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View Full Version : NHC Football Fuels Sectarianism in Scotland



Keith_M
20-02-2015, 11:41 AM
....according to a study reported in The Herald (http://www.heraldscotland.com/news/home-news/football-biggest-contributor-to-scotlands-sectarianism-with-parade-fears-not-borne-ou.118874478)

NAE NOOKIE
20-02-2015, 12:02 PM
I have never seen a sectarian incident at any game outwith our games with The Rangers and to a far lesser extent Hearts.

I would imagine that 99% of football matches in Scotland pass off without sectarian incidents of any type, so this report would be better placed replacing the word football with the phrase Old firm.

NYHibby
20-02-2015, 12:07 PM
Here is the relevant section of the report:
http://www.gov.scot/Publications/2015/02/5330/7

"Football is the most commonly mentioned factor people believe contributes to sectarianism in Scotland (88% mentioned it, and 55% thought it was the main factor)"

Keith_M
20-02-2015, 12:15 PM
I have never seen a sectarian incident at any game outwith our games with The Rangers and to a far lesser extent Hearts.

I would imagine that 99% of football matches in Scotland pass off without sectarian incidents of any type, so this report would be better placed replacing the word football with the phrase Old firm.


:agree:


But there would have been an outcry if they'd told the truth.



EDIT: I would actually say The Old Firm and some Hearts Fans, though.

NYHibby
20-02-2015, 12:24 PM
:agree:


But there would have been an outcry if they'd told the truth.



EDIT: I would actually say The Old Firm and some Hearts Fans, though.

This is an unfair criticism of the actual report. If you read the report it makes it clear that it is generally an old firm issue.

While we may not have Irish catholic/protestant sectarianism at our games, lets not pretend that we are prefect when it comes to other forms of bigotry.

Keith_M
20-02-2015, 12:27 PM
This is an unfair criticism of the actual report. If you read the report it makes it clear that it is generally an old firm issue.

While we may not have Irish catholic/protestant sectarianism at our games, lets not pretend that we are prefect when it comes to other forms of bigotry.


I wasn't pretending anything, merely commenting on where the main sources of sectarianism exist in Football.

Phil D. Rolls
20-02-2015, 12:43 PM
....according to a study reported in The Herald (http://www.heraldscotland.com/news/home-news/football-biggest-contributor-to-scotlands-sectarianism-with-parade-fears-not-borne-ou.118874478)

But I thought that sectarianism is an outlet for this fundamental hatred of people who are different. Over the years the argument has been that things would be a lot worse if people couldn't have "pretend" wars at the football.

Are they really suggesting that having two teams closely aligned to either side of the divide causes people to think beyond football? After all, we are talking about two of the greatest clubs in the world here.

Jones28
20-02-2015, 12:51 PM
It's a bit of a chicken and egg issue isn't it? Does the football fuel the sectarianism or was the sectarianism a result of 2 football teams set up around religion and belief?

Rangers and Celtic are vehicles for people to spout their bile.

Bostonhibby
20-02-2015, 12:58 PM
....according to a study reported in The Herald (http://www.heraldscotland.com/news/home-news/football-biggest-contributor-to-scotlands-sectarianism-with-parade-fears-not-borne-ou.118874478)

A quick translation for our overseas viewers

" bigots looking for a focal point for their ignorance and hatred tend to polarise around two Glasgow football clubs who encourage it by their inaction. Many of the people concerned would turn up at alternative events and venues to display their hatred, ignorance and lack of historical perspective even if the teams concerned didn't actually exist.

Other bigots are available at other teams but on nowhere near the same scale and they are far less likely to be tolerated by genuine football fans who are there to support a football team"

southsider
20-02-2015, 02:31 PM
Story going around about how ruthless Ashley can be. Buys a company, sacks the poor staff and shuts the gates. Buys back said company from the receiver the next day now non toxic. New the rangers GM could be a bloodbath. Ashley v King/Murray. One guy holds all the aces by way of securities where as other two are bared by Stock Market rules (ie The Law) from holding directorships in Newco. Only one winner.

Andy74
20-02-2015, 02:40 PM
Centuries of Imperialism may have provided a bit more fuel than football ever did.

It does give certain people an outlet for it but so do orange walks and the like.

Barney McGrew
20-02-2015, 03:44 PM
Football doesn't fuel it.

Rantic do.

semaj64
20-02-2015, 04:57 PM
Bit on BBC but nothing that we did not know already. Wonder why Scottish Football is not tackling the issue. According to the report is a UEFA standard, already adopted down south, something to do with money I suspect.

emerald green
20-02-2015, 05:49 PM
The biggest contributory factor to fueling sectarianism in Scotland is parents passing their views onto their children, and they in turn passing those same views onto theirs, and so on down through the generations.

