There is a lot of hate in this world. You would think that given the age and current state of our league we would welcome any new fans to the fold with open arms. But you would be wrong. Soccer is the only sport in the United States where the fans speak against other fans with such vitriol. In baseball, fans in Yankee shirts can sit in Fenway Park with only the occasional obligatory curse. You may say “I hate Red Sox fans” as a general statement, but there is not the seething resentment that is found in the hatred of one team’s supporters over another’s. In football, hockey, and basketball, it is much the same.

Maybe it’s the immaturity of the league, maybe it’s the nature of the sport itself. Let’s face it, soccer supporters are a passionate bunch. Fans of opposing teams in the English Premiere League have long been known for hooliganism. Supporters in Serie A physically assault players on the pitch by throwing coins at them during corner kicks. And a Deportivo La Coruna fan died at the hands of Atletico Madrid supporters in La Liga.

At least in MLS we haven’t escalated to that level, but the seeds are there, in the clashes that start, priming the beast for stupid behavior in real life before or after the match. The supporters in MLS are a very closed circuit group. Only those within your tribe are true believers. You and you alone are the ones who support your team and the league in the proper manner. All other fans are idiots. They are “plastic” and “casual”. They are not the truly faithful. God forbid they let it be known that they actually watch any of the European leagues or that they admit that the level of play in Europe is better. Then they are Eurosnobs and can’t be true lovers of MLS.

MLS cultivated this culture to bring the league out of the niche market it created of soccer moms, mini-vans, and the suburbs in the early years. They encouraged the supporters groups to be edgier than the fans of other sports. They marketed this hooliganism-lite as a true soccer experience.  But as MLS grows it will no longer be able to control this atmosphere. The risk is that as the league grows so too will our culture and unless we are careful our form of hooliganism could quickly escalate into its uglier European cousin. 

We can change this. We can choose to do it better. Soccer fans version 2.0. Although something tells this writer we won’t. The league is still young at only twenty years old. Rivalries in Europe have been built over a century of team meetings. In our rush to catch up and have a culture of our own we import a lot. We import players, we import club names and we import chants. Let’s not also import the ugliness of hooliganism.