What the **** is wrong with people?

[C70R]

bad company said:

C70R said:

I respect your experience as valid. However, I can pull examples of all of the above in top flight football this season. The suggests you may have a very a very narrow view of the sport.

Name me another sport where you could do the same for more than one of those?

Do you go to top flight football? Over 14 million people did last season out of which how many caused trouble?

Yes you can find examples of bad behaviour but given the numbers I’d say not as big a problem as reported.

Edited by bad company on Thursday 21st February 02:54

That wasn't the question I asked. I can find examples of everything in that list from top-flight football this season alone.
Can you tell me another sport where multiple of those has happened in the top flight in the past season/year?

Given that you've fallen straight back to the "oh, it's only a minority" argument, I suspect it doesn't bother you much.

(and yes, I get along to Arsenal and Chelsea with friends a few times a season - even though I support neither)

[C70R]

macushla said:

Whilst I don’t agree with C70R’s assessment of football as a whole there is an element of truth to it, it it isn’t limited to football. Football is a microcosm of society, society is becoming more and more extreme, tolerance of abuse is becoming more acceptable. See the recent comments around the ISIS girl. I’m not defending her actions and that’s what we should be focussed on, but the comments about her skin colour, her religion etc dominate the extreme comments.

Racism is back. What would have been unacceptable 5 years ago now seems commonplace and the casual racist seems to be accepted. From this many other things grow and become normalised.

But why is it only football?
I don't see all the things in that list happening in cricket, handball, rugby or basketball. Why is it 'ok' for these things to come up at football matches, but nowhere else in sport?

[macushla]

C70R said:

But why is it only football?
I don't see all the things in that list happening in cricket, handball, rugby or basketball. Why is it 'ok' for these things to come up at football matches, but nowhere else in sport?

No other sports have such populous crowds. Nowhere near.

The history of the minority of football crowds have always been what you describe and whilst it’s been gentrified to some extent, the less acceptable face is making a comeback.

Other sports have their own problems too, but the lack of wider interest means they don’t get as well publicised. As has been pointed out though, racing is starting to see the ugly side growing with fights, drunken behaviour and general unacceptable actions coming to the fore.

Test cricket is full of drunken idiots, all “enjoying” a football type chant as the day wears on. Give it time and problems could ensue.

Rugby is supported by toffs in general and often used as a way to beat up football in comparison. However, the crowds at their PL matches are a fraction of what the football PL sees each week. Sadly 1% of either crowd misbehaving is about 40 people at a rugby match or 400+ at football. Which is most likely to be noticed?

[C70R]

macushla said:

C70R said:

But why is it only football?
I don't see all the things in that list happening in cricket, handball, rugby or basketball. Why is it 'ok' for these things to come up at football matches, but nowhere else in sport?

No other sports have such populous crowds. Nowhere near.

The history of the minority of football crowds have always been what you describe and whilst it’s been gentrified to some extent, the less acceptable face is making a comeback.

Other sports have their own problems too, but the lack of wider interest means they don’t get as well publicised. As has been pointed out though, racing is starting to see the ugly side growing with fights, drunken behaviour and general unacceptable actions coming to the fore.

Test cricket is full of drunken idiots, all “enjoying” a football type chant as the day wears on. Give it time and problems could ensue.

Rugby is supported by toffs in general and often used as a way to beat up football in comparison. However, the crowds at their PL matches are a fraction of what the football PL sees each week. Sadly 1% of either crowd misbehaving is about 40 people at a rugby match or 400+ at football. Which is most likely to be noticed?

Many American sports have crowd sizes that the average top tier football club could only dream of. Yet you don't see anywhere near the same kind of behaviours as I've listed there.

Even horse racing (the chav mecca that it is) only manages to tick one of the items on that list.

Top-tier football has ticked off every item on that list this season alone. I don't know why supporters seem so keen to excuse/downplay this or try to paint comparisons with other sports where they clearly do not exist...

[stuartmmcfc]

C70R said:

That wasn't the question I asked. I can find examples of everything in that list from top-flight football this season alone.
Can you tell me another sport where multiple of those has happened in the top flight in the past season/year?

Given that you've fallen straight back to the "oh, it's only a minority" argument, I suspect it doesn't bother you much.

