Survey: Racism and other bad behavior

[WLDBIL6]

I'm curious to see how people have felt about fan behavior so far and hear interesting stories. In general, I've been impressed with the crowd's sportmanship with only a few exceptions:

1) U.S.-Italy: Thought the level of support for the U.S. was amazing. I had goosebumps during the anthem. However, I was disappointed when some of the U.S. fans threw cups on to the field after the offsides call on Beasley potential goal. This is never acceptable in my opinion and the Bullsh*t chant is a bit tacky.

2) Spain-Tunsia: Right next to the Tunsia fans. Great spirit but they whistled whenever Spain touched the ball and that got old quickly. About 1/3 of them left with 10 minutes remaining after Spain took control.

3) Australia-Croatia: Found fans from both sides great. Too bad the players couldn't behave better.

4) A-hole of the tournment award nominee: The guys I saw at the Stuttgart train station that was intentionally slide a U.S. flag around under his foot. I'm presumming he was Serbian based on his hat. I can understand his hatred of America and I'm not part of the group that wants flag burning banned in the U.S., but this doesn't even strike me as political protest. It's really just being pathetic little punk loser. I just shrugged and went on with my business. Don't know if he knew I was American, but I like to hope my indifference bothered him.

Anyone have stories to tell?

[Gorton Blue]

Although I was not there, a mate of mine was in Stuttgart for the chair tossing match between the Germans and our boys. Also said the Trinidad fans were amazing and overall solid people.

[WLDBIL6]

Although I was not there, a mate of mine was in Stuttgart for the chair tossing match between the Germans and our boys.

I know that the overwhelming majority of the English fans are good people, but it seems like the only significant trouble makers have been from England. Any opinion as to why this aspect of English football still lingers? It seems to be fairly well stamped out of the club level. At least I've never seen/heard of any problems at the games I've attended.

I'm not criticizing England. I'm just trying to understand the mentality better.

[WLDBIL6]

Can I politely ask you guys to "take it outside"; so we can get back to the original topic which was examples of bad behavior at the world cup (not message boards :D )

[vanGobbel redded]

I'm curious to see how people have felt about fan behavior so far and hear interesting stories. In general, I've been impressed with the crowd's sportmanship with only a few exceptions:

1) U.S.-Italy: Thought the level of support for the U.S. was amazing. I had goosebumps during the anthem. However, I was disappointed when some of the U.S. fans threw cups on to the field after the offsides call on Beasley potential goal. This is never acceptable in my opinion and the Bullsh*t chant is a bit tacky.

2) Spain-Tunsia: Right next to the Tunsia fans. Great spirit but they whistled whenever Spain touched the ball and that got old quickly. About 1/3 of them left with 10 minutes remaining after Spain took control.

3) Australia-Croatia: Found fans from both sides great. Too bad the players couldn't behave better.

4) A-hole of the tournment award nominee: The guys I saw at the Stuttgart train station that was intentionally slide a U.S. flag around under his foot. I'm presumming he was Serbian based on his hat. I can understand his hatred of America and I'm not part of the group that wants flag burning banned in the U.S., but this doesn't even strike me as political protest. It's really just being pathetic little punk loser. I just shrugged and went on with my business. Don't know if he knew I was American, but I like to hope my indifference bothered him.

Anyone have stories to tell?

Haha, you are too cute.

[Tim 17]

It's not just English fans that mis-behave abroad. I think it's a culture thing.

If you go to any town in the UK on a Friday or Saturday night you'll find hundreds of people totally drunk spoiling for a fight. This is then transported if they go on holiday to Spain or Greece and of course if there's a World Cup or Euro championship. I'm english but even i can't explain why this happens.

I think things have improved a bit due to the banning orders on approx 3000 hooligans who couldn't go to Germany. If they had been allowed to travel i dread to think how bad things would have been. So to me although several hundred were arrested for minor offences ( without being charged ) i think this is an improvement.



Tim.

[Prenn]

It's not just English fans that mis-behave abroad. I think it's a culture thing.

