I'm a nice guy ... just ask me.

SWISS COURT BANS CARTOON BOOK – BECAUSE ‘IT WOULD DAMAGE BLATTER’S GOOD REPUTATION’

Thin-skinned Sepp Blatter has persuaded a Zurich court to ban a book of jovial cartoons about him.

The power of Blatter to bully Swiss justice officials was revealed when his lawyers wrote to the court insisting that the cartoons, by former footballer and noted graphics artist Olé Andersen, were so damaging that they should issue an immediate ban urgently before actually hearing any arguments from him.

Blatter’s lawyers claimed that he ‘has a good reputation and if the cartoons were published he would never be able to repair the damage.’ ...

See the whole story here (and the court complaint), courtesy of Transparency in Sport.

Kicking Back Comments: Long live the Freedom of Speech and the Press in the US and abroad. I just hope The Platter Cartoons are available in the US soon and I would just love to help 'the cause.'

To Tweet or not to Tweet ... that was the question

Photo courtesy of BBC

For anyone who has been keeping up with the FA Cup and Liverpool's loss to Mann-U on Sunday the 9th, you may have been treated both to some of the decisions Howard Webb made, but also the Twitter fallout by Liverpool winger Ryan Babel (@RyanBabel).

I am not here to debate Webb's decisions that allowed a penalty in the 1' to have Man-U go up 1 - 0, or the later send off. Both are in the video clip below. You can all judge for yourself.

Man United 1-0 Liverpool | The FA Cup 3rd Round - 09/01/11

Uploaded by fatv. - Discover the latest sports and extreme videos.

Instead, I am more interested Mr. Babel's actions on Twitter to edit a picture of Mr. Webb in a Man-U kit (see the picture here) and with the comments shown above. These are detailed in an excellent article from the BBC, Twitter ye not? Also, I am interested in the FA's response in sanctioning Mr. Babel with "improper conduct."

Now, Twitter is an incredible medium to communicate info quickly, 140 characters at a time. If you are reading this you likely already know that, and I hope you follow Kicking Back on Twitter (@kicking_back). My question is should players really be sanctioned for being openly critical in such media?

Please note my use of words, specifically the word critical. My stance is much different when public comments get personal, provocative, or threatening. There is no place for these types of comments at all, regardless of who they are cast at, and equally so when cast at an official. I also have no love for parents slinging criticism to younger referees. They are not ready to understand how to process that rubbish at such a young age. This leads to legions of referees resigning their badge after a year or two and must be stopped.

I have a very different opinion regarding critical comments, parody, and the like, which I believe are absolutely essential speech, even if done in a mean spirited way in the detailed situation. Without this speech, a critical component of discourse is unavailable. Honestly, can you image a match without any critical comments? What fun is that! I mean really ... has anyone logged into Big Soccer lately and looked around? There is an incredible about of information exchange there. While not always "glowing" for some, the opinions shared are largely tremendously insightful and can certainly lead to a good takeaway from those willing to read and understand.

I will got out on a limb here too and support Mr. Babel in his comments. Not because I believe he was correct, but rather because I support his right to do so as necessary discourse in a society. Keep in mind that I am an advocate for the 1st Amendment, and this speech would fall under this amendment, but also understand that this does not extend outside the US. For free speech principles on the internet in the US see Reno v. ACLU (51 U.S. 844) where SCOTUS struck down the CDA.

That said, I believe the FA is asking for trouble in this regard. To begin to sanction players for their comments in any media is a slippery slope. Again, personal, provocative, or threatening is another matter and should be dealt with fully by the FA. These comments however were clearly not that. An opinion was expressed, accompanied by a very clever picture showing the same displeasure. I somehow think that Mr. Webb's first reaction was hardly fear or anger. I'd be willing to bet that his first reaction was a snicker and a smile. Why does the FA need to turn into the "Twitter Police" over this?

While I appreciate the FA riding in on its white horse to save Mr. Webb from the wounding words slung by Mr. Babel, somehow I believe the referee from the 2010 World Cup final is up to that particular challenge.