(and yes, I get along to Arsenal and Chelsea with friends a few times a season - even though I support neither)

Are you talking this country or worldwide?
This season I’m struggling to think of examples of most of them. Behind close doors? Mass brawls of opposing supporters?
The examples such as refs needing protection, objects thrown, racist chants etc very occasionally happen and tend to make the news when they do because they really are a minority.
Minutes silences for tragic events tend to be very well observed. I remember the 50th anniversary of the Munich disaster being total silence in the ground. There’s the odd idiot who refers to “Munich’s” but tbh it’s a long time since I heard anyone do that.
I’m going to the League cup on Sunday and I have no worries about my safety when I pass through the Chelsea fan zone. Obviously if I started shouting “Chelsea rent boys” it wouldn’t really be surprising if someone got upset with me though.
I’d have no worries taking my son to a game either.
I don’t know about other countries and I suspect that it’s not all about football when trouble starts.
Having said that though, despite all the warnings, the World Cup passed with no trouble.

[C70R]

stuartmmcfc said:

C70R said:

That wasn't the question I asked. I can find examples of everything in that list from top-flight football this season alone.
Can you tell me another sport where multiple of those has happened in the top flight in the past season/year?

Given that you've fallen straight back to the "oh, it's only a minority" argument, I suspect it doesn't bother you much.

(and yes, I get along to Arsenal and Chelsea with friends a few times a season - even though I support neither)

Are you talking this country or worldwide?
This season I’m struggling to think of examples of most of them. Behind close doors? Mass brawls of opposing supporters?
The examples such as refs needing protection, objects thrown, racist chants etc very occasionally happen and tend to make the news when they do because they really are a minority.
Minutes silences for tragic events tend to be very well observed. I remember the 50th anniversary of the Munich disaster being total silence in the ground. There’s the odd idiot who refers to “Munich’s” but tbh it’s a long time since I heard anyone do that.
I’m going to the League cup on Sunday and I have no worries about my safety when I pass through the Chelsea fan zone. Obviously if I started shouting “Chelsea rent boys” it wouldn’t really be surprising if someone got upset with me though.
I’d have no worries taking my son to a game either.
I don’t know about other countries and I suspect that it’s not all about football when trouble starts.
Having said that though, despite all the warnings, the World Cup passed with no trouble.

Most of them are covered by the English Premiership/Championship. You need only add one or two top European leagues to get the full house.
Take a look at this article: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/47139322 but I'm sure it was just "one or two bad apples", for the umpteenth time...

I could gladly dig out articles to back up every point in that list.

[stuartmmcfc]

C70R said:

Most of them are covered by the English Premiership/Championship. You need only add one or two top European leagues to get the full house.
Take a look at this article: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/47139322 but I'm sure it was just "one or two bad apples", for the umpteenth time...

I could gladly dig out articles to back up every point in that list.

Can you please

[Driver101]

C70R said:

Many American sports have crowd sizes that the average top tier football club could only dream of. Yet you don't see anywhere near the same kind of behaviours as I've listed there.

Even horse racing (the chav mecca that it is) only manages to tick one of the items on that list.

Top-tier football has ticked off every item on that list this season alone. I don't know why supporters seem so keen to excuse/downplay this or try to paint comparisons with other sports where they clearly do not exist...

You don't think racism is a huge problem in American sports?

[stuartmmcfc]

C70R said:

Most of them are covered by the English Premiership/Championship. You need only add one or two top European leagues to get the full house.
Take a look at this article: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/47139322 but I'm sure it was just "one or two bad apples", for the umpteenth time...

That’s about a game in France and Marseille has always been the home of a bunch of hot heads whonlike trouble. The town itself struck me as quite an intimidating place the time I went.
I can only speak as a fan who goes to a lot of matches, both home and away, I can’t recall anything scary in a long time.

[C70R]

stuartmmcfc said:

C70R said:

Most of them are covered by the English Premiership/Championship. You need only add one or two top European leagues to get the full house.
Take a look at this article: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/47139322 but I'm sure it was just "one or two bad apples", for the umpteenth time...

I could gladly dig out articles to back up every point in that list.

