couldn't have worded it better. This had NOTHING to do with sport. To even drive this further, you might not know that the home team WON the game. An occurrence that takes place every few years. They had no motive to go kill 100+ fans of the visiting team...if it were not for the military council seeking retribution. The article is quite absurd; in fact, it comes off as an unfounded/undeserved pat on the back.