Rangers staff risk stoking sectarianism hints Glasgow council boss Susan Aitken

[Gonzo79 15,294]

18 minutes ago, Walterbear said:

why anyone thinks they know what was going through the minds of the founding fathers. I

Who has suggested they know that?

[JohnMc 2,754]

3 hours ago, Blue Moon said:

I was speaking from personal experience when I said I was in the minority.  I lived in a well known mining village and we were one of a very few families who displayed Labour posters at election time.   For the rest it was an identity thing and they voted Tory.  The same was true in the supporters club I was a member of.  

 

I will leave it there as I have to go out.

 

 

That's really interesting. My father's from an Ayrshire mining village and my Granny used to tell me her mother put red ribbons on her on May Day just to annoy her mother-in-law who was a Tory. But that was the 1930s, I thought by the 1970s that Tory/Unionist vote in mining communities had largely disappeared. Happy to be corrected. 

[Soulsonic5791 408]

1 hour ago, Walterbear said:

I don’t think the cops are politicised to that level Soul I just think when Rangers are involved they think crowd control as opposed to crowd management. Not sure if that’s coz of our history of volatility such as Manchester, the demographics, match day logistics, scale etc. 

Ok mate, I can see why you've said that.

 

FWIW, here's my two bob's worth in the subject.

 

I've been to many a big game with large crowds exceeding 70,000 at various stadia across Europe, with more than a smattering of them involving ourselves and the other ticket being in direct opposition. In years gone by policing of our support always struck me as a mixture of both control and management with the accent being on 'management' in many cases, especially so at Hampden where the policing mostly struck me as being efficient and as unobtrusive as it could be from Plod's perspective. There was no need for kettling etc., and unecessarily raising people's blood pressure in an already pressured situation due to the importance of the game. Now the reasons for this policing approach may be manifold, namely, different tactics being deployed due to lessons learned from the 1980 SCF, Heysel, Hillsborough, etc, etc.

 

However, this has changed within the last ten years IMO. Having attended numerous away games during that time and witnessed different policing methods by forces in other areas of Scotland, at the 2016 SCF, it was apparent to me at least, that what could be interpreted, conveniently so, as Police incompetence, had a more worrying underlying aspect. It seemed to me and countless others that were there that day, that the Police were almost willing an escalated flashpoint to take place due to their botched handling of the situation. We bore the brunt of that. Not Hibs. This is despite the fixture between the two clubs having a necessary level of risk attached to it. Anyone who has been to Easter Road and witnessed Lothian & Borders officers in riot gear filming ordinary 'scarfers' will attest to how that level of risk is scored with a far smaller crowd and the higher than commensurate number of officers on the ground. 

 

This wasn't replicated at Hampden, allegedly. Was this used for ulterior motives in perhaps say, a resource bun fight at Scottish central government? Perhaps, and maybe a discussion for another time.

 

Furthermore, policing at Firhill last season was the most unecessary display of mismanagement that I have witnessed barring the scenes after the final whistle against Hibs mentioned above. And, it trumped the Met's handling of England v Scotland matches when I left Wembley thinking 'they should send someone up to Glasgow to learn how to handle a big crowd without antagonising fans'.

 

Whether or not policing has been politicised to such an extent as to deliberately treating our fans unfavourably is probably down to personal experience and varying levels of paranoia informing theories of conspiracy. However, I think it is fair to say that the attitude towards our support has changed in relatively recent times and not for the better.

 

People might agree or disagree with me and that's cool.

[JohnMc 2,754]

2 hours ago, Darthter said:

From a recent PanelBase opinion poll....a example of the Independence "split" within Rangers supporters...not a lot in it.

 

 

I know opinion polls need read with a bit of caution but as a snapshot it's fascinating. It suggests what many believe, namely that our support is far more representative of the general public than some of us believe or we are popularly portrayed. 

 

14% of SNP voters don't support independence! It also suggests the majority of 'Unionists' are Brexit voters. That's ironic. 

 

As an aside, whilst there have been some bad tempered posts (guilty), some offensive posts and some clear trolling on this thread, there have also been some very good posts. Stewarty's post 471 being particularly good. 

 

[Walterbear 557]

I defer to your greater experience soulsinuc and Hampden was a shocker I agree and I can sense fans are treated like cattle and second rate citizens.  From reading about it we get treated badly abroad as well so the only comparator in Scotland due to scale would be the Tims. I don’t know if we get treated differently to them which if true would support claims of bias. 

 

I haven’t travelled much tbh. Did a bit round Scottish grounds in the 70/80s when we basically went where we wanted and drank in any pub we fancied  (which saw the increase in Hibs and Aberdeen casuals). I can see it’s totally different now but I can’t comment on last ten years. 

[Gonzo79 15,294]

It's nice to see that we now know that Unionists who vote for Brexit are 'ironic' (nothing actually ironic about it), that the figureheads or Unionism are all bonkers extremists and that the Rangers support is inclusive and diverse.

Meanwhile, our detractors (some of whom are more visible than others) can continue to take pops willy nilly.  

