Brazilians are supposed to be so football-crazy they’d do anything to host a World Cup. Sure enough, the 2014 World Cup will be held in Brazil.
So are the people rejoicing? Not exactly. They are, millions of them, out in the streets protesting against the billions their government is spending on the extravaganza. By the looks of it, the government isn’t long for this world.
So where does this leave our stereotype?
Or take another sport, tennis. A country is supposed to spend a lot of money to produce champions, right? So Britain spends £61 million a year and we have exactly one man in the world’s top 200.
Poland, on the other hand, spends £900,000 a year, and they have two players in Wimbledon’s last eight.
There goes another stereotype, tumbling down like the walls of Jericho.
And now for something less trivial: the Middle East is craving for democracy, isn’t it?
To satisfy that craving, the West, led by the Americans with their usual panache, has been fomenting trouble in the Middle East for over a decade.
Millions have died, stable regimes have been destabilised, armies of refugees have been set adrift, billions have been spent, a few nasty leaders have been killed and others ousted, civil wars have become either a reality or a distinct possibility.
Yet if you listen to the neocons of both American and British vintage, it has all been in a good cause: bringing democracy to the region.
You see, the pursuit of happiness enshrined in the American Declaration of Independence has to lead people to the voting booth every few years.
That’s where happiness awaits, in the booth. Once they get there they’ll be deliriously ecstatic. Perhaps not quite so happy as the Americans are, but as near as damn.
This is a stereotypical idea sold to those who either can’t or won’t think for themselves. The binary notion is beautiful in its simplicity: democracy is good, anything else is bad.
Surely everyone understands that? The whole world wants to be just like the US of A, doesn’t it? Well then, the whole world wants to be democratic.
Take Egyptians, for example. They got their democracy a year ago, and they’re all happy as a sandboy. Of course, their free elections brought to power the kind of chaps who think all infidels must die, but that’s the way the couscous crumbles.
We may not like our democratically elected leaders, but as long as they are indeed democratically elected, we must all be happy. Consent of the governed, right? When a quarter of the population votes a government in, they’ve given consent on the part of the other three quarters as well.
That’s democracy, isn’t it? That’s what the whole world wants. Can’t be happy without it.
Egyptians are like that too. That is to say they’re just like us. Now they have their democracy, they’re happy. They… hold on a moment…
What’s that on the news? Is that millions of them demonstrating in the streets of Cairo, Alexandria and every other place with a population greater than the Man City squad? Is that protesters getting killed? Is that civil war about to break out?
Is that the army saying such non-democratic things as “We swear to God that we will sacrifice even our blood for Egypt and its people, to defend them against any terrorist, radical or fool”?
Now when army spokesmen in those parts say they’re ready to sacrifice ‘even their blood’ fighting their own people, what they really mean is that they’re ready to shoot said people like rabbits.
Of course terrorists, one can understand. Even radicals, if they’re too radical. But going to war against fools, that’s a bit much. Perhaps those chaps don’t quite grasp the principal idea of democracy: a fool’s vote weighs as much as yours or mine.
And since there are more fools than people like you or me, they are much more important. A democracy doesn’t shoot fools; it puts them on a pedestal, so democratic politicians don’t have to bend to kiss fools’ backsides.
Nor do the broad masses of Egyptians seem to realise that in a democracy it’s not street riots but elections that are supposed to bring governments down. You know, you make your choice, you live with it. Until the next election all you can do is grin and bear it – not take on the country’s armed forces.
Perhaps, just perhaps – and I hope the skies won’t open and the God of Democracy won’t smite me with lightning for saying this – people in the Middle East aren’t really democrats at heart.
No, perish the thought. Of course they are. The whole world is – the neocons have told us so. The Middle Easterners are desperate to become just like the Midwesterners. All it takes is a few laser-guided bombs for them to see the light (and presumably hear the bang). Flash, bang, and Bashir is your uncle, Fatima is your aunt.
If you think there’s anything wrong with this scenario, you’re rejecting one of the most cherished stereotypes of modernity. Shame on you – and shame on me for feeling the same way.