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Hibbyradge
22-02-2016, 10:12 PM
Sadly, I have to agree with what Matthew Syed has put forward in this article in today's edition of 'The Times'; there really are a huge number of vile football fans!

In my experience, they are there at all clubs; whilst overt racism has been pretty much stamped out, there is still anti-Semitism, homophobic abuse, crude references to ISIS, terrorists and 'Jihadi John', comparisons with accused and convicted paedophiles e.g. to Leeds supporters "Jimmy Saville - he's one of your own" etc.

Such behaviour is more prevalent amongst away fans, presumably, because individuals persistently engaging in such anti-social behaviour in their regular seats would be identified and shown the door; however, this problem is not exclusively confined to away supporters! Part of the package for my away trips to Liverpool, Manchester City, Everton and Manchester United is to be greeted with chants of 'Chelsea Rent Boys' and, whilst a minority, there are still too many Chelsea supporters too happy to throw around the insult of 'Yids' to Tottenham fans!

Clubs need to face up to the newer disgusting forms of discriminatory behaviour amongst fans and not just sit back on their laurels from the success of the great 'Kick Out Racism' campaigns!

"On a weekend when coin throwing tarnished two matches, it is naive to blame a few people
It is noteworthy that when Peter Coates compared modern football to the church recently, nobody gave a hollow laugh. The Stoke City chairman was implying that football is a unifying force, a way of bringing communities together, an uplifting social ritual.
This romanticised notion of fandom rarely gets challenged these days. For the likes of Coates, the throwing of a coin by a West Bromwich Albion fan into the face of Chris Brunt on Saturday was a one-off. It was the act of a single person rather than a reflection of football’s culture.
Likewise, when Micah Richards was recently confronted by Aston Villa fans after a 1-1 draw with Wycombe Wanderers, it was just a few troublemakers. The fans waited by the team bus to threaten violence and hurl insults — but it was presumably “just a minority”. And when Randy Lerner, the owner of Villa, was met with vile chants stating “we’re all having a party when Randy Lerner dies”, well, that was doubtless a minority too.
All these examples (I could have picked dozens more) are of fans turning on their own. But let us look at how fans treat the opposition, for this cuts to the heart of the matter. We have all watched aghast as vast sections of supporters have chanted about the tragedy of Munich, poured scorn over the victims of the Bradford fire, scoffed at the Hillsborough disaster and made fun of the victims of the Holocaust.
We know, too, about how fans made the most sexualised and graphic taunts at Eva Carneiro, the former Chelsea doctor; about the constant insinuation that Arsène Wenger is a paedophile; about how Aaron Ramsey, who suffered a terrible leg injury at the Britannia Stadium in 2010, was mocked by Stoke fans. “Aaron Ramsey, he walks with a limp,” they jeered. What did Coates, who was at the ground that afternoon, say? You guessed it: “It’s a minority.”
Yesterday, Chelsea fans threw coins at Manchester City’s young players as they celebrated an equaliser. When Andre Marriner went to pick up the coins, he was subjected to jeering and vile gestures.
If such grotesque behaviour is limited to a tiny minority, why did Nottinghamshire police place undercover officers in the stands for the match between Nottingham Forest and Derby County in November, worried about public disorder? Why did Scottish MPs pass an act of parliament in 2011 to clamp down on the sectarianism that flares every time Rangers face Celtic? As one academic put it: “What may have started as a progressive desire to overcome divisions in society and reduce animosity between people has resulted in the opposite occurring.”
A tiny minority? In that case, Mohamed, a Sheffield United fan, must have been seeing things when he reported the gratuitous chants that rained down at a recent match against Bradford City. “It was more than five or ten fans it was more like a few hundred”, he said. “I could make out they were singing ‘you’re just a town full of Isis’ towards the Bradford fans. I was disgusted, you cannot compare a whole town to a murderous fanatical cult.”
The next time you watch a big match on television, press the pause button when an opposition throw-in is about to be taken. You will notice a backdrop of hundreds of fans, a large section of whom are giving crude hand signals, shouting expletives, faces distorted with synthetic hatred. Coates may have been there more recently than me, but I have rarely seen that behaviour at All Souls, Langham Place, even after the communion wine.
A tiny minority? The problem with this excuse, as shameful as it is ubiquitous, is that it destroys the impetus to do anything (after that Arsenal game, Coates, true to form, said: “How do you control these things? You can’t.”). It spares us from analysing why adults and, in many cases, children, who wouldn’t dream of insulting people outside the stadium, transmogrify into foul-mouthed yobs as soon as the opening whistle has sounded. It stops us from asking why at football, almost uniquely among mass entertainment events, vitriol has such currency.
The truth, of course, is that football has a serious problem. It is not a majority but for a significant section of fans, the sense of tribalism, so central to the game’s meaning, has become grotesquely distorted. It isn’t enough to celebrate one’s own team, and to have good-humoured fun at the expense of one’s rivals. The real buzz of a Saturday afternoon isn’t complete without impugning and maligning the opposition.
Any vehicle for this hatred will do. Glasgow, for example, is a modern city where tribal divisions have all but disappeared. As Paul Davis, a sociologist at the University of Sunderland, put it: “The vast majority of modern-day Scots, including a decisive majority in the west, do not care or pretend to care about Catholics and Protestants, or Loyalists and Rebels, any more than they care about the Great Pumpkin.”
Only at football are these grievances resurrected, to justify and perpetuate the spite that has become, for many, a key part of the “experience”. As Lawrence MacIntyre, head of safety for Rangers, put it: “It is called a 90-minute bigot, someone who has got a friend of an opposite religion living next door. But for that 90 minutes they shout foul religious abuse at each other.”
That this tendency is now being inflicted upon one’s own players, as was the case with Brunt on Saturday, and in many other examples, including the spat between Joleon Lescott and Villa fans, exemplifies how deep it has become. Like a narcotic, you need ever larger quantities of spite to get the same rush. If the opposition are not good enough targets, go after your own. Hell, throw a few coins too.
It is worth stating, here, that many fans behave impeccably, and that one would never wish to eradicate the witty and satirical chants that make the game so vivid. Nobody wishes to sanitise the game. But neither should we tire of challenging the hatred that so often disfigures football, or querying the naivety and inaction of people like Coates.

