Allegedly
Thursday, January 15, 2009 at 9:35PM I'm sure we'll know in time, but there are rumours suggesting that the 11 Tottenham fans charged for you-know-what against Sol Campbell have been pretty much stitched up. Not to go over old ground (for the millionth time) I have no gripes about people being prosecuted for racist chanting or homophobic chanting (although this one is a bugbear for many people who frequent football games - as discussed in earlier posts).
Apparently, of the 11 fans arrested, only 2 have been charged with singing the 'Lunacy' song which has been deemed offensive by the Police and media via Campbell (bite me yeah). The remaining 9 fans (three of which are juveniles ) have been charged with singing one of the following songs:
You can stick Sol Campbell up your arse, Singing we've got Ledley at the back
or
Gay Boy, Gay Boy
Again, I have to stress, this post is simply about this rumour and I'm not suggesting it's fact and will be interested to see what the charges amount to once the guilty appear in court. The 'gay boy' chant is crude but is hardly worth prosecuting people for. Seriously, its ridiculous. Songs about gassing the Jews (can we retrospectively bring charges against thousands of Chelsea and West Ham fans dating back to the 1970's?) and Harold Shipman, Munich, Ronaldo dying in the tunnel and a ton more with homophobic connotations relating to several Prem players sang by most clubs that never appear to fathom complaints from the targeted footballers are completely ignored because as wrong as they are, they are right in the footballing stadia arena (although that appears to be changing. No more common mans muck for us).
Apparently the following is from an e-mail sent by Spurs to a fan. Again, pinch of salt, as it's just an extract, but if you remember the Trust meeting from a few weeks back, Spurs did make it clear that they did not think the charges against the Spurs fans were fair.
We do not believe our fans to be guilty of racism and believe that the media organisations that originally carried the story under that misapprehension have now amended their copy. We have actively promoted our stance that the song is not racist within the media.
If anyone has e-mailed the club, feel free to share the response.
Christ only knows how volatile and intense the atmosphere will be on Sunday. Personally, 3 points and a good performance is all I care about. We need to rise above it, but you get the feeling the police and stewards will be very active and fans (both sets) will exchange colourful words - but nothing more than the usual for a game that includes former players/managers up against the club they left.
Campbell, will no doubt have unbelievable abuse (I'm talking about the level of noise) aimed at him. I can guess already the four letter word on everyone's lips (it's neither racist or homophobic, well, not until Campbell complains and the Daily Mail run the story).
Reader Comments (5)
Yet again we have another website trivialising the vile behaviour of some Tottenham "fans" - the chant of "Gay Boy" is enormously offensive because it is only chanted because these people believe that it is an insult to call someone homosexual. Sadly I have no faith that the police or THFC will get rid of these scum who blight my away trips (Someone said "Green is a gay colour"to Nijmegen fans and then sang songs about how we saved the Dutch from the Nazis without a hint of irony)
I dont think he is trivialising the behaviour. If you read previous blogs you'll get that. Although Spooky does (and he's admitted it) appear to be stuck in the middle of what is right and wrong. I think all he's saying is, why make scapegoats of these Spurs fans for chants that are not that uncommon when police and other clubs have choosen to ignore the very same chants sand by a number of fans?
Is it because Campbell complained? Will this set a precedence for other footballers to also complain?
Football sadly is plighted with such 'humour', this being low-grade and unoriginal. But it seems a complete waste of time to prosecute these fans especially when the press went ape-shit over the lunacy song - which is a complete nightmare to dissect (as either racist or homophobic).
Look. I hate having to write about Campbell and the chanting.
I don't involve myself, ever, in this type of singing. Would rather sing about my team and my players rather than some bloke who once wore the shirt.
I don't like Campbell as a man or a footballer, for obvious reasons. I hate the amount of energy spent by our fans, aiming songs at him. I dont think they should ignore him - because if he wasn't abused, in his own misguided way he'd think he was forgiven and justified.
Old fashion boo'ing and name calling (thats traditional name calling) is fine by me, and although you wouldn't get away with it on the street, its ok in a football ground.
Sadly, fans don't tend to have too many brain cells, and hit the lowest common denominator. In this case, the gay slurs.
It's embarrassing.
All I was saying (and obviously, not very well) was that the police seem to be setting an example, but it lacks true focus in the grand scheme of things.
So much more has been ignored - week in and week out, and yet this has dominated headlines and goes out on a whimper.
Why so selective?
It's a bullshit police based media stunt for the masses. Yes, the chants are crude but any lawyer that doesn't have his head up his harris will get this thrown out before you can say...
...no, actually I can't say it.
Spooky, you have to admit there's a minority (a growing one) that seem to be prone to singing these type of songs (like the one about Adebayor). So prosecuting these 11 is sending out a message that it won't be tolerated.
*thinks*
Yep, high profile to make the papers, so even though the 'abuse' is not as venomous as other examples of terrace 'banter' this whole exercise serves a purpose.
Can't believe that the lunacy song isn't part of the charges against the 11.