[Walterbear 557]

1 hour ago, Gonzo79 said:

Who has suggested they know that?

I didn’t express myself well gonzo. All I meant is I suspect the club were founded purely for football and sports reasons so people are entitled to support them for those reasons. 

 

They are also entitled to support Rangers because they were born close to the ground, because they like blue, because Ibrox was the first ground they visited, because their dad or big brother supported Rangers and for all sorts of non political reasons. They are also entitled to support Rangers because they can express political identity amongst many like minded people and watch their favourite sport at the same time. 

 

No one group or person who supports Rangers owns the identity of Rangers (obvious copyright issues excepted).  

 

Going back to your question unless someone can point out that the club was set up as an exclusive club for a particular theme other than sport then all are welcome imo. Because a significant number choose to take the club identity in one direction doesn’t invalidate the support of those who support Rangers for their own personal reasons and who may have different politics. They may think it makes those folk less of a supporter but I would challenge that for the reasons given. 

 

If the 4 lads had specified Rangers can only exist in a specific political or idealogical context then that would have been the single biggest threat to the existence of the club as politics, identity and ideologies change through time. 

 

The reason I referred to the founders rationale is its clear some who support Rangers on here and have leanings towards independence feel as if they are being valued as less than Rangers fans. If I have picked that up wrong apologies. 

 

 

 

 

[Darthter 542]

29 minutes ago, Walterbear said:

I didn’t express myself well gonzo. All I meant is I suspect the club were founded purely for football and sports reasons so people are entitled to support them for those reasons. 

 

They are also entitled to support Rangers because they were born close to the ground, because they like blue, because Ibrox was the first ground they visited, because their dad or big brother supported Rangers and for all sorts of non political reasons. They are also entitled to support Rangers because they can express political identity amongst many like minded people and watch their favourite sport at the same time. 

 

No one group or person who supports Rangers owns the identity of Rangers (obvious copyright issues excepted).  

 

Going back to your question unless someone can point out that the club was set up as an exclusive club for a particular theme other than sport then all are welcome imo. Because a significant number choose to take the club identity in one direction doesn’t invalidate the support of those who support Rangers for their own personal reasons and who may have different politics. They may think it makes those folk less of a supporter but I would challenge that for the reasons given. 

 

If the 4 lads had specified Rangers can only exist in a specific political or idealogical context then that would have been the single biggest threat to the existence of the club as politics, identity and ideologies change through time. 

 

The reason I referred to the founders rationale is its clear some who support Rangers on here and have leanings towards independence feel as if they are being valued as less than Rangers fans. If I have picked that up wrong apologies. 

Good post....

 

Regarding your point at the end....it's not the Independence supporters that feel we are being valued as lesser Rangers fans - we are being told that we are.  Where as, we know we're not.

I come onto this forum to talk about Rangers....not religion or politics - there's other places I can go for that.  However I will defend my thoughts, personal beliefs & my right to support whatever football team I wish.  I really couldn't care what anyone else's political or religious thoughts are, but don't bring them into the football world - somethings are just not compatible.  

 

The more footballing folk want to get involved in politics & religion, the more division there will be - across the board, not just within Rangers.

As a support, I am getting a distinct impression that we are getting extremely paranoid & convinced that EVERYONE is against us.  For example:

- BBC

- SFA

- SPFL

- Scottish Govt

- SNP (at all levels)

- Police Scotland

- HMRC

- Ibrox & Cessnock Community Council

- Glasgow City Council

- All teams within the SPFL & many out with

- All Referees

- Tartan Army

- Scottish Print media

- Scottish TV media

- Scottish Radio media

 

I'm sure I've missed several off the list....but it's a pretty long list!!!!

[Gonzo79 15,294]

20 minutes ago, Darthter said:

I really couldn't care what anyone else's political or religious thoughts are, but don't bring them into the football world - somethings are just not compatible.  

You don't care what anyone else thinks but you don't want them to bring their thoughts into certain areas of interaction.  Even areas of interaction that are intertwined with those very things, such as a thread about politics negatively affecting Rangers Football Club.

 

If the moderators want to ban us speaking about it fair enough but it would be terribly convenient for those conflicted amongst us to have it that way.  

 

The continued attacks on Rangers by members of a certain political persuasion are undeniable - they don't even try to hide it, so let's not kid ourselves otherwise.  

[JohnMc 2,754]

1 hour ago, Walterbear said:

All I meant is I suspect the club were founded purely for football and sports reasons so people are entitled to support them for those reasons. 

 

 

 

 

 

Rangers were on the go for 40 years before we started to be associated with Protestantism and Unionism. There's a big argument to be made that if Queen's Park had decided to embrace professionalism they'd have become the 'Protestant' team in Glasgow. But it wasn't until the 1910s that Rangers started to be clearly identified that way, and that was largely down to be us being the only side strong enough to regularly best Celtic. Thistle moving away from Partick helped with that too. The creation of Celtic, and Hibs to a lesser extent, meant almost every other side was by default 'Protestant', but it was decades before it became something clearly associated with us.