That Israel flag

[Hildy 0]

That is just not correct. In fact the opposite is true.

 

Going back to 1962 a Glasgow businessman and Celtic supporter Max Benjamin who wanted to raise money for the Jewish National Fund Charitable Trust paid £100,000 if I recollect, to bring Real Madrid to Parkhead.

 

The lad who I pictured with the Israeli flags on the train to Derby said he was Jewish but when I asked him and his mates about it they said that it was (a) because THEY have been getting away with IT for years (which is no reason at all in my book) and (b) because they supported Israel's right to defend itself (which has nothing whatsover to do with football in my book).

 

Rangers fans have consistently carried the flags of countries whose players are wearing the colours and it may well be that they were fellow countrymen; but that apart I see no place for the flags of unrelated countries at football matches.

If a Protestant businessman had done that, what would it prove?

[Rangersitis 0]

Rangers fans can take various national flags to games thanks to a succession of men who fought to keep our little world free from tyranny. The reason they are doing it is both immaterial and none of your fucking business.

[BrahimHemdani 1]

If a Protestant businessman had done that, what would it prove?

 

It was just an example.

 

All I propose to add is that my personal experience tells me that your comment about Jewish people predominately supporting Rangers rather than Celtic is not true.

 

In fact if you look back a little further you will find that most first generation Jewish immigrants lived in the Gorbals and supported Third Lanark.

[Hildy 0]

It was just an example.

 

All I propose to add is that my personal experience tells me that your comment about Jewish people predominately supporting Rangers rather than Celtic is not true.

 

In fact if you look back a little further you will find that most first generation Jewish immigrants lived in the Gorbals and supported Third Lanark.

I read an article by a Jewish Celtic fan, which was actually quite dreadful, saying that most of his Jewish friends supported Rangers during our nine in a row years - glory-hunters he called them.

 

As I understand it from much older people, Jews were more inclined towards Rangers than Celtic back around the time of the game you mention, although the numbers at Rangers were never particularly great either.

Edited August 5, 2014 by Hildy

[barca72 440]

No, you don't.

 

The Orange Order has lost it way - just as Rangers have. I am highly critical of Rangers because I care about it. I hate to see it and its supporters tolerating mediocrity and excusing its many highly paid servants for delivering low grade football and empty promises.

 

My opinion on the Orange movement, which I know much less about, is also low. It has about as much political influence as the Scottish communist party and is regarded in similarly low esteem. It will likely be banned from marching extensively in the future because it is an easy target and has even less friends than Rangers - which is quite an achievement.

 

When it finally happens, I'll support it in any way that I can, but I suspect that it will take a lot more than me to stop the rot.

 

Scotland has changed, and not in a way that I would have chosen, but it would be a lot more useful if people could dismiss romantic notions of how it was and deal with things as they now are. What the Orange movement once was, it no longer is.

 

As for Rangers, I'm a bit more optimistic - but still a pessimist.

 

I repeat, I do get it.

You will notice that I refused to allow your first post to pass without comment. Why would that be?

Well you state here - "Scotland has changed, and not in a way that I would have chosen, but it would be a lot more useful if people could dismiss romantic notions of how it was and deal with things as they now are. What the Orange movement once was, it no longer is."

Let's look at that.

First you berate me for looking at the situation for the way it was and then exhort me to deal with things the way they are.

 

Fifty plus years ago as a young man I could feel that something was not right but I couldn't put my finger on it. As time passed I began to realise that the mhedia in Scotland were presenting things to me in a context that was not as it should be.

I slowly became to realise that they were attempting to have me accept that it was wrong of me to be a proud Protestant and that I should champion the Catholic cause.

You have to understand that this was an insidious campaign that was hard to comprehend. They did not come right out and say that as a Protestant I was being sectarian, that realization came later.

In those days there were haves and have-nots. Mostly the Protestants had the better jobs.The catholics wanted them, they took them and the Protestants let them.

As they moved from the lower to middle to top managerial jobs ( including the better paper pusher jobs ), institutions were changed and a culture was eroded.

Throughout that period institutions were portrayed as being wrong, the Loyalist institutions in especial.

The populace bought into this propaganda, apathy set in, ergo institutions like the Orange Order were portrayed as yesterday's child.

It is a fact, is it not, that to destroy a culture you first destroy its institutions?

It became fashionable not to offend anyone for fear of being labelled as sectarian or a bigot.

I don't have the power to buy middle-page ads in the newspapers so I do what I can by writing to editors, government departments, etc. and state my resistance whenever I see this campaign being perpetrated.

Just as I refuted your first post, I continue to resist whenever I can and wherever I see an opportunity.

I refuse to accept that my culture is wrong. I refuse to accept that although the young people of Scotland have been raised with an increased exposure to this insidious campaign that the battle is over.

The P/U/L community can redress the balance, but leaders have to emerge to encourage this resurrection. Each individual has to accept that they need to withstand the guff they are being fed if they wish to, as you put it, deal with things as they are.

