logoalt Hacker News

gonzalohmtoday at 4:26 PM3 repliesview on HN

In the US there is lobbying. In Spain there is soccer. I have seen crazy things done just for soccer. The town I used to live in closed my street for a few weeks during one world cup. I wasn't able to use my garage during all that time.

Also, somehow small towns always find money available for soccer related stuff (like building stadiums, events, etc.) but there is no money for improving healthcare or building parks.

I hated that


Replies

greenavocadotoday at 4:52 PM

> Also, somehow small towns always find money available for soccer related stuff (like building stadiums, events, etc.) but there is no money for improving healthcare or building parks.

Bread and circuses. Whatever it takes to suppress the instinctual nationalistic ambitions of the people by redirecting their spirits and energy into /dev/null

show 1 reply
dummydummy1234today at 4:44 PM

... Out of curiosity, why did they close the street? Was it to turn it into public walking space? (I'm trying to imagine a reason and coming up short...)

show 2 replies
FireBeyondtoday at 4:55 PM

> Also, somehow small towns always find money available for soccer related stuff (like building stadiums, events, etc.) but there is no money for improving healthcare or building parks.

I mean Texas can hold a candle there. Nearly 30 high school football stadiums with 10,000+ capacity (and 20,000 in a few cases), built for amounts sometimes exceeding $50M each. Some of the stadiums are shared with track and field etc., but others are "exclusively used by the high school football teams".

show 2 replies