Nationalism, Patriotism, and Colonial Identities
Part 1 of this essay established the Ryder Cup’s structural architecture of coloniality; a binary format that excludes the Global South, a racially flexible definition of Europe that privileges whiteness over geography, and a facade of post-racial inclusion that obscures the exploitation of racialised migrant labour. My contention in Part 1 was that the event is premised upon inherited colonial structures, and that it actively performs and reproduces these structures through nationalist pageantry, militaristic rhetoric, and economic extraction.
Today in Part 2, I examine how these performances escalate the colonial logics identified earlier, transforming the golf course into a theatre of authoritarian nationalism and neocolonial capital accumulation. The 2025 edition at Bethpage reveals what happens when the Fortress West’s veneer of civility cracks under pressure, exposing the violence that was always latent within its design.
From the moment national anthems echo across the course, the Ryder Cup becomes a staged performance of nationalist fervour. The European side in particular necessitates a curious paradox, English, Spanish, German and Scandinavian identities are temporarily subsumed under an abstract Team Europe, embraced only to confront the American other. Commentators routinely invoke militaristic metaphors, “invading” fairways, “capturing” holes, “defending” territory, transforming the course into colonial terrain. The rhetoric harks back to the language of conquest; the players are recast as proxies in a geopolitical struggle.
This theoretical framework erupted into visceral reality at the 2025 Ryder Cup at Bethpage. As the Guardian reported, the “New York-loud” atmosphere quickly devolved into “venomous” abuse, with European players like Rory McIlroy subjected to homophobic slurs, crude insults about their families, and relentless personal attacks. This was not mere partisanship, but a performance of “a certain politics of humiliation,” amplified by the presence of Donald Trump. The event became a case study in how the Ryder Cup’s martial nationalism, when fused with a modern political culture that “applauds ‘saying the quiet part out loud,’” can normalise and licence outright bigotry, transforming the course from colonial terrain into a hostile ground where the us-versus-them binary is enforced not just with chants, but with slurs.
We are slowly getting used to the Trump doctrine of authoritarian populism, a form of governance that cements exclusionary rhetoric with institutional capture and performative spectacles of sovereignty. Looked at in this way, the Ryder Cup 2025 is nothing less than a case study in how sport can be mobilised to normalise authoritarian affect and policy aims.
Economics and Neocolonialism
Looking back to the 2023 Ryder Cup in Rome we can see how local culture is commodified for corporate profit. Official sponsors (BMW, Rolex, Citi, Aon, Capgemini, Hilton and DP World) aligned Italianness with luxury consumption and global capital. Italy’s Ministry of Tourism promoted Made in Italy products, packaged local cuisine and heritage as premium extras in VIP-only pavilions. 271,000 visitors generated 318,000 commercial bed-nights, driving up accommodation costs and displacing long-term residents from the Rome market. Framed as economic development, these interventions channel revenue into multinational coffers and infrastructure upgrades managed by large contractors, perpetuating neocolonial patterns of public-asset appropriation for private gain. Similar economic patterns were again on view at Bethpage.
Camaraderie
Advocates of the Ryder Cup insist it embodies the pinnacle of sportsmanship, unity and transatlantic friendship. They point to moments of cross-team camaraderie, charitable initiatives and the unique bond forged by competition. There was very little of this on view in 2025. The documented events on view in 2025, showed how “galleries drifted from partisan into venomous,” into homophobic and personal attacks that shatter the illusion of camaraderie. Whatever camaraderie exists is predicated on shared membership in an exclusive Western club. The moments of cross-team camaraderie are the exception that proves the rule, a rule of bounded identity that, when stressed, reveals a deep-seated hostility. The unique bond is so fragile that it can instantly revert to the very colonial rancour it claims to transcend when met with the all-caps incivility of modern American nationalism. True sportsmanship is impossible in an arena where players require a phalanx of state troopers to compete.
Conclusion
The 2025 Ryder Cup at Bethpage will be remembered not only for Europe’s victory but for the ugly backdrop that confirmed the event’s colonial underpinnings. Viewed through an Arendtian and decolonial lens, the homophobic slurs, the personal vitriol, and the institutional failure to curb them were not an anomaly but a potent enactment of colonial legacies. The Fortress West, when pressured, revealed its true nature; not a gentleman’s club, but a contested space where geographical exclusion and martial nationalism erupt into the language of conquest this essay describes.
To imagine a truly decolonised world-team golf competition would require dismantling these entrenched binaries, opening participation beyond Western elites, valorising diverse labour and reframing the course not as territory to be conquered but as shared commons. In the current dispensation, with authoritarian nationalism ascendant and corporate capital more entrenched than ever, this will remain an imagining.