It’s always interesting when the media make someone or something a cause. A few may remember, for instance, golf prodigy Michelle Wie. In the early 2000s when she was about 14, the media relentlessly promoted the six-foot lass after she showed promise and boasted of how she was going to beat the men, including then-world number one Tiger Woods. For the media love feminism-buttressing, girl-power stories, and Wie wasn’t complaining: Much like Barack Obama getting a Nobel Peace Prize based on perceived potential, the positive press eventually won the golfer a $50 million Nike contract.
Oh, today, at age 33, Wie just retired, never having come close to being number one on even the women’s tour and having captured only one major tournament. Media hype met reality.
Another girl-power press darling is the U.S. Women’s National Team (USWNT), the soccer ladies who’ve been protesting our National Anthem and who, until recently, were led by purple-haired lesbian Megan Rapinoe. As such, the pseudo-elites and the team’s few fans are crestfallen that the squad just registered its worst World Cup showing yet, falling to Sweden’s gals in the tournament’s round of 16. They’re also upset that the loss has pleased millions of Americans who don’t cotton to the USWNT’s unpatriotic displays.
Of course, the pseudo-elites can’t understand (or pretend they can’t) why anyone dislikes the team and, what’s more, they may even claim it’s unpatriotic to not support it. “Dissent is the highest form of patriotism” is the idea (except when one protests the 2020 election as stolen, or opposes Ukraine aid or anything else leftists in power do). And, unfortunately, no one has as yet drawn the crucial distinction that damns the USWNT’s behavior. (More on that later.)
In reality, the team’s players have distinguished themselves, according to an ex-player, a foreign competitor, and others — as prima donnas with a nauseating sense of entitlement. In other words, they’re disliked because they’re wholly unlikable.
Remarking on this recently, commentator Clay Travis mentioned that the USWNT was loved, including by him, when it won 2015’s World Cup. What changed? And why is the team possibly a shadow of its former self?
“I think the woke nature of their political stance became toxic to the overall brand of the team; they played as ‘individuals,’ and I think Megan Rapinoe led them into a disaster,” Travis said Monday on OutKick The Show. “Rapinoe was asked afterwards what she was ‘most proud of’ in her career; she said equal pay,” he continued, adding perspective. “I think this is an important lesson — first of all, she didn’t say she was proud of something they did on the field; she was proud of something they did off the field.”
Travis went on to state that “United States exceptionalism” is what explains the USWNT’s past excellence. Not only did the human rights we afford women allow the soccer players to cultivate their talents, but “being good at sports is a luxury,” he said — “a luxury that capitalism [read: economic freedom] provides.”
Travis also claimed that the “U.S. women receive a massive amount of pay because of United States exceptionalism.” This, however, is not completely true. Part of that excessive pay is attributable to a cancer in America: political correctness.
That is to say, after the USWNT lost a scrimmage 5-2 (a big score in soccer) to the FC Dallas Academy under-15 squad — young teen boys — it should’ve been clear why they didn’t command the professional men’s pay. But thanks to continual media and political agitation, the market was gamed and the women got a “wokeness bonus.”
Of course, perhaps nothing reflects a spirit of entitlement more than indignantly claiming you deserve pay you don’t. “Entitlement” certainly epitomizes the USWNT, too. Just ask former player Carli Lloyd.
Appearing on her Fox Sports co-worker Alex Lalas’ podcast last week, Lloyd attributed the team’s dismal 2023 showing to a prima donna attitude.
“‘When I first got onto the team, there was just a level of respect for everyone there — for coaches, other players, support staff… massages [sic], trainers, doctors,’ Lloyd said at first,” related the Daily Mail. But this has changed.
After providing examples of how many current players act like princesses lording their status over servants, Lloyd said that there’s now “a level of — I guess not everybody — but a level of entitlement … that everyone’s gonna do everything for you and just not being respectful of others.”
“And as the years have kind of gone by, it’s little stuff, but it kind of amounts to big things, and ultimately affects [performance] on the field,” the paper also relates her as saying.
And some of those big things are mouths. So said Netherlands player Lineth Beerensteyn, explaining recently why the USWNT’s loss pleased her. “From the start of the tournament, they had really big mouths and were already talking about the final,” she stated.
In other words, millions of Americans dislike the USWNT because it’s the kind of squad that lights up a room — when it leaves it.
As for who’s the patriot, Rapinoe’s defenders claim she kneeled during the Anthem because of her patriotism. But if this is true — if she’s protesting our nation for love of country — couldn’t we say we’re protesting the USWNT for love of the team? The truth, however, is that it’s all a lie.
We don’t like the team.
And the team doesn’t like the country.
As to this, a simple point, heretofore unmade, adds perspective. When I was a child my mother would remind us kids, “Don’t wash your dirty laundry in public.” That is, there’s a time and place for everything. If there’s a family problem, you address it in-house; you don’t scandalize the family by impugning it around outsiders.
The same holds true for our national family. Even if the USWNT’s gripes were legitimate, when our Anthem is playing on an international stage would be the wrong time and place to address them. Period.
But this point, simple though it is, may ever elude self-centered, arrogant, entitled people.