Football doesn't really fuel sectarianism. It's just a convenient outlet for it.

weonlywon6-2
20-02-2015, 06:14 PM
Punish rangers or Celtic every time there is a problem, that for me is the only way of putting an end to it

superfurryhibby
20-02-2015, 06:21 PM
Centuries of Imperialism may have provided a bit more fuel than football ever did.

It does give certain people an outlet for it but so do orange walks and the like.

The first sentence says it all.

I would ban the Orange Walks tomorrow, no place in our society for those views. I would also get rid of any faith school. Why should the taxpayer fund any religious based education? I would have liked my boys to go to the Steiner School. Unfortunately they have fees of 6000/year. I' m not expecting the taxpayer to pay for it though.

Ozyhibby
20-02-2015, 06:57 PM
If it wasn't for football sectarianism would not be an issue in Scotland. It's not like we are having a big theological debate on the merits of the different religions.
For most of the bigots, church is just somewhere their gran goes and the odd wedding.
Only through football is it given any thought or voice.

Andy74
20-02-2015, 07:04 PM
If it wasn't for football sectarianism would not be an issue in Scotland. It's not like we are having a big theological debate on the merits of the different religions.
For most of the bigots, church is just somewhere their gran goes and the odd wedding.
Only through football is it given any thought or voice.

It's an issue in a small part of football and that is because there is a social issue. Football is just the most obvious outlet just now but the conditions which have given rise to this in Ireland and the West of Scotland have been a long time in the making and football had nothing to do with its cause.

heidtheba
20-02-2015, 07:18 PM
The first sentence says it all.

I would ban the Orange Walks tomorrow, no place in our society for those views. I would also get rid of any faith school. Why should the taxpayer fund any religious based education? I would have liked my boys to go to the Steiner School. Unfortunately they have fees of 6000/year. I' m not expecting the taxpayer to pay for it though.


Totally agree with this, not against any religion or denomination but I'd argue that most state schools have at least a veneer of Church of Scotland about them. Whether they should/shouldn't is a different argument. But I'd say they do. As long as they do have this I can see why someone who isn't Church of Scotland would want an alternative.

Brizo
20-02-2015, 07:33 PM
Liverpool and Manchester have very similar demographics to Glasgow. Large elements with Irish Catholic and Irish Protestant ancestry, large pockets of severe poverty and faith schools. Both had historic sectarian divisions which were by and large eliminated by the 60s / 70s.

Question must be whats different about Glasgow and surrounding west Scotland, where these divisions haven't died out. For me its clearly the OF who have perpetuated them, aided and abetted by a forelock tugging media and politicians too scared to address the issue for fear of losing votes.

Eyrie
20-02-2015, 07:57 PM
There are two clubs in Scotland that make a fortune out of continuing sectarianism.

Keith_M
20-02-2015, 08:12 PM
It's an issue in a small part of football and that is because there is a social issue. Football is just the most obvious outlet just now but the conditions which have given rise to this in Ireland and the West of Scotland have been a long time in the making and football had nothing to do with its cause.


I don't think the article suggested that Football is the cause of sectarianism. It's more that the West of Scotland Football divide has been the biggest contributor in keeping it going.

Scouse Hibee
20-02-2015, 08:13 PM
Liverpool and Manchester have very similar demographics to Glasgow. Large elements with Irish Catholic and Irish Protestant ancestry, large pockets of severe poverty and faith schools. Both had historic sectarian divisions which were by and large eliminated by the 60s / 70s.

Question must be whats different about Glasgow and surrounding west Scotland, where these divisions haven't died out. For me its clearly the OF who have perpetuated them, aided and abetted by a forelock tugging media and politicians too scared to address the issue for fear of losing votes.


Is there any substance to the assertion that religious differences in some way have played a part in the history of the Merseyside clubs?

Perhaps a judicious conclusion to make would be that, though there is no compelling argument to make the case that football on Merseysidefollowed the path taken in Glasgow or Belfast, there was, in some respects, asignificant cleavage between the clubs that does warrant acknowledgement.Certainly, the patterns of control at each club in the late Victorian and Edwardianperiod are startling in their difference, and the political distinctions betweenthem would not look out of place when comparing the hierarchy of Glasgow’s OldFirm or that of, say, Belfast Celtic and Linfield.

