Ratlands

I am not an advocate of violence for the sake of violence.  I prefer “peace through superior firepower.”  Unfortunately, there are some situations where normal logic and rational thought just don’t apply (no, I am not, in this instance, referring to either major political party).

Football (what we Americans refer to as soccer) is one of those.  From Rantings of a Sandmonkey (who is a relatively sane individual whose political commentary is interesting and worth a look if you aren’t familiar with him) on the upcoming World Cup qualifying match between Egypt and Algeria

You see, here is the thing about Algerians: They are fuckin nuts. For real. Violence is their thing. Something is not right with those people in general, but especially when it comes to football. Whenever we played a game there in the past year, the fans , at the very least, will throw rocks and rockets at our players. And as if that wasn’t enough, some algerians burned the egyptian flag in the streets and starting making songs about what a bunch of sissies Egyptians are. Given that we are a country that worships football, and not big on being called sissies, even by crazy algerians, the egyptian people decided that they will escalate, and declare war back on Algeria.

(…)

The game is on Saturday, which means there are still 48 hours to go during which at least 3000 angry Algerians will be gracing the streets of Cairo, which are already filled with crazed Egyptian fans. Something tells me this won’t end well, which is awesome news for me. I am hoping someone burns the stadium down. It’s been a while since we had a pretty fire, and I think the Algerians might just be the kind of people who will oblige me. In other news, I am totally parking my car in a private garage that day.

In between the parts I excerpted are the details of all the incidents that have occurred so far (team bus attacked, an appeal from a tv show for Egyptians to go “hang out” at the hotel where the Algerian team is staying, owls being sacrificed, an Algerian hacker putting an Israeli flag on the Egyptian FA website, etc.).  I know Americans are crazy about sports, but this is a whole ‘nother level of crazy.

Should be an interesting weekend.