Post by QPR Report on Jun 7, 2009 9:05:40 GMT
Sunday Herald - Scotland
Standing up for the fans
FAN'S EYE VIEW: Football supporters may no longer be caged like animals at matches but, argues Kenny Hodgart, they do have to endure being dealt with in a way that you wouldn’t treat your dog
WHAT WILL it be like, watching football, say 10 years from now? The Great and the Good like that sort of question, probably because they get to sound like Barack Obama without having to grapple with their own impotence, contradictions or doubts. A seat for everyone and everyone in his (or her) seat? Well, they've got that one nailed down already. Family-friendly atmospheres? Sure, we all like families. No sectarianism, racism or homophobia? Even better.
But wait. It's important to get this straight, because it is surely obvious to all but fools that once social ills are eliminated from sport they'll soon up and evaporate from the rest of life, too. How are we to achieve this eradication of nastiness? The answer, of course, is via CCTV, dossiers of offensive chants and lip-synch technology; by herding, stifling, monitoring and, ultimately, spying on supporters.
They tend to be quite big on civil liberties, the Great and the Good, but not when it comes to people attending football matches. And, going on burgeoning evidence, fans around the UK are frequently beheld with a presumption of guilt. For the most part they are suffered like naughty children, enjoined to turn up, sit down and shut up. One supposes that is progress from the days when they were caged in behind fences like animals, but in the aftermath of the G20 protests and the Damian Green affair, when people are wondering what exactly the police are for, it's worth noting that patrons of what is one of the country's biggest leisure industries still seem to have fewer rights than animals.
Last year, Cliff Auger took his two teenage sons to Stamford Bridge to watch their team, Chelsea, beat QPR in the FA Cup. When, after the game and walking away from the ground, 16-year-old James was bitten by a police dog, Cliff instinctively jumped in and kicked it, only to be set on by officers wearing riot gear, who broke several of his ribs, putting him in hospital for four days. He was then found guilty of causing unnecessary suffering to a protected animal and fined £500.
"There was a simple presumption on the part of the police that he was a troublemaker because he was a football fan," says Michael Brunskill of the Football Supporters' Federation, which represents 142,000 registered members in England and Wales. "There was no acknowledgement that a father protecting his son is a natural instinct."
Policing and stewarding in and around football grounds is one of the FSF's main areas of concern and they receive complaints from fans about mistreatment every week. Stewards, says Brunskill, are often little different to bouncers. He said: "An example of that is at Newcastle, who decided they would have a singing area but, of course, there was to be no standing. If you sing in church, you stand, it's natural, but these guys go in and effectively man-handle people, which they've no more legal right to do than you or I."
The FSF are also worried by the new ploy of locking supporters in pubs near stadia so they miss the game. The Sunday Herald hasn't heard of the tactic being used in Scotland, but Steve Sutherland of Aberdeen's Red Ultras supporters' group, set up almost a decade ago with the aim of putting some colour and passion back into Scottish football, recognises the intent behind it.
"We've had guys arrested for as little as handing out bags of confetti, or for standing up, or for not moving where they're told," he said. "It's the same for other groups like ourselves around the country. It's amazing that something so innocent as wanting to support your team can become so complicated.
"The issue of standing is a bit of a sticking point. When Elton John played a concert at Pittodrie, the whole place was standing; but then there's a football game in front of a half-empty stadium and all of a sudden it's considered dangerous."
Gone today are the swaying terraces of yesteryear, and with them much of the chorused banter and vitriol that formed part of the cultural experience of watching football. A generation has grown up for whom watching on television, either at home or in the pub, is the authentic ticket, and if you do go to the game, at whichever identikit stadium your club or their opponents were forced to erect to keep the bureaucrats happy, it will be made quite clear that if ever football was the people's game it is no longer.
Having forked out handsomely to watch men who care more about wresting ever-greater sums of money from the chairman than they do about your club's traditions, you won't know much about what your fellow fans are shouting or singing anyway because your ears will still be hurting from the Robbie Williams song they played when the teams ran out.
It's not this uniformly drab in other parts of Europe, mind. When Spurs travelled to Wisla Krakow in the Uefa Cup recently, the Polish crowd mocked the atmosphere in London the week before by sitting behind their newspapers for the first 15 minutes of the game. In Germany, most grounds have designated safe standing areas where fans can jump around, sing and do all the other stuff that would have the authorities here spitting feathers and clutching for the health and safety manual. Not even Lord Taylor, let's remember - in his report in the wake of the Hillsborough disaster - was able to argue that standing at football matches is inherently unsafe.
Football clubs and their governing associations in the UK have instead assisted in the stifling of passion and spontaneity at grounds. They have done so to placate sponsors and politicians and, perhaps, because like everyone else they must be seen to reinforce political correctness.
"We're not saying we want a return to the bad old days and there should be no place for racism or homophobia in football, but it's arguably naive to think that football supporters can or should be made to behave like boy scouts," says Brunskill. "How far do you go? Shouldn't we have a debate, for example, before people who've verbally abused this or that player are named and shamed on Crimewatch?"
In Glasgow, it is well-known that chorused invective can be an overture to real violence, but in most cases it is understood that going to the football involves a partial suspension of the rules of everyday life. Tribalism, rivalries and petty antagonisms are all realities on which the game thrives. If they're being honest, the Old Firm clubs know this full well. And where there is no real social basis for a vicious footballing rivalry, one evolves anyway - how else do you explain Kilmarnock v Ayr United?
