Liverpool v Rangers (A) CL

[Kenneth]

I dunno. I think it is worse if players are doing it, as they are paid employees doing it on the work dime in work colours.

They are aslo rolemodels, and if kids (or lets face it, some adults) hear them doing it then they will copy them.

Players are held to a higher standard than dickheads in the stand (and I realise every club has them... but I like to think Liverpool fans should know better).

And thats not to say I dont agree with everything you said

Players doing it encourages fans, more than the other way around, and there are a lot more fans than players.

[Charly]

Sorry Jaco... I dont have time to write anything more meaningful, but that sounds awful. And agree 100%

[Mark79]

I am not going to knock anyone that thinks players doing it is worse or that thinks fans are worse for doing it. I do take your point (and I think it might be what Mr Pink meant also) that a potential role model doing it will let to cases of monkey see monkey do and kids growing up thinking it is ok to say as their heroes as saying it.

Is not like it is a good thing regardless of who is saying it and even worse in the cases of any of say it and mean it.

I think with the Ra stuff and a lot of the more nationalistic leaning stuff it obviously hits a nerve more for a lot of Irish folk when we hear idiots saying/chanting it.

It is that bit more disgusting and ignorant when we think about stuff relating to certain organisations decades and decades removed from the Civil War era or even some of the Troubles era (and that is not me condoning or condemning every single thing from those eras either, just me saying that the meaning of certain words carried different meanings in different eras and that history can be a complex mistress at times).

But when I think chants like UP the Ra in 2022, it reminds me of being back in Ireland in the mid 1990s visiting family in county Limerick and driving through Adare village on the day the IRA hit a cash in transit van and opened up on the gardai (Irish police) with AK 47s. No warning, no nothing, just spraying them with bullets as they sat in their cars. I drove through in the aftermath, blue lights flashing everywhere, armed response teams everywhere and so on.

There was no "cause", no heroic standing for Ireland, just terrorists committing murder on the streets of Ireland. That's the type of scium chants like Up the Ra glorifies.

The same scum that when they were in prison that Gerry Adams, the then leader of the political party Sinn Fein, and Mary Lou McDonald, the current leader of the same party, were vocally calling for the release of.

The same scum that the Sinn Fein leadership were there to welcome when they did get released as part of the Good Friday agreement.

And one of those scum being a man who went on to continue a life of crime and terror after being released and then went postal on his own wife with a knidfe and still have the political elements trying to turn themselves into knots to avoid being overly critical.

Up the Ra glamourises the same organisation that shot and killed others in other counties from the 1990s onwards as they robbed from cash in transit vans and the like. The same organisation that developed ties with drug gangs in Ireland and abroad and that played/plays a part in gun running globally.

So for me, as an Irishman, I find that chant in 2022 disgusting, ignorant, embarrassing and if you believe in the words you are saying then you are someone I have no respect for and see no point in you at all.

Completely agree. Well said, Jaco

[Doc_Piptorious]

Sorry Jaco... I dont have time to write anything more meaningful, but that sounds awful. And agree 100%

It was not personally awful for me, certainly not compared to those directly involved in that particular day or their friends and families having to deal with the fall out, as I was just in a car passing through the aftermath, but it is my clunky way of explaining how and why for me, and maybe some of the other Irish heads, that some of those chants carry a bit of extra sting/cringe/embarrassment when heard and provoke a reaction that might seem out of whack to others.


Words have an impact, even ones said through a veil of ignorance, and words said with conviction cut even deeper.

Is why things like thousands and thousands chanting about Hillsborough disgusts me. There have been decades of education, decades of the actual truth being spoken of and printed, and yet the songs and chants go on. And all those chants came from an era without internet access and 24/7 access to any info you could wish for.

Excuses for chants and hatred become less and less valid imo the more access we have to information, to cold hard facts. If people persist in spouting hate in the face of actual facts, then at some point you have to stop making excuses and blaming role models, blaming copying their mates and start to assume that certain people want something to hate, they want to hate something or someone they see as being "different", and being able to express that hatred outweighs morals, decency and the truth.


Going to totally derail the thread is I continue though.

So going to harrass the oddballs in the coffee thread or a few Scots instead. That'll learn em to be different to me

[Mark79]

Another airing for this chant, disappointing to see we sunk to their level

https://twitter.com/tony4score/statu...05096138952716

Dickheads. Can’t do **** like that and then expect other fans to respect LFC fans in not singing certain other songs.

[ChesterDave]

Dickheads. Can’t do **** like that and then expect other fans to respect LFC fans in not singing certain other songs.

