There is a section of the Celtic support which could almost convince me to back Strict Liability.
I am not joking. There are days when I wake up, check the headlines, and think that it would be a price worth paying if the degenerate segment of our fan-base was gone and gone for good. Our reputation is important to us and these filthy people are pissing it away.
Today’s headlines have been grabbed by another coin thrower and a song being sung in a pub. The coin thrower, I’ll deal with briefly; Celtic needs to be all over this issue, it’s the third time this season and it damned well ought to be the last.
If that means the club pushes ahead and proposes reforms of how away match tickets are allocated – and yes, that’s Celtic’s last resort in challenging supporter’s buses to get their own members in line – then so be it.
With bangers, smoke bombs and flares still a feature of our away support there is a certain grim inevitability about the club taking over control of away tickets. Because nothing else has worked, there are people who just refuse to get the message and who will not toe the line. There will be some impact on their fellow fans, but they don’t care about their fellow fans anyway or they wouldn’t do what it is that they do with such depressing regularity.
I know this, the SFA has been spooked by the Clarke thing and the other high profile incidents this season, and they’ve had enough of this. If they’ve opened talks with the government then they are gearing up to allow Strict Liability to go through the parliament and they’re saying that they will not challenge any law that’s passed. The window the clubs had to get in front of this and take action is almost shut. After that, the politicians will do it for them.
There’s plenty the government can do as well, short of punishing all fans though; a change in the law which hands out custodial sentences for those who bring pyrotechnics into a football ground would be a good start. I can’t imagine many people would object to It.
On top of that, the police could do more than just stand about watching this stuff. I’ve heard a lot of mealy-mouthed nonsense about how they can’t be expected to wade into crowds and pull people out … I’m afraid then there’s no point in us, as tax payers, paying for the policing of football stadiums cause it’s nothing more than free overtime.
It’s time people got their act together, and fast, before this issue ends up the subject of a major parliamentary vote, and the clubs are put on a collision course with huge sections of their own supports. We don’t need this crap inside our grounds, it’s time it was weeded out and eradicated once and for all.
Whatever measure Celtic takes has the full support of this site and its entire editorial team.
The reputation of the club and the rights of our ordinary decent fans are paramount.
Those clowns who continue to do as they like, it’s time we were rid of them.
On top of that, now there’s this, the Brendan Rodgers IRA song, to the tune of the same appalling bile which is sung about Nacho Novo. Nobody on this site needs to be told of my utter contempt for the Spaniard; it’s been the subject of several pieces on here. But the IRA song is childish, witless, idiotic bile which this site would have highlighted over and over and over and over again had its equivalent been sung about someone at Celtic, and rightly so.
It’s been yonks since it was heard at games, as it’s been yonks since an equally disgusting tune was being sung about the fat Ibrox kit-man. But the Brendan Rodgers version really is dredging the gutter in every bit as sick a way as anything I’ve heard at Ibrox.
The video footage of it being sung in a pub is dire for so many reasons. First, that someone would sing it, second that someone would film it, third that the someone would think it belongs online to be “shared” by the rest of us … honestly, it’s a piece of filth that ought never to have seen the light of day. Everyone singing it should be heartily and thoroughly ashamed. It’s a disgusting chant, vile, sick, evil, and those doing it … honestly, what goes through your head?
That song cannot be allowed to appear in a football ground. If people want to sing it in dingy back-street boozers, then that’s up to them and the landlord and if they are named and shamed then I’ll have no sympathy with them whatever stigma or consequences come with the act. But the day that surfaces at a game will bring shame on our club and at that point I personally will not just reconsider my stance on Strict Liability but I’ll actively campaign for it.
The people who would sing such a thing … this support does not want them.
Not in my name, not in their name, not in the names of any ordinary decent fans.
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