Cancel The World Cup
One of the opening brawls during a February 2025 hockey game between the United States and Canada. Image taken from The Independent.
Now, I need to get one thing out of the way: I don’t normally care about professional sports. Like, at all. The outcome only really matters to me insofar as if the Boston teams win, the people around me are going to be in a better mood.
That being said, it needs to be said that the World Cup is scheduled for next year. It will be jointly hosted by Canada, Mexico, and the United States. As much as it pains me to say this, I believe that the USA should be stripped of its host status for the event. Here I’ll present some reasons why.
First of all, it’s never been safe to host the World Cup in the USA. Even before Donald Trump was elected in 2016 and reelected in 2024, gun violence has been an enormous stain on the nation. In fact, even before the current set of travel warnings against us due to Trump’s immigration enforcement leading to foreign tourists getting detained, there were still plenty of advisories about the risk of being caught in a mass shooting.
This isn’t hypothetical, either. While foreign tourists have historically rarely been victims of mass shootings, it has happened before. As an example, four Canadian citizens lost their lives in the 2017 Las Vegas shooting at a music festival. And the massacres have only accelerated since 2017.
Sure, people might say “But Saclux, they held a World Cup in South Africa.” And that’s true, they did. While South Africa has an overall higher crime rate than the United States, there’s a lot of nuance to be had here. Even though I’ve never been to South Africa, I’d imagine that in that country, you know where the dangerous places are and to avoid them.
In the USA, by contrast, danger is everywhere. The top five deadliest mass shootings in American history were at the aforementioned music festival, an LGBTQ+ nightclub, a university, an elementary school, and a church. Even if Trump were not President, I wouldn’t blame any foreign spectators and/or teams if they don’t feel safe.
Aftermath of the 2024 Kansas City parade shooting, which followed that year’s Super Bowl. Image taken from People.com.
The picture above is from Kansas City after the 2024 Super Bowl. It just so happens that Kansas City is one of the places that is to host a soccer game for the World Cup. But given what happened there just last year, will teams feel safe playing anywhere in America? It’s doubtful, and I don’t blame them whatsoever.
Some people might point out that the World Cup will have a crazy amount of security for both players and spectators. And that’s also true. But if someone crazy enough to attack a World Cup venue is that determined, they can still cause a lot of damage in the security line.
As horrific as all mass shootings are, they’re not the only reason why the United States should not be allowed to host the World Cup next year. Gun violence happened under Biden too, after all.
Lately, Trump has been detaining foreign tourists left and right. The Salvadoran man whom the Supreme Court ordered Trump to “facilitate the return of”? This illegitimate President is defying that order. To be fair, he’s probably already dead given what we know about Bukele’s prisons.
It’s not just Garcia, though. There are many cases of detained tourists, including from countries that are our former allies. When Russia did this to Brittney Griner a few years ago, it was shocking and received tons of rightful condemnation. But we’ve grown numb to this as Americans, just as we’ve grown numb to so many other atrocities.
And let me be clear: These detentions we hear about on the news are likely only the tip of the iceberg. It’s probably happened to hundreds or even thousands of people since Trump returned to office. Yes, it probably won’t happen to members of a World Cup team, but is that a risk they want to take? Or, more to the point, do they want to support a country that detains tourists from countries that are supposed to be their allies?
This is to say nothing of US-Canada relations, which are at an all-time low right now. Trump has repeatedly called Canada the “51st state”, and that isn’t going to happen without an invasion. Maybe he is joking, but should we risk World War III by assuming that? Even if he isn’t serious, this rhetoric is incredibly dangerous, and Canada will never trust us again for anything that requires longer than a four-year commitment.
The invasion threats are a joke until they aren’t.
Of course, if America actually invades Canada within the next year, the World Cup will probably be canceled anyway. Whether or not the United States can host it will be the least of anyone’s worries. Even if the invasion does not occur, it’s going to be a shitshow of epic proportions.
The final reason I’m going to present is not explicitly political - it’s merely practical.
I’m far from the first person to make this observation, but public transit in the United States is absolute ass. This is no secret - we prefer our gas-guzzling cars and getting stuck in giant traffic jams. Maybe not all of us (I for one would love better and cleaner transportation infrastructure), but enough of us that it remains this way.
Most of the stadiums that have held World Cup matches have contained abundant transport links for modes that weren’t car-based. Say what you will about Russia in 2018, but at least their major cities have metros. That is not the case in America.
Two sports stadiums in Arlington, Texas, USA. The stadium in the background is the AT&T Stadium, which is to host several World Cup games in 2026. Image taken from r/CityPorn.
Pictured here is AT&T stadium in Arlington, Texas. It is currently scheduled to host multiple games during the 2026 FIFA World Cup. Fun fact: Per Wikipedia, it’s going to temporarily change its name to “Dallas Stadium” in accordance with FIFA’s rules against corporate-sponsored names.
But look at that. As the image’s caption from r/CityPorn said, there is no public transportation in sight. And that’s because none exists in Arlington, Texas. As car-dependent as most of the United States is, Texas takes the sprawl to a whole nother level. The traffic jam out of the stadium is going to be legendary, and it’s going to lead to another deluge of international shame on the United States. As if we needed more shame!
Arlington isn’t the only stadium in the US that’s like this. Even Gillette Stadium in Massachusetts, one of the states with better public transportation (which, to borrow a phrase from Not Just Bikes, is like saying you have a better-smelling outhouse), still sees lots of car traffic. There’s a reason why the tradition of hanging out before a sporting event is referred to as “tailgating” in America. But enough about that.
With regards to the transit situation, we can look at one potential silver lining. If FIFA chooses to disregard one random blogger’s advice and host the World Cup in the United States anyway, it’s going to be a mess and an international embarrassment for America. But on the bright side, if enough Americans see how insane we are as a country, we might actually agitate for change, including more walkable cities that have viable alternatives to driving. If it takes a disastrous World Cup to show us that we need to mobilize for a better country, then so be it.
But I wouldn’t count on it.
