Growing up and living most of my life in Victoria, I can only really speak on AFL.

As far as I can see, it's not only an issue of the AFL being fearful of football, but rather it is part of the whole culture of Aussie Rules that football must be denigrated.

As kids growing up in the 70's and 80's in Victoria, we were taught/indoctrinated by our families (those with anglo celtic backgrounds), the anglophile media and wider cultural interactions that this Victorian sport of Aussie Rules was the 'be all and end all' of sports, and nothing else could come close to it, except maybe cricket over summer. That attitude was all pervasive. Part of going along with that was having to eschew any support for 'foreign sports' including sokkah, and for Victorians, that also included  'Rugby' (as both union and league were referred to). Shit, I didn't even know there were 2 rugby codes til I was about 20.



It seems to me, supporting Aussie Rules and criticising other sports actually had a lot to do with defining a 'cultural identity' of what it meant to be Victorian, and Australian, and I'm assuming the same thing occurred with Aussie Rules in TAS, WA, SA and Rugby League in NSW, Qld. I reckon both Ausse Rules and Rugby League actively encouraged denigration of sokkah as the outsiders sport, what with all those new australians playing it and ethnic clubs. I reckon that a lot of this was heightened from the 1950's-60's as part of the backlash to the post war migration boom which brought so many greeks, italians, croatians etc to melbourne, and I'm extrapolating that to other cities. Tell me if I'm wrong. 

The AFL and NRL were still generally semi professional and suburban without national competitions, up until the 1990's. Before that time, I don't think it was so much 'fear' of other sports from an economic point of view, but as I've said above, a cultural cringe, a part backlash/fear response against post war migration, and the need for each state/major city/area to validate it's own culture and say we are better than elsewhere, and our unique homegrown sport is part of that, therefore that sport must be better than other sports. This last point is particularly the case in the "Who's better, Sydney/Melbourne?" argument that used to always be talked about. 

As such, I genuinely believe that it became part of the psyche of those following those sports that they should talk down sokkah. I reckon this is the case even with people that were exposed to football as kids. I'm sure everyone in their 40's onwards knows someone who as a kid of migrants didn't follow football like their dad, but became an avid AFL/NRL fan, and now criticise the round ball game. 

I think that after the AFL and NRL became professional and national, yes, there was a more heightened commercial imperative to suppress football, and of course, a degree of genuine fear that football will take some revenue and support away from their sports. I think that has only increased since the A league and the socceroos continued qualification for world cups. It has also become incredibly sophisticated and well disguised.

Eating hotdogs and NFL matches... Sounds Like their offseason media articles already.

Well I saw this article today

Next stop for International Rules? USA Test - AFL.com.au

Thats an official site article saying they will play mongrel AFL in Boston or Phillie because there are Irish decedents there. 

Whats the point?
Will be a massive media ordeal for the southern states. Everything from players eating hot dogs to visiting an NFL game and comparing who is tougher I guess. 

Eating hotdogs and NFL matches... Sounds Like their offseason media articles already.

Sport has always been a key part of national identity, even if we like to think it isn’t. In a lot of former colonies of the British, in the 19th century, people wanted to consider themselves free of foreign domination, and to forge a national identity for themselves. Sport was part of this. Every country wanted a unique pastime that was different to the stale pastimes of the old world, especially free from British influence.

Canada invented Ice Hockey, Australia invented AFL. The USA invented Baseball, Basketball and NFL. Each country played them and excelled in them because the people of that era wanted their own unique pastime or way of life.

The urge to promote and protect AFL comes from a Nationalistic and Protectionist instinct. AFL is the Australian game, therefore anyone who promotes another winter code is unAustralian. If you move to Australia, especially to the southern states, you are expected to assimilate. You do so by following an AFL team.

If you live in Melbourne and you don’t follow AFL, you are “disloyal to Australia and Victoria”.

In Sydney it’s less about Nationalism and more about class. Rugby League split from Rugby Union over the issue of player payments and professionalism. Rugby League became “the workingman’s game” because players actually got paid.

In Sydney until about 20 years ago, If you followed Rugby Union, Football or AFL, you were being “disloyal to the working class”. And if you were upper class and you followed league, you were seen as “mixing with the unwashed masses”.

Cricket and Football are the only two team sports in Australia that could ever hope to bridge all of these class and national divides and create an inclusive national identity.

Cricket isn’t a threat, because it’s played in summer. But Football is. It’s international, and it’s outward looking. It’s a non-contact sport. It’s multicultural as opposed to Assimilation. It’s followed by all social classes.

It is everything that the egg ball codes can never be, and that’s why they want to destroy it.

I've never seen it as AFL & NRL vs Football. To me it has always been the sport of AR vs everything they see as a competitor

10 days ago, all of our competitors (Cricket, NRL, Super 15, NBL, etc), publically wished the Socceroos good luck in their playoff against Honduras. There was 1 governing body of 1 sport that was conspicuously silent. 

