What soccer can teach us about freedom | Marc Bamuthi Joseph

"Soccer is the only thing on this planet that we can all agree to do together," says theater maker and TED Fellow Marc Bamuthi Joseph. Through his performances and an engagement initiative called "Moving and Passing," Joseph combines music, dance and soccer to reveal accessible, joyful connections between the arts and sports. Learn more about how he's using the beautiful game to foster community and highlight issues facing immigrants.

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54 Comments on What soccer can teach us about freedom | Marc Bamuthi Joseph

  1. Soccer? Lol yeah your free to flop, roll on the ground and cry like a little baby every time the opponent simply touches you!! Futbol does take A LOT of skill no denying that but my god the “dives” every 5 minutes gets ridiculous.

    • Majd Anbar true, it does give an unfair advantage in many cases to bigger people, although being fast nd able to slip past defenders is a bit easier for smaller people, also, just to be clear, and i haven’t, I myself don’t actually have anything against football itself and do quite enjoy playing it, my problem with it is the theatre in some occasions of big game football, and the gigantic amount of money it moves, because I don’t really think that one should be payed millions to play any sport.

    • Kiko Tanto well that’s just how big the game has gotten. i mean that’s capitalism for ya nothing you could do about that, there thousands of players that can score 10 goals in a *good* league, hundreds that can score 20 and probably about 30 players can do 30 goals. Now you guys like messi and ronaldo and they’re scoring 60 goals a season, do you blame them for the demand they created for themselves? Of course they’re gonna get millions

    • Majd Anbar nah, I don’t blame them, I just blame the system which prefers giving the people bread and games instead of actually making the world a better place, but as you said, that’s capitalism for ya, and there’s nothing we can do about that.

    • Don’t Waste Time On YouTube it’s not war it’s a game and it’s as much about using your head as it is about your body.you’re gonna tell me these NBA guys aren’t playing the opponent into fouling them in a favorable position? ? it takes a lot of guts to choose to dive instead of shooting in the penalty box especially with a yellow card on the line. Most players can’t do it properly only the really good ones can and they save it for the last few minutes.

    • My theory is it’s about sports dominance. The bigger sport in a country often gets called football where’s you’d have to specify if you referred to a smaller sport by the same name. Still it’s silly to get this worked up about it and often just devolves into a d*** measuring competition.

  2. Football yes. If you can’t say that, try “The Beautiful Game”.
    EVERYONE SHOULD KNOW: ALL other sports who are called football, are called so because the sport doesn’t involve RIDING something. Whether that be a chariot, horse, skates or slaves, it’s a really really stupid fucking reason to call your sport “football” because you use your own two feet to move around and that being the SOLE reason.
    That’s why 99,9% of the world agrees and knows EXACTLY what sport football is. The only one it makes SENSE to have that name for. Wake and smell the coffee slavers, this is the 21st century not the 16th one. Stop having slave names for sports. It’s shameful!

    • Ben Saber but American football requires you to be on your feet too. you got to be rather quick and powerful to score in American football.

    • Ben Saber considering the fact that the game was started by the Mesoamericans,
      We can call it what we want.
      It was then refined by the British to what is now soccer. It was again refined by the desendants of British colonists once the game was back in America.
      Now you have football.

      What do you play basketball with?
      A basketball.

      What do you play baseball with?
      A baseball.

      What do you play tennis with?
      A tennis ball.

      What do you play football with?
      A football.

      What do you play soccer with?
      A soccer ball.

      Ever play golf…

  3. This is why TED is out of touch and American centric. It’s FOOTBALL not soccer. The whole world recognise it as FOOTBALL except the americans.

  4. Why is it allways freemdoms of imagraint to the ethnic European nations. How bout the freedoms of imagaint, white farmrs in South Africa. Let’s talk about thier freedoms & dreams to remain living.

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