Historians plotting thedevelopment of football clubs associated with religious sectarianism in Scotlandand Northern Ireland, for example, are firm in their opinion that the identities ofthese clubs are less a result of their being initially founded as sportingoutgrowths of churches or chapels than they are the product of long establishedboardroom hierarchies who stamped them in their own image. Clubs likeGlasgow Celtic, Hibernian and Belfast Celtic, founded to provide charity to theCatholic poor and as an outreach to young Catholic men, soon found theirdirection dictated by a local business elite, many of whom were involved inNationalist politics.

Similarly, the identity of Glasgow Rangers and Linfield – clubswhich, if not being founded by Presbyterian chapels certainly had their rootswithin that religious tradition were moulded by the Unionist politics of mendominating their boardrooms. For this reason alone, the claims of a religiousschism in Merseyside football circles cannot simply be dismissed as the productof a tendency amongst some supporters to look for convenient binary opposites.In terms of determining whether such obvious differences in leadership impactedon the running of the club, it could, one supposes, be argued that it may have ledto differences in the targeting of imported players, and that Everton’s forgingstrong links with Ireland was a “follow on” of some aspect of its boardroomprofile. Such a policy might explain the large amount of anecdotal evidenceprofessing Everton to be a team supported by Liverpool Catholics: the amount ofIrish players the club attracted to it igniting a certain degree of ethnic pride inEverton amongst the city’s Irish-born or those of Irish descent.

One writer withknowledge of both the Glasgow and Merseyside professional football scenebelieved this to have been the case. ‘Everton Football Club, like Celtic FootballClub’, wrote Celtic historian, James Handley, ‘owed its success to immigrant Red and Blue and Orange and Green? support, the Irish in Liverpool rallying wholeheartedly round it’. This is anopinion still at large today amongst onlookers to Merseyside football’s affairs. However, despite there being a marked difference between Everton andLiverpool in the volume of players selected from Ireland, evidence suggests that,overall, there was no attempt by the clubs to operate discriminatory policies onthe grounds of religious sectarianism when employing playing staff. And neitherdoes there appear to have been any policy to build up support amongst onesection of the population to the detriment of attracting support from anothersection.

There was, in short, no obvious effort to secure a support base byrepeating the type of divisive practices via “community outreach” found incertain other football cultures elsewhere in Britain (nor, indeed, to mirror thedivisions found in the city of Liverpool on every level: from schooling to housing;from welfare provision to workplace recruitment). This latter point may haveprompted the Liverpool Lord Mayor’s observation in 1933 that the two clubs haddone more ‘to cement good fellowship…than anything said or done in the last 25years’ - a period blighted by sectarian unrest in the city

jgl07
21-02-2015, 12:46 AM
Liverpool and Manchester have very similar demographics to Glasgow. Large elements with Irish Catholic and Irish Protestant ancestry, large pockets of severe poverty and faith schools. Both had historic sectarian divisions which were by and large eliminated by the 60s / 70s.

Question must be whats different about Glasgow and surrounding west Scotland, where these divisions haven't died out. For me its clearly the OF who have perpetuated them, aided and abetted by a forelock tugging media and politicians too scared to address the issue for fear of losing votes.
When I was growing up in Manchester back in the 1960s there was a perception that United were the Catholic team and City were the Protestant (and Jewish) team.

It was similar in Liverpool where Everton were once known as the priests' team and Catholic priests were once given free admission to Goodison.

It was already breaking down and City certainly had plenty of Catholic (even Irish Catholic) support back then. This was despite the fact that City were founded by Ulster Protestants.

I recall one conversation in a pub regarding the relative merits of supporting Celtic or Rangers in Scotland when the topic turned to the Edinburgh teams. Somebody suggested Hibs only to be contradicted by my pal Dennis who said that Hibs were the Catholic team and that City supporters should favour Hearts. This drew the response 'but Dennis, you are a Catholic'. Yes he conceded but that's not the point!

The point is that sectarianism in football does not exist any more outside of Glasgow (Rangers and Celtic) and Belfast (Linfield and Cliftonville). In Scotland it has become a major marketing ploy by the dastardly duo and the tabloids that feed off them.

seanshow
21-02-2015, 11:23 AM
The clubs had the the option to bring in Uefa standard liability rules for racism and bigotry last June and voted against it. :confused:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/22853305
(it was accepted and put it place in England without an issue).
It would have enabled a sliding scale of penalties for clubs whose fans are found guilty. monetary fines,closed stands,penalty points, expulsion from competitions etc..
In the meantime the clubs can hide behind the "we took all reasonably practicable precautions rule" which we saw rolled out after the bigot derby a few weeks ago.

The end result is we are giving these vile idiots carte blanche to sing whatever wherever they like without retribution and they love it.
I don't know if many watched raith v sevco on tv last night, but these disgusting songs were sung loud and clear yet again and not even the broadcaster made an attempt to cut them out.