A “tiny minority”? If only."

Onceinawhile
22-02-2016, 10:15 PM
There was an article on football 365 that may resonate a bit more with some, as it specifically mentions Hibs and the iona bar.

I wonder if anyone knows the writer?

http://www.football365.com/news/coin-throwing-is-only-worst-of-hate-culture

Hibernia&Alba
22-02-2016, 10:35 PM
The way you see some grown men behaving in and around football makes you cringe, but it's been like that for as back as I can remember. In fact it's improved a lot since I was first taken along in the late eighties, with far more women and children at matches now, and far less racism and sectarianism.

The macho culture still persists amongst some of course. Perhaps it's due to being a member of tribe against a common enemy, perhaps it's alcohol, perhaps it's the only way some men can express themselves and makes them feel powerful/important. I will never understand why grown men would fight over which football team they support; I can only think they must be inadequate or unhappy in other areas of their lives and are filling that emptiness through misbehaviour around football.

Andy74
22-02-2016, 10:41 PM
A bit overplayed. It seems to suggest the majority at most games act this way.

No mention of moments like the applause on Saturday and how football seems to pay respects to something just about every week.

It's a high profile game with many thousands attending games for most of the year. Of course you are going to get a bit of everything.

superfurryhibby
22-02-2016, 10:42 PM
Football, full of contradictions. The faux outrage over a twat like goal celebration, whilst sections of our own support rant about peadophilia and Savills and young Rolf etc like that's really respectful to victims of such heinous crimes.

Aye, but it all banter, isn't it?

50 miles away anti- sectarian charities punt cheap and lazy cliches about the Edinburgh derby and how it mirrors tribalism found in Glasgow, failing to see that that type of nonsense is actually colluding with the haters.

Hibernia&Alba
22-02-2016, 10:58 PM
Football, full of contradictions. The faux outrage over a twat like goal celebration, whilst sections of our own support rant about peadophilia and Savills and young Rolf etc like that's really respectful to victims of such heinous crimes.