Can you please

Sure thing:

- In which other sports do referees frequently need protection to leave the pitch?
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/46812988 ("The referee then had to be given a police escort to his next match after allegedly receiving threatening messages.")
- In which other sports are players at risk of being hit by projectiles from the crowd?
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/47007852
- How often do referees in other sports receive targeted, personal abuse from spectators?
https://www.football365.com/news/referees-could-st... (the important quote is "It happens every week, at pretty much every single game, at every single level, from the top flight down to amateur league")
- How often do players in other sports receive targeted, personal abuse from opposing fans?
https://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/sport/football/footb... (although this could apply to #2 also)
- How often do players in other sports receive significant volumes of racist abuse?
https://news.sky.com/story/sky-views-radical-actio...
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/47124198 (look at the number of incidents it references this season alone!)
- How often do opposing fans in other sports have huge brawls/fights around venues on a regular basis?
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-47146...
- Which other sports see opposition fans descending into immediate and frankly horrible abuse towards each other on social media?
You could pick literally any comment section on this Instagram account: https://www.instagram.com/strayoffside/
- When have other sports been forced to play 'behind closed doors' because of the behaviour of their fans?
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/47139322
- Which other sports have fans openly mocking tragic accidents suffered by opposing players/staff/fans?
https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/47187084 (although I would also accept Munich or Matthew Harding based submissions)

Most of those are actually from the past few weeks, and it took no more than a couple of minutes to find!

I can't wait to see you explain all this away, and come back to the "just a few bad apples" defence again.

[stuartmmcfc]

I’ve looked through them all and I can only see 2 that refer to games in the EPL, most are in Scotland or France,
The Southampton one was widely condemned and early in this thread people who went said they hadnt seen it. The culprits were identified.
The Sterling incident was also widely reported and it was only a few idiots who’ve since been identified and banned for life.
The fa cup one is hardly surprising with Millwalls reputation as an area let alone a football team.
Some reports are very general with no specific incidents.
You’re in danger of taking a few isolated incidents (reported because they’re relatively rare)
and believing it’s the norm. Believe me it’s not.
It’s just a few bad apples.

[C70R]

stuartmmcfc said:

I’ve looked through them all and I can only see 2 that refer to games in the EPL, most are in Scotland or France,
The Southampton one was widely condemned and early in this thread people who went said they hadnt seen it. The culprits were identified.
The Sterling incident was also widely reported and it was only a few idiots who’ve since been identified and banned for life.
The fa cup one is hardly surprising with Millwalls reputation as an area let alone a football team.
Some reports are very general with no specific incidents.
You’re in danger of taking a few isolated incidents (reported because they’re relatively rare)
and believing it’s the norm. Believe me it’s not.
It’s just a few bad apples.

And you are the problem with football. And the reason why it never bothers to do a decent job of standing up to this kind of behaviour.

Making excuses for this kind of behaviour, or deciding that the EPL is fine (note that article referring to numerous incidents of racism specifically in the EPL?) because only a few of those things have happened in 2019 so far, is as good as burying your head in the sand.

Perhaps someone more mature will be along for a discussion shortly.

[stuartmmcfc]

C70R said:

And you are the problem with football. And the reason why it never bothers to do a decent job of standing up to this kind of behaviour.

Making excuses for this kind of behaviour, or deciding that the EPL is fine (note that article referring to numerous incidents of racism specifically in the EPL?) because only a few of those things have happened in 2019 so far, is as good as burying your head in the sand.

Perhaps someone more mature will be along for a discussion shortly.

I’ve never said they’re fine or made excuses for it, simply that it’s not epidemic in my experience.
The reply of someone who knows they’ve lost the argument.
Having a good half term?

[C70R]

stuartmmcfc said:

C70R said:

And you are the problem with football. And the reason why it never bothers to do a decent job of standing up to this kind of behaviour.

Making excuses for this kind of behaviour, or deciding that the EPL is fine (note that article referring to numerous incidents of racism specifically in the EPL?) because only a few of those things have happened in 2019 so far, is as good as burying your head in the sand.

Perhaps someone more mature will be along for a discussion shortly.

I’ve never said they’re fine or made excuses for it, simply that it’s not epidemic in my experience.
The reply of someone who knows they’ve lost the argument.
Having a good half term?

The irony is strong.

Saying "it's not an epidemic" is just another way of putting "just a few bad apples". It's hilarious to watch you try and say that everything I've linked to (which took <5min, and was just the tip of the iceberg in volume terms) isn't really all that bad. I can't imagine any other sport putting up with this kind of behaviour - but it's water off a duck's back to some football fans.

[Driver101]

C70R said:

And you are the problem with football. And the reason why it never bothers to do a decent job of standing up to this kind of behaviour.

Making excuses for this kind of behaviour, or deciding that the EPL is fine (note that article referring to numerous incidents of racism specifically in the EPL?) because only a few of those things have happened in 2019 so far, is as good as burying your head in the sand.

Perhaps someone more mature will be along for a discussion shortly.

Very mature ending to your own point.

Who do you think isn't standing up for it? Don't the police arrest people for disorder outside the stadium?

The fans who are caught shouting racist abuse get charged. The fans who were mocking Sala have also been arrested.

In your own examples teams have had to play in empty stadiums.

What other action would you like to see happen? Short of banning people and seeking criminal convictions what else would you like to see?

[SS2.]

C70R said:

Perhaps someone more mature will be along for a discussion shortly.

Any credibility you were trying to build just went sailing out of the window with that jibe.

[C70R]

Driver101 said:

C70R said:

And you are the problem with football. And the reason why it never bothers to do a decent job of standing up to this kind of behaviour.

Making excuses for this kind of behaviour, or deciding that the EPL is fine (note that article referring to numerous incidents of racism specifically in the EPL?) because only a few of those things have happened in 2019 so far, is as good as burying your head in the sand.

Perhaps someone more mature will be along for a discussion shortly.

Very mature ending to your own point.

Who do you think isn't standing up for it? Don't the police arrest people for disorder outside the stadium?

The fans who are caught shouting racist abuse get charged. The fans who were mocking Sala have also been arrested.

In your own examples teams have had to play in empty stadiums.

What other action would you like to see happen? Short of banning people and seeking criminal convictions what else would you like to see?

It would be a start if fans could admit there was an endemic issue in the sport, rather than citing "isolated events" and "a small number of bad apples".

Given that this is a minority of people we're talking about who actually do these things, the frequency and impunity with which they seem to happen suggests that the majority of fans are not clear enough about what constitutes unacceptable behaviour.
The reason this doesn't happen with anything like the frequency or ferocity in other sports is because the fans show some class and self-police. Football's tribal, antagonistic atmosphere is a barrier to this.

[C70R]

SS2. said:

C70R said:

Perhaps someone more mature will be along for a discussion shortly.

Any credibility you were trying to build just went sailing out of the window with that jibe.

Will you at least have a bash at trying to address some of the many issues raised? Or would you prefer to play the man, rather than the ball?

[Driver101]

C70R said:

It would be a start if fans could admit there was an endemic issue in the sport, rather than citing "isolated events" and "a small number of bad apples".

Given that this is a minority of people we're talking about who actually do these things, the frequency and impunity with which they seem to happen suggests that the majority of fans are not clear enough about what constitutes unacceptable behaviour.
The reason this doesn't happen with anything like the frequency or ferocity in other sports is because the fans show some class and self-police. Football's tribal, antagonistic atmosphere is a barrier to this.

You used American sports earlier. It has deep issues with racism.

You say other sports show class? As much as you think football supporters like to hide their mass problems, I think rugby fans wrongly think they are a better class.

I personally don't think football gets to hide it's issues. Every little story is headline news for football. Everything is scrutinised to far greater levels.

Then there is the people who take great pride in looking down their noses at football.

Nobody is saying there isn't an element of what you say, but it's not as deep rooted at you think.

You'll often find there is far more arrests for violence at music gigs than there is football.

[C70R]

Driver101 said:

C70R said:

It would be a start if fans could admit there was an endemic issue in the sport, rather than citing "isolated events" and "a small number of bad apples".

Given that this is a minority of people we're talking about who actually do these things, the frequency and impunity with which they seem to happen suggests that the majority of fans are not clear enough about what constitutes unacceptable behaviour.
The reason this doesn't happen with anything like the frequency or ferocity in other sports is because the fans show some class and self-police. Football's tribal, antagonistic atmosphere is a barrier to this.

You used American sports earlier. It has deep issues with racism.

You say other sports show class? As much as you think football supporters like to hide their mass problems, I think rugby fans wrongly think they are a better class.

I personally don't think football gets to hide it's issues. Every little story is headline news for football. Everything is scrutinised to far greater levels.

Then there is the people who take great pride in looking down their noses at football.

Nobody is saying there isn't an element of what you say, but it's not as deep rooted at you think.

You'll often find there is far more arrests for violence at music gigs than there is football.

Seeing lots of excuses and very little acceptance there.