I remember going as a boy to the football with my dad and hearing, for the first time, all manner of swearing and vitriolic abuse. It didn't put me off, but nor did it set me on the path of recidivism. It told me, I think, that football could be a bit rough around the edges, that here was a man's game. Is that really so bad?
www.sundayherald.com/sport/shfootball/display.var.2512914.0.0.php
Standing up for the fans
FAN'S EYE VIEW: Football supporters may no longer be caged like animals at matches but, argues Kenny Hodgart, they do have to endure being dealt with in a way that you wouldn’t treat your dog
WHAT WILL it be like, watching football, say 10 years from now? The Great and the Good like that sort of question, probably because they get to sound like Barack Obama without having to grapple with their own impotence, contradictions or doubts. A seat for everyone and everyone in his (or her) seat? Well, they've got that one nailed down already. Family-friendly atmospheres? Sure, we all like families. No sectarianism, racism or homophobia? Even better.
But wait. It's important to get this straight, because it is surely obvious to all but fools that once social ills are eliminated from sport they'll soon up and evaporate from the rest of life, too. How are we to achieve this eradication of nastiness? The answer, of course, is via CCTV, dossiers of offensive chants and lip-synch technology; by herding, stifling, monitoring and, ultimately, spying on supporters.
They tend to be quite big on civil liberties, the Great and the Good, but not when it comes to people attending football matches. And, going on burgeoning evidence, fans around the UK are frequently beheld with a presumption of guilt. For the most part they are suffered like naughty children, enjoined to turn up, sit down and shut up. One supposes that is progress from the days when they were caged in behind fences like animals, but in the aftermath of the G20 protests and the Damian Green affair, when people are wondering what exactly the police are for, it's worth noting that patrons of what is one of the country's biggest leisure industries still seem to have fewer rights than animals.
Last year, Cliff Auger took his two teenage sons to Stamford Bridge to watch their team, Chelsea, beat QPR in the FA Cup. When, after the game and walking away from the ground, 16-year-old James was bitten by a police dog, Cliff instinctively jumped in and kicked it, only to be set on by officers wearing riot gear, who broke several of his ribs, putting him in hospital for four days. He was then found guilty of causing unnecessary suffering to a protected animal and fined £500.
"There was a simple presumption on the part of the police that he was a troublemaker because he was a football fan," says Michael Brunskill of the Football Supporters' Federation, which represents 142,000 registered members in England and Wales. "There was no acknowledgement that a father protecting his son is a natural instinct."
Policing and stewarding in and around football grounds is one of the FSF's main areas of concern and they receive complaints from fans about mistreatment every week. Stewards, says Brunskill, are often little different to bouncers. He said: "An example of that is at Newcastle, who decided they would have a singing area but, of course, there was to be no standing. If you sing in church, you stand, it's natural, but these guys go in and effectively man-handle people, which they've no more legal right to do than you or I."
The FSF are also worried by the new ploy of locking supporters in pubs near stadia so they miss the game. The Sunday Herald hasn't heard of the tactic being used in Scotland, but Steve Sutherland of Aberdeen's Red Ultras supporters' group, set up almost a decade ago with the aim of putting some colour and passion back into Scottish football, recognises the intent behind it.
"We've had guys arrested for as little as handing out bags of confetti, or for standing up, or for not moving where they're told," he said. "It's the same for other groups like ourselves around the country. It's amazing that something so innocent as wanting to support your team can become so complicated.
"The issue of standing is a bit of a sticking point. When Elton John played a concert at Pittodrie, the whole place was standing; but then there's a football game in front of a half-empty stadium and all of a sudden it's considered dangerous."
Gone today are the swaying terraces of yesteryear, and with them much of the chorused banter and vitriol that formed part of the cultural experience of watching football. A generation has grown up for whom watching on television, either at home or in the pub, is the authentic ticket, and if you do go to the game, at whichever identikit stadium your club or their opponents were forced to erect to keep the bureaucrats happy, it will be made quite clear that if ever football was the people's game it is no longer.
Having forked out handsomely to watch men who care more about wresting ever-greater sums of money from the chairman than they do about your club's traditions, you won't know much about what your fellow fans are shouting or singing anyway because your ears will still be hurting from the Robbie Williams song they played when the teams ran out.
It's not this uniformly drab in other parts of Europe, mind. When Spurs travelled to Wisla Krakow in the Uefa Cup recently, the Polish crowd mocked the atmosphere in London the week before by sitting behind their newspapers for the first 15 minutes of the game. In Germany, most grounds have designated safe standing areas where fans can jump around, sing and do all the other stuff that would have the authorities here spitting feathers and clutching for the health and safety manual. Not even Lord Taylor, let's remember - in his report in the wake of the Hillsborough disaster - was able to argue that standing at football matches is inherently unsafe.
Football clubs and their governing associations in the UK have instead assisted in the stifling of passion and spontaneity at grounds. They have done so to placate sponsors and politicians and, perhaps, because like everyone else they must be seen to reinforce political correctness.
"We're not saying we want a return to the bad old days and there should be no place for racism or homophobia in football, but it's arguably naive to think that football supporters can or should be made to behave like boy scouts," says Brunskill. "How far do you go? Shouldn't we have a debate, for example, before people who've verbally abused this or that player are named and shamed on Crimewatch?"
In Glasgow, it is well-known that chorused invective can be an overture to real violence, but in most cases it is understood that going to the football involves a partial suspension of the rules of everyday life. Tribalism, rivalries and petty antagonisms are all realities on which the game thrives. If they're being honest, the Old Firm clubs know this full well. And where there is no real social basis for a vicious footballing rivalry, one evolves anyway - how else do you explain Kilmarnock v Ayr United?
I remember going as a boy to the football with my dad and hearing, for the first time, all manner of swearing and vitriolic abuse. It didn't put me off, but nor did it set me on the path of recidivism. It told me, I think, that football could be a bit rough around the edges, that here was a man's game. Is that really so bad?
www.sundayherald.com/sport/shfootball/display.var.2512914.0.0.php