Aye, but it all banter, isn't it?

Meanwhile other ****s get all indignant about a lone Irish scarf in a photo of the crowd at a club founded by Irish immigrants.

50 miles away anti- sectarian charities punt cheap and lazy cliches about the Edinburgh derby and how it mirrors tribalism found in Glasgow, failing to see that that type of nonsense is actually colluding with the haters.

So much is subjective when it comes to verbal abuse. Nobody wants to hear racist/xenophobic/sectarian remarks (at least no-one beyond Ibrox) but beyond bigotry and threats, we all have different boundaries. What's deeply offensive to one person mightn't be in the least offensive to others. We can't expect football crowds to act like they're at a church service, and some people, though they mightn't be anti-social, simply have no tact. I enjoy abusing the opposition according that my own sense of decency, but others will have different standards, either more or less lax.

superfurryhibby
22-02-2016, 11:08 PM
So much is subjective when it comes to verbal abuse. Nobody wants to hear racist/xenophobic/sectarian remarks (at least no-one beyond Ibrox) but beyond bigotry and threats, we all have different boundaries. What's deeply offensive to one person mightn't be in the least offensive to others. We can't expect football crowds to act like they're at a church service, and some people, though they mightn't be anti-social, simply have no tact. I enjoy abusing the opposition according that my own sense of decency, but others will have different standards, either more or less lax.

Some good points. I wonder though, is there a hierarchy of distaste around what is offensive? Is singing about Fenian blood any worse that the Craig Thomson song? The moral compass is challenged by this kind of thing.

Bishop Hibee
22-02-2016, 11:20 PM
A one-time poster on here was banned from .net for giving me abuse related to me being an RC. It's impossible to stamp out hatred but where does free speech end and an offence begin? Not always easy to define but there are enough current laws to deal with breaches of the peace and racist and homophobic chanting at games if the police care to use them.

Football supporters behave a hell of a lot better than they did when I started watching Hibs in the 70's though.

Hibernia&Alba
22-02-2016, 11:26 PM
A one-time poster on here was banned from .net for giving me abuse related to me being an RC. It's impossible to stamp out hatred but where does free speech end and an offence begin? Not always easy to define but there are enough current laws to deal with breaches of the peace and racist and homophobic chanting at games if the police care to use them.

Football supporters behave a hell of a lot better than they did when I started watching Hibs in the 70's though.

A Hibs fan? :confused:

jacomo
22-02-2016, 11:31 PM
I think Matthew Syed needs to get over himself a bit.

Football is so much safer and better behaved than it was. He wants to eradicate things he doesn't like, but chanting 'Aaron Ramsey he walks with a limp' is fans tying to put a player off and affect the match. He doesn't seem to get that.

linlithgowhibbie
23-02-2016, 07:14 AM
Football, full of contradictions. The faux outrage over a twat like goal celebration, whilst sections of our own support rant about peadophilia and Savills and young Rolf etc like that's really respectful to victims of such heinous crimes.

Aye, but it all banter, isn't it?

Meanwhile other ****s get all indignant about a lone Irish scarf in a photo of the crowd at a club founded by Irish immigrants.

50 miles away anti- sectarian charities punt cheap and lazy cliches about the Edinburgh derby and how it mirrors tribalism found in Glasgow, failing to see that that type of nonsense is actually colluding with the haters.

Hi Superfurry,

I'm not sure where you get the "All indignant about a lone Irish scarf in a photo" from. I suggest you re-read my original post and look again at the photo. You will see another "Irish" scarf just below the scarf I commented on. It didn't get me all "Indignant".

I'm not sure what deserved the "****s" aimed at me, to be honest i'm not 100per cent sure what word you have blanked out. I do suspect it wasn't a nice word. That perhaps says more about you than me!

Have a nice day

Brian

superfurryhibby
23-02-2016, 05:56 PM
Hi Superfurry,

I'm not sure where you get the "All indignant about a lone Irish scarf in a photo" from. I suggest you re-read my original post and look again at the photo. You will see another "Irish" scarf just below the scarf I commented on. It didn't get me all "Indignant".

