@terryb @serge And actually, come to think of it, I don't think the point you say I missed is actually a particularly good one- "Football" isn't what the world calls it, they have different names in different languages, many of them a cognate to football, but that falls off outside of European languages pretty quick. Japan calls it "Sakkaa", for example. Soccer. It's "Sokker" in Afrikaans. China calls it zuqiu, which is football.

I forget what they call Mt. Everest in the Himalayas, but you get my point. Different languages means different names get to all be correct.

@terryb @serge That's really funny. See, the reading I've done on it told me that football and rugby were evolving apart at the time, and all three sports were getting their names. Brits named soccer soccer and football football. Football died a quick death in the UK in favor of rugby. We kept those names, though.

That brits see our use of the name football as American exceptionalism instead of just being a different convention (which is absolutely is, nobody here actually puffs up their chest about it, much less gives it much thought) makes me wonder if there's not some of the old British Empire thinking bubbling up. I've seen it a number of times around the world in the form of Brits being able to speak the local language yet refusing to.

I'm reminded of how the world complains that they can't wrap their heads around how we measure things, and call us stupid for it. The best part is that we know and use metric all the time.