Phil D. Rolls
21-02-2015, 11:28 AM
It's a bit of a chicken and egg issue isn't it? Does the football fuel the sectarianism or was the sectarianism a result of 2 football teams set up around religion and belief?

Rangers and Celtic are vehicles for people to spout their bile.

I don't think that there's any doubt what came first. Rather it's a case of what keeps it going?


Liverpool and Manchester have very similar demographics to Glasgow. Large elements with Irish Catholic and Irish Protestant ancestry, large pockets of severe poverty and faith schools. Both had historic sectarian divisions which were by and large eliminated by the 60s / 70s.

Question must be whats different about Glasgow and surrounding west Scotland, where these divisions haven't died out. For me its clearly the OF who have perpetuated them, aided and abetted by a forelock tugging media and politicians too scared to address the issue for fear of losing votes.

There were political reasons to divide and rule in Scotland following WW1 - Red Clydeside put the sh*ts up the establishment.

Another possible thing to consider is that Scotland and NI are Presbyterian communities, whereas Liverpool and Manchester were not.


The clubs had the the option to bring in Uefa standard liability rules for racism and bigotry last June and voted against it. :confused:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/22853305
(it was accepted and put it place in England without an issue).
It would have enabled a sliding scale of penalties for clubs whose fans are found guilty. monetary fines,closed stands,penalty points, expulsion from competitions etc..
In the meantime the clubs can hide behind the "we took all reasonably practicable precautions rule" which we saw rolled out after the bigot derby a few weeks ago.

The end result is we are giving these vile idiots carte blanche to sing whatever wherever they like without retribution and they love it.
I don't know if many watched raith v sevco on tv last night, but these disgusting songs were sung loud and clear yet again and not even the broadcaster made an attempt to cut them out.

Didn't watch the entire game, but I noticed that the background noise was muted a lot of the time.

Was it the entire songbook?

CockneyRebel
21-02-2015, 11:33 AM
I don't think the article suggested that Football is the cause of sectarianism. It's more that the West of Scotland Football divide has been the biggest contributor in keeping it going.

Thank the lord we have the fair minded Weegie polis to prevent things getting out of hand.

truehibernian
21-02-2015, 11:41 AM
Thank the lord we have the fair minded Weegie polis to prevent things getting out of hand.

I also noted who the match delegate was yesterday at Raith v The Rangers.......you'll be able to guess which team he supports too eh :rolleyes: I've read he has reported the singing yesterday however I'm sceptical that it would be impartial to be honest.......we'll just have to see I suppose. I'll give him the benefit of the doubt but cannot see the football authorities taking any sort of stand - they are all asleep at the wheel when it comes to bigotry at football.

Only way to effectively deal with it, and it is harsh and it punishes those that least deserve it, is points deductions - if you know that going to a game means if you get caught singing bile it will lead to your side plummeting down the table rather than up, it will stop. Players and clubs would guarantee then sit up bolt upright and use the media to stop it happening if the sport of football was suffering.

CockneyRebel
21-02-2015, 11:45 AM
I also noted who the match delegate was yesterday at Raith v The Rangers.......you'll be able to guess which team he supports too eh :rolleyes: I've read he has reported the singing yesterday however I'm sceptical that it would be impartial to be honest.......we'll just have to see I suppose. I'll give him the benefit of the doubt but cannot see the football authorities taking any sort of stand - they are all asleep at the wheel when it comes to bigotry at football.

Only way to effectively deal with it, and it is harsh and it punishes those that least deserve it, is points deductions - if you know that going to a game means if you get caught singing bile it will lead to your side plummeting down the table rather than up, it will stop. Players and clubs would guarantee then sit up bolt upright and use the media to stop it happening if the sport of football was suffering.


Have to agree with this opinion. A points deduction would be much more effective than a fine.

cabbageandribs1875
21-02-2015, 11:46 AM
and Labour MSP jim murphy wants to allow neanderthals alcohol at games :rolleyes: get off of yer crate murphy

truehibernian
21-02-2015, 11:54 AM
Have to agree with this opinion. A points deduction would be much more effective than a fine.

It's the only way you'll then get players taking a stand in full view of the media - they are rich, they have no concept of money, and are selfish individuals - many wouldn't be bothered if the club was fined. They would however start to worry if it meant that they would lose bonuses, lose the chance of titles, lose a cup tie if fans didn't behave.......they do, most of them, still have sporting integrity (unless you bet against your team right enough :cb:greengrin).

The harsh side of that though is it penalises those that go to games and genuinely support the side and don't take part in such bile.