Come on En-ger-land!

See this guy in the picture, he's not patriotic, he's a nutter. Albeit a harmless nutter. (Oh it's not there anymore. Oh well. Basically it was an eccentric old guy with his body and house all decked out like a neo nazi) Maybe it's where I live but once upon a time all the things I used to view as a novelty and fairly endearing such as barbecues, laminate flooring and small gatherings of the community to watch the football are quite, quite unbearable. Common. I realise that my hatred and derision partly stem from my general dislike of most people but the fear goes deeper. It's the fear of hysteria spilling over and infecting everything, transforming all our lives, dumbing it down further than it is already. And when it's been adopted by the chavs as well, well their tack becomes our tack.

This commercialisation of world cup fever in part isn't just fuelled by The Sun but the supermarkets. You can get England themed tents, sunglasses, pillow cases, wigs, shirts, boots, cakes, bead, tic-tacs, erm flags, bunting, cigs, burgers, pens, gobstoppers, dogs, pubs, council houses, car kits, tortoises, calculators, and lipstick. I tried looking for French and Italian flags in the suprmarket but they didn't have them. It's not so much the ubiquity of it that worries me but the aggression behind it, the mentality, the force behind 'Come on En-ger-land!', not being a rallying cry but almost a call to arms, with death to those who refuse to join in, or get in their bloody way. It's the threat of the English defence league and the BNP, the fear, oh yes, the fear that woe betide us all if England don't at least win the world cup, as our immigrants and basically anyone will get it.

I do love the world cup. Not as much as I used to. The loss of interest is because of the commercialisation, is because of the sponsorships, the naff world cup themed ads and how it's hi-jacked and allowed everyone on to its bandwagon who may have been indifferent. 1982's finals in Spain which remain a big part of my childhood and my life, being the first one I engaged with and even filled duplicate Panini sticker albums is precious to me. I don't want it's memory tainted. I don't want the world cup to be a game of one upmanship on which house has the most ridiculous England decorations and union jacks. It's one of the reasons I'm losing interest. I blame supermarkets, 1966, Euro 96 and people for it being dumbed down. And I blame James Corden for being effortlessly unfunny for trying to hi-jack his own place in its televisual history, the gobshite, with his really shit programme.

So I'll be pleased if England don't do too well. Not because  it'll upset people. I just won't be able to bear the street parties, the forced jollity and the media banging on and on about it, the way they do about 1966, Euro 96, Germans, Argentina, the hand of God and the second world fucking war. Get over it.