Also **** to expect a group of fans to take **** and not give it back. Same as when fans abuse a player all match then try and storm the pitch because they celebrate in front of the same fans

[Doc_Piptorious]

Also **** to expect a group of fans to take **** and not give it back. Same as when fans abuse a player all match then try and storm the pitch because they celebrate in front of the same fans

Can verbals not be given back without going to the level of those giving the ****?


If Mancs sing about Hillsborough, does that make it ok for scousers to sing about Munich?

Nope.

Better to let them live in the gutter, and wind them up with different chants/songs that still allows you to keep your self respect.

[Mark79]

Also **** to expect a group of fans to take **** and not give it back. Same as when fans abuse a player all match then try and storm the pitch because they celebrate in front of the same fans

A player celebrating a goal is not the same thing as offensive or deliberately inflammatory chants.

[rudedog]

[ame]https://twitter.com/Oldfirmfacts1/status/1580295891478421506[/ame]

[Mr Pink]

and I think it might be what Mr Pink meant also

Ya I was still half asleep when I wrote that and could have chosen better words- when I said it’s worse, didn’t mean the act itself is worse, but more that it has more of an impact as more people will see it and people see them as role models or whatever.

By saying it’s ‘worse’, I didn’t mean to condone inappropriate chants in the fanbase at all. Think with social media etc, a lot more could and should be done to have repercussions for anti social behavior at games.

Also as an Irish person (especially living abroad), it’s pretty embarrassing when there’s clips going round of people chanting bout the IRA ffs

[ChesterDave]

A player celebrating a goal is not the same thing as offensive or deliberately inflammatory chants.

Not generally celebrating now. But willfully running up to the opposition fans and celebrate in front of them including cupping the ears etc is inflammatory/goading

[Mark79]

Not generally celebrating now. But willfully running up to the opposition fans and celebrate in front of them including cupping the ears etc is inflammatory/goading

But that should be fair game if the player has been taking **** all game as you say.

A player rubbing the oppo’s fans noses in it when he scores is not comparable to songs mocking or celebrating events or organisations that claimed lives.

[baitman]

Not generally celebrating now. But willfully running up to the opposition fans and celebrate in front of them including cupping the ears etc is inflammatory/goading

Goading of jug eared cunts

[Saveloy]

https://twitter.com/Oldfirmfacts1/st...95891478421506

[Angryred]

I am not going to knock anyone that thinks players doing it is worse or that thinks fans are worse for doing it. I do take your point (and I think it might be what Mr Pink meant also) that a potential role model doing it will let to cases of monkey see monkey do and kids growing up thinking it is ok to say as their heroes as saying it.

Is not like it is a good thing regardless of who is saying it and even worse in the cases of any of say it and mean it.

I think with the Ra stuff and a lot of the more nationalistic leaning stuff it obviously hits a nerve more for a lot of Irish folk when we hear idiots saying/chanting it.

It is that bit more disgusting and ignorant when we think about stuff relating to certain organisations decades and decades removed from the Civil War era or even some of the Troubles era (and that is not me condoning or condemning every single thing from those eras either, just me saying that the meaning of certain words carried different meanings in different eras and that history can be a complex mistress at times).

But when I think chants like UP the Ra in 2022, it reminds me of being back in Ireland in the mid 1990s visiting family in county Limerick and driving through Adare village on the day the IRA hit a cash in transit van and opened up on the gardai (Irish police) with AK 47s. No warning, no nothing, just spraying them with bullets as they sat in their cars. I drove through in the aftermath, blue lights flashing everywhere, armed response teams everywhere and so on.

There was no "cause", no heroic standing for Ireland, just terrorists committing murder on the streets of Ireland. That's the type of scium chants like Up the Ra glorifies.

The same scum that when they were in prison that Gerry Adams, the then leader of the political party Sinn Fein, and Mary Lou McDonald, the current leader of the same party, were vocally calling for the release of.

The same scum that the Sinn Fein leadership were there to welcome when they did get released as part of the Good Friday agreement.

And one of those scum being a man who went on to continue a life of crime and terror after being released and then went postal on his own wife with a knidfe and still have the political elements trying to turn themselves into knots to avoid being overly critical.

Up the Ra glamourises the same organisation that shot and killed others in other counties from the 1990s onwards as they robbed from cash in transit vans and the like. The same organisation that developed ties with drug gangs in Ireland and abroad and that played/plays a part in gun running globally.

So for me, as an Irishman, I find that chant in 2022 disgusting, ignorant, embarrassing and if you believe in the words you are saying then you are someone I have no respect for and see no point in you at all.

My exact sentiments, Jaco...I absolutely abhor Sinn Fein & what they believe in...nothing will make me change my mind but looks like they will be the next party in Government & that makes me cringe!