I'm not sure what deserved the "****s" aimed at me, to be honest i'm not 100per cent sure what word you have blanked out. I do suspect it wasn't a nice word. That perhaps says more about you than me!

Have a nice day

Brian

Apologies, misguided and a poor turn of phrase.

Derek

California-Hibs
23-02-2016, 06:00 PM
Jamie

21.05.2016
23-02-2016, 06:05 PM
I've often found with hibs that the idiot element in our support comes out at the bigger fixtures (tynecastle, hampden etc). Folk seeing it as an excuse to get completely off their faces before the game and then start thinking their a big man and throwing their weight about. A few idiots near us last year at hampden who were off their faces and seemed determined to start a fight with someone.

NAE NOOKIE
23-02-2016, 06:23 PM
Football, full of contradictions. The faux outrage over a twat like goal celebration, whilst sections of our own support rant about peadophilia and Savills and young Rolf etc like that's really respectful to victims of such heinous crimes.

Aye, but it all banter, isn't it?

50 miles away anti- sectarian charities punt cheap and lazy cliches about the Edinburgh derby and how it mirrors tribalism found in Glasgow, failing to see that that type of nonsense is actually colluding with the haters.

Though your original post still contains your comment about folk getting "indignant about a scarf" that part doesn't appear when I quote your post? Good trick :greengrin

That particular discussion is relevant to me as a Hibs fan and I don't see how or why it relates to this subject ....... unless you are making the ridiculous assumption that A) ... the subject has something to do with sectarianism ..... or B) ... if you occupy yourself with that subject you are too stupid to have an opinion on this one.

As it happens I agree to a point with the rest of your post.

superfurryhibby
23-02-2016, 07:00 PM
Though your original post still contains your comment about folk getting "indignant about a scarf" that part doesn't appear when I quote your post? Good trick :greengrin

That particular discussion is relevant to me as a Hibs fan and I don't see how or why it relates to this subject ....... unless you are making the ridiculous assumption that A) ... the subject has something to do with sectarianism ..... or B) ... if you occupy yourself with that subject you are too stupid to have an opinion on this one.

As it happens I agree to a point with the rest of your post.

How did I do that? It was a poor comment and I supposed I link it to my frustration about how I feel about the difficulties we face with the complexities of Scottish football and sectrianism.

It's an interesting subject and the competing views and discussions around Hibs and identity have at times been both fascinating and challenging for me.

For what it's worth. I do think the club have more or less got it right in their approach to our diverse history and culture. The club badge reflects that, as does our participation in appropriate heritage events. Our very good charitable work continues another good Hibs tradition. Oh aye, and STF and the connection to our early custodians.

As for the wider issue...........

linlithgowhibbie
23-02-2016, 07:00 PM
Apologies, misguided and a poor turn of phrase.

Derek

Accepted, no probs and thanks

Brian:gwa:

NAE NOOKIE
23-02-2016, 07:12 PM
How did I do that? It was a poor comment and I supposed I link it to my frustration about how I feel about the difficulties we face with the complexities of Scottish football and sectrianism.

It's an interesting subject and the competing views and discussions around Hibs and identity have at times been both fascinating and challenging for me.

For what it's worth. I do think the club have more or less got it right in their approach to our diverse history and culture. The club badge reflects that, as does our participation in appropriate heritage events. Our very good charitable work continues another good Hibs tradition. Oh aye, and STF and the connection to our early custodians.

As for the wider issue...........

Cheers SFH ... peace man :greengrin

CockneyRebel
23-02-2016, 07:39 PM
The way you see some grown men behaving in and around football makes you cringe, but it's been like that for as back as I can remember. In fact it's improved a lot since I was first taken along in the late eighties, with far more women and children at matches now, and far less racism and sectarianism.

The macho culture still persists amongst some of course. Perhaps it's due to being a member of tribe against a common enemy, perhaps it's alcohol, perhaps it's the only way some men can express themselves and makes them feel powerful/important. I will never understand why grown men would fight over which football team they support; I can only think they must be inadequate or unhappy in other areas of their lives and are filling that emptiness through misbehaviour around football.

The clubs all say it's jut a minority - in which case the police should be able to take care of it.
The police say there are too many for our officers to deal with - they can't both be right.