Ex-FIFA referee looks at Germany-Serbia officiating and Klose's ejection

The author of this article, L. E. Eisenmenger (as seen on http://soccerlens.com/) has reached out to me over concerns of correctly citing the authorship of this work.


As stated in the "legal stuff" portion of this blog, Kicking Back is dedicated to respect of copyrights and wants to get these issues right.


While Kicking Back does not believe any violation has occurred, this particular post has been removed for the time being until such redaction or (optimally) additional permission is secured to re-post in full ... as this is a truly excellent article.


Stay tuned for more, and thanks for reading.

The rats are already leaving the ship

Well, the 2010 World Cup is over for the USA team and the news certainly reflected that. Take a look at the following headlines:
Ghana eliminates the United States in the 2010 World Cup
Ghana with the Win II: a sorry sequel
Africa soaks up Ghana's World Cup win over the USA
Ghana: Black Stars Cruise Into Q-Final, Play Uruguay Friday

What frosts my cookie is headlines like these, and the image they portrait:
Americans Have No One to Blame but Themselves
World Cup Soccer Dreams End Saturday
US needs creative touch to reach next level at World Cup

... and my personal favorite:
Loss shows US not ready for soccer's big time yet 

I mean, come on. The author of this last piece (Nancy Armour) has to be kidding. This type of vapid reporting about the game in the US is one of the issues, I believe, with the game not reaching its full potential. Take a look at her bio. Wow, she is a figure skating writer too. How much real experience does she have with the game? Or for that matter, any of the sports she writes about?

Contrast that with someone like Grant Wahl (bio) who has been around the game and, in my opinion, actually takes the time to understand what is going on. Take a look at his blog here. This is great stuff. Insightful. Hard hitting. Asks the right questions generally. In short, he and SI care about what is going on.

This is not to call out any particular reporter (it just worked out that way), but to make the point about how incredibly fickle the United States is to the game, and in particular the international game. There are a number of issues here beyond the press that include, FIFA, US Soccer, US Youth Soccer, MLS, WPS and the performance of the teams, the US press, how we are seen in the world, and yes, us as referees. Any one of these acting alone will not get the US on the world stage, and keep us there as so many of us want to be, but rather it has to be a team effort with all of these forces acting in concert, knowingly or not.

This particular rant just touches on how in general it would seem the US press are like a bunch of rats, now leaving the SS World Cup as the USA exits from the tournament. What concerns me more is those in the press who never got on the ship in the first place.

Who is JAFO?

As many of you have seen, there is a contributor listed named JAFO. A couple of readers have asked who that is. JAFO is someone who occasionally may contribute to the posts but wishes to remain anonymous. 

Again speaking from my legal training, the right to speak anonymously has been upheld again and again by the US Supreme Court (SCOTUS). One example for those who want to fall asleep is Talley v. California 362 U.S. 60 (1960) which stands for the proposition that "... identification and fear of reprisal might deter perfectly peaceful discussions of public matters of importance."

I believe we can operate within this fora in this manner without undermining its effectiveness. I am more willing to hide the identity of some contributors who do so in good faith and for legitimate reasons that not have these folks contribute at all, as their posts are valuable and provide a perspective I can not.

A historical example is Benjamin Franklin, his pseudonym Silence Dogood was a staple in James Franklin's paper the New England Courant. This middle aged widow character looked at the world through a particularly "cracked" lens and allowed Ben to protect himself from any public scrutiny that may result. Same here at Kicking-Back.

The name JAFO is actually an acronym.  If you really want to know what JAFO stands for, check out the 80's film called Blue Thunder.

Now one person who is not masking their identity is me, your humble host. I believe it is critical to have one "face" to show that we mean business and stand behind what is written here. As I have offered before, and I do so again now, if there are ideas for future entries, or a topic you want to spin up, please feel free to contact me here, or post directly to the blog entries, and we can make that happen.