So the AFL are the Lannisters and football is Daenerys Targaryen with her army of Unsullied and Dothraki?

Dont think its been metioned but aussie rules in melbourne has long had the backing of the wog communities, particulaly as the clubs are traditionally placed in the inner city suburbs. The membership take up of italians and greeks would leave most round ball people horrified.

Why do so many football people despise AFL so much? I think it's cool that Australia has its own game, which is actually pretty fun to both play and watch if you just manage to suppress this ridiculous eurosnob prejudice that a lot of Aussie football fans tend to wear as a badge of honour. In this respect, how are we any better than the likes of Sheahan and that other anti-soccer guy whose name I don't remember? All I see on this forum is ridicule towards afl and its fans. Why should they accept us when we're just as ignorant about and dismissive of their game as they are of ours? 

Welcome back Pippinu!!

Why do so many football people despise AFL so much? I think it's cool that Australia has its own game, which is actually pretty fun to both play and watch if you just manage to suppress this ridiculous eurosnob prejudice that a lot of Aussie football fans tend to wear as a badge of honour. In this respect, how are we any better than the likes of Sheahan and that other anti-soccer guy whose name I don't remember? All I see on this forum is ridicule towards afl and its fans. Why should they accept us when we're just as ignorant about and dismissive of their game as they are of ours? 

I'd suggest you do your homework on the subject, but here's the bottom-line: they began this sh1tfight many decades ago, but we're the only ones who can finish it - once we get our house in order so as to enable it:exclamation:

Just on cricket though, I'd be VERY surprised if Australia is still a Test-status ICC member in 30+ years' time. It will def lose cultural traction in future(& the process has already begun, IMHO) for the lack of international variety about it, to say nothing of the fact most migrants to this country have been/continue to be from places where it doesn't exist. Me personally, I've never seen the big deal about Australia being among the very best @ something for all intents&purposes played only by 12 nations...

And onto CarlitoG's post, no doubt you're referring to this absolute tragicomedy:

Dont think its been metioned but aussie rules in melbourne has long had the backing of the wog communities, particulaly as the clubs are traditionally placed in the inner city suburbs. The membership take up of italians and greeks would leave most round ball people horrified.

In Sydney it’s less about Nationalism and more about class. Rugby League split from Rugby Union over the issue of player payments and professionalism. Rugby League became “the workingman’s game” because players actually got paid.

Growing up and living most of my life in Victoria, I can only really speak on AFL.

As far as I can see, it's not only an issue of the AFL being fearful of football, but rather it is part of the whole culture of Aussie Rules that football must be denigrated.

As kids growing up in the 70's and 80's in Victoria, we were taught/indoctrinated by our families (those with anglo celtic backgrounds), the anglophile media and wider cultural interactions that this Victorian sport of Aussie Rules was the 'be all and end all' of sports, and nothing else could come close to it, except maybe cricket over summer. That attitude was all pervasive. Part of going along with that was having to eschew any support for 'foreign sports' including sokkah, and for Victorians, that also included  'Rugby' (as both union and league were referred to). Shit, I didn't even know there were 2 rugby codes til I was about 20.



It seems to me, supporting Aussie Rules and criticising other sports actually had a lot to do with defining a 'cultural identity' of what it meant to be Victorian, and Australian, and I'm assuming the same thing occurred with Aussie Rules in TAS, WA, SA and Rugby League in NSW, Qld. I reckon both Ausse Rules and Rugby League actively encouraged denigration of sokkah as the outsiders sport, what with all those new australians playing it and ethnic clubs. I reckon that a lot of this was heightened from the 1950's-60's as part of the backlash to the post war migration boom which brought so many greeks, italians, croatians etc to melbourne, and I'm extrapolating that to other cities. Tell me if I'm wrong. 

The AFL and NRL were still generally semi professional and suburban without national competitions, up until the 1990's. Before that time, I don't think it was so much 'fear' of other sports from an economic point of view, but as I've said above, a cultural cringe, a part backlash/fear response against post war migration, and the need for each state/major city/area to validate it's own culture and say we are better than elsewhere, and our unique homegrown sport is part of that, therefore that sport must be better than other sports. This last point is particularly the case in the "Who's better, Sydney/Melbourne?" argument that used to always be talked about. 

As such, I genuinely believe that it became part of the psyche of those following those sports that they should talk down sokkah. I reckon this is the case even with people that were exposed to football as kids. I'm sure everyone in their 40's onwards knows someone who as a kid of migrants didn't follow football like their dad, but became an avid AFL/NRL fan, and now criticise the round ball game. 

I think that after the AFL and NRL became professional and national, yes, there was a more heightened commercial imperative to suppress football, and of course, a degree of genuine fear that football will take some revenue and support away from their sports. I think that has only increased since the A league and the socceroos continued qualification for world cups. It has also become incredibly sophisticated and well disguised.

Agree and most of them deride soccer like no tommorow.