[philippejara]

As a brazillian, as I assume you also are, can't help but disagree. The ratio of good to bad is at most 9-1 in my experience, and I say this with no exaggeration. The only time I can remember people really talking shit about his personal was in the ~2013 protests when he called for protesters to watch the cup(?) or something instead of protest, his illegitimate daughter is mostly a footnote when talking about his personal life for better or for worse, the man's affair with xuxa is far more of a topic of discussion.

[wyclif]

Pelé certainly has a much better reputation than, say, Maradona.

[emondi]

Maradona was anti-establishment. Compare Pelé with Sócrates for example https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S%C3%B3crates

[chucke]

Maradona was left-wing friendly, same as Sócrates, which is somehow seen more positively by the crowds. And while Sócrates gets credit for participating at rallies and protests and actually walking the walk, I've never seen Maradona rallying with the people, just benefitting from Cuban public health service.

Despite having been a politician, Pelé rarely discussed preferences, as he was aware of repercussions to his image. In that regard, he can be compared with Michael "republicans also buy sneakers too" Jordan.

[thanatropism]

s/the crowds/sports journos/

[baby]

If he was Brazilian he would have said football not soccer

[grardb]

This isn't necessarily true. I recently met someone from Brazil who used the word "soccer" when speaking English. As an American living in Europe who's met people from all over the world, I've noticed that it's actually quite common for people to do that if the English they've been exposed to most is American English, especially if that was the dialect they were formally taught. In the case of Brazil, I'm pretty sure that American English is what would be taught in most schools.

[wirrbel]

As a German the game is Fußball (literally: football), but I just regularly say soccer in english because I cannot be bothered into finding out what the people I converse with think that football is and soccer is understood by everyone to be association football, i.e. the sport where the only hand that can be used is t̶h̶e̶ ̶h̶a̶n̶d̶ ̶o̶f̶ ̶m̶a̶r̶a̶d̶o̶n̶a̶ the hand of god.

[irrational]

I’m American and I say football instead of soccer (I use American Football for the other sport).

[zxexz]

Don’t you find that leads to unnecessary confusion? I use football if I’m out of the US, but in the US I’ve only heard people say soccer unless they’re being pretentious or recently moved here/on holiday.

[philippejara]

I myself end up using soccer at times due to reflex, a mixture of learning american english and never reading/talking about american football hence barely seeing the word football being used, given the vast majority of english speaking media is US-based. It's not as uncommon as it may initially seem.

[CyanBird]

Pleas don't pollute hackernews with useless comments

Thank you

[EL_Loco]

As a brazilian, I agree with you. Pretty much everybody I know likes Pelé.