I refuse to be fatalistic. If you feel that you want to be a Protestant, then protest don't accept. Look what happened when Calvin and Knox protested.

The power lies with your generation. All my generation can do is encourage you and support where we can. Being positive rather than negative may help.

Maybe your generation could start by reclaiming GCC. Why not, eh?

Maybe the shitstorm that is supposedly heading in the direction of the east end will assist you.

Ah, but first the NO vote has to be won.

[Super Cooper 0]

Politics and football should never mix but how does one get away from it, there is no avenue or arena to spew any political bile so the football stadium is chosen.

 

On the Israel flag, I remember seeing my first Israel flag way back in the 80s, it was the star that attracted me to it and forced me to ask my dad what it was. It's not a new phenomenon at Ibrox.

[Juancornetto 1]

Politics and football should never mix but how does one get away from it, there is no avenue or arena to spew any political bile so the football stadium is chosen.

 

On the Israel flag, I remember seeing my first Israel flag way back in the 80s, it was the star that attracted me to it and forced me to ask my dad what it was. It's not a new phenomenon at Ibrox.

 

Welcome back buddy

[Super Cooper 0]

Welcome back buddy

 

Thanks mate. [emoji106]

[Hildy 0]

I repeat, I do get it.

You will notice that I refused to allow your first post to pass without comment. Why would that be?

Well you state here - "Scotland has changed, and not in a way that I would have chosen, but it would be a lot more useful if people could dismiss romantic notions of how it was and deal with things as they now are. What the Orange movement once was, it no longer is."

Let's look at that.

First you berate me for looking at the situation for the way it was and then exhort me to deal with things the way they are.

 

Fifty plus years ago as a young man I could feel that something was not right but I couldn't put my finger on it. As time passed I began to realise that the mhedia in Scotland were presenting things to me in a context that was not as it should be.

I slowly became to realise that they were attempting to have me accept that it was wrong of me to be a proud Protestant and that I should champion the Catholic cause.

You have to understand that this was an insidious campaign that was hard to comprehend. They did not come right out and say that as a Protestant I was being sectarian, that realization came later.

In those days there were haves and have-nots. Mostly the Protestants had the better jobs.The catholics wanted them, they took them and the Protestants let them.

As they moved from the lower to middle to top managerial jobs ( including the better paper pusher jobs ), institutions were changed and a culture was eroded.

Throughout that period institutions were portrayed as being wrong, the Loyalist institutions in especial.

The populace bought into this propaganda, apathy set in, ergo institutions like the Orange Order were portrayed as yesterday's child.

It is a fact, is it not, that to destroy a culture you first destroy its institutions?

It became fashionable not to offend anyone for fear of being labelled as sectarian or a bigot.

I don't have the power to buy middle-page ads in the newspapers so I do what I can by writing to editors, government departments, etc. and state my resistance whenever I see this campaign being perpetrated.

Just as I refuted your first post, I continue to resist whenever I can and wherever I see an opportunity.

I refuse to accept that my culture is wrong. I refuse to accept that although the young people of Scotland have been raised with an increased exposure to this insidious campaign that the battle is over.

The P/U/L community can redress the balance, but leaders have to emerge to encourage this resurrection. Each individual has to accept that they need to withstand the guff they are being fed if they wish to, as you put it, deal with things as they are.

I refuse to be fatalistic. If you feel that you want to be a Protestant, then protest don't accept. Look what happened when Calvin and Knox protested.

The power lies with your generation. All my generation can do is encourage you and support where we can. Being positive rather than negative may help.

Maybe your generation could start by reclaiming GCC. Why not, eh?

Maybe the shitstorm that is supposedly heading in the direction of the east end will assist you.

Ah, but first the NO vote has to be won.

 

You used the term 'nose-in-the-air' earlier. This is like Rangers-haters using 'sectarian' and other derogatory terms to describe us. It displays more about them, and in this case, you, than about those they take issue with.

 

Perhaps this is where the problem really lies. The Orange movement does not encompass to any great degree the broad spectrum of the Protestant community. It represents what we might call the blue collar Protestant community, or at least a part of it, and has limited appeal elsewhere. It cannot reach out and embrace Protestants from the white collar part of the community in any great numbers, perhaps because it perceives a 'nose in the air' attitude to be distasteful, or maybe because the organisation itself is too flawed, too parochial and too entrenched.

 

The Orange movement may well have had to deal with unfairness and finger-pointing over the years, but has it reacted in a way that sees it winning the argument? Few would say so. Its marching presence brings embarrassment to the very community it purports to represent - because it represents only a strand of the Protestant community and seems to alienate the rest.

 

When its defenders use terms like 'nose in the air', it's maybe not too difficult to see why.

 

To reiterate the earlier point, it would be utter madness to highlight in any way the Orange movement or Rangers in this NO campaign.

 

Most Rangers fans can grasp this and I would hope that members of the Orange movement can grasp it, too.

[compo 6,462]

lets keep politics out of sport