In almost every imaginable scenario, being a soccer fan is the moral equivalent of riding sidecar while a French terrorist tramples a bald eagle with his electric moped.
But we are pleased to have found exceptions to the rule and thrilled to honor some extraordinary soccer fans with a Washington Free Beacon Man of the Year award for their courage, of all things.
Courage, though it may seem antithetical to a sport that glorifies low scores and performative whining, was blaring from the rafters on a warm August night in Frisco, Texas. The crowd was sparse at Toyota Stadium, where Dallas was hosting Nashville in a Major League Soccer showdown. But what they lacked in numbers, they made up for in freedom.
While most of the pandemic-ravaged country was pining for the return of real sports, these improbable heroes proved that #NotAllSoccerFans are morally bankrupt failures who hate America. Players who took a knee during the national anthem were met with a chorus of boos as loud and as glorious as Little Boy's angelic victory crescendo over Hiroshima some 75 years ago.
Bless you, free-thinking soccer fans who shouted down the depraved acolytes of Colin Kaepernick and bellowed in defense of freedom, law and order, endless war, and all that's good in the world. Your soccer-loving souls are almost certainly beyond repair, but your actions on that August night in Frisco, Texas, will echo through eternity.