If you go to any town in the UK on a Friday or Saturday night you'll find hundreds of people totally drunk spoiling for a fight. This is then transported if they go on holiday to Spain or Greece and of course if there's a World Cup or Euro championship. I'm english but even i can't explain why this happens.

I think things have improved a bit due to the banning orders on approx 3000 hooligans who couldn't go to Germany. If they had been allowed to travel i dread to think how bad things would have been. So to me although several hundred were arrested for minor offences ( without being charged ) i think this is an improvement.



That's wrong, several hundred people were arrested for just being there. The Germans called them 'preventative arrests'. It was shown to be the case when all but a few are released without any charge whatsoever. The German response was absolutely correct and should be a lesson to any other coutnry policing a future tournament however it did give the rags in the media a chance to blow everything out of proportion.

[comme]

That's wrong, several hundred people were arrested for just being there. The Germans called them 'preventative arrests'. It was shown to be the case when all but a few are released without any charge whatsoever. The German response was absolutely correct and should be a lesson to any other coutnry policing a future tournament however it did give the rags in the media a chance to blow everything out of proportion.

They were pretty good, but in some cases they should have acted sooner.

The tension was building in a few cases and they could have stepped in before anything actually happened. It is a very fine line to tread though in fairness to them. There is a constant suspicion of English fans over there, and I do believe that this encourages trouble.

Most incidents are widely misreported in the British media, and there is a constant sense that the media are desperate for trouble to actually occur. The camera crews hand round like vultures waiting to get footage of it kicking off.

There is no doubt that the banning orders have helped significantly, and the majority of trouble is simply what would occur if you let 50,000 British males drink all day in the sun in a city anywhere.

[avocats]

I (an almost-senior-citizen female wearing a USA shirt) politely said "Excuse me" to a Czech fan on a tram on the way to the USA Czech game, when the little old German lady seated next to me was trying to get off the tram. He started with "p-tooey--USA: Vietnam, Bosnia, IRAN" I was, like, whoa--did I miss the news, we invaded IRAN? But before I could go into a long discussion of my views on Vietnam and Iraq, a nice German-Indian guy told the Czech that football was no place for politics and to clamp it. He did.

All in all, there were mostly great fans from all over, and a few drunken idiots from each country. No real trouble during the whole three weeks. A wonderful experience. I especially appreciated how great the Germans were.

[inirenec]

I (an almost-senior-citizen female wearing a USA shirt) politely said "Excuse me" to a Czech fan on a tram on the way to the USA Czech game, when the little old German lady seated next to me was trying to get off the tram. He started with "p-tooey--USA: Vietnam, Bosnia, IRAN" I was, like, whoa--did I miss the news, we invaded IRAN? But before I could go into a long discussion of my views on Vietnam and Iraq, a nice German-Indian guy told the Czech that football was no place for politics and to clamp it. He did.

All in all, there were mostly great fans from all over, and a few drunken idiots from each country. No real trouble during the whole three weeks. A wonderful experience. I especially appreciated how great the Germans were.

Well, the americans reputation was severely damaged after the Irak invasion. I think it will take years for people to get over it especially in Europe and Middle East. On the other hand, this is not racism but more a kind of rejection of the american politics and obviously it will affect every american citizen abroad even more if they wear american symbols.

Concerning real racism and football, I think there is still a lot to do to prevent it but the new FIFA regulations are a first good step.

[marianelah]

This turkish guy refused to sell me anything in his store. I was wearing my US jersey and he went off on Irak, Bush etc... I walked out and went to another store.

[RawDog88]

good: the german people. terrific hosts & extremely nice and helpful whereever we went. hit 5 cities in all.

bad: american drunkenfrat boy-types with big mouths doing like they own the place. also some of the english.

what's the story with the fat, shaven-headed, drunk, tattoed set?

who are these people?

are they the UK equivalent to "white trash" in the US?

what type of idiot tattoes a football club crest on his forearm or a cross of st. george across his torso?

my unpleasant observations of them:

1. refused to give up our reserved seats on the train. had to threaten to call the conductor and german police. was cursed when they vacated.

2. asked a japanese family of 4 if they had games tix on the train to the england-trinidad game. tried to buy all 4 for 400 euro after cussing among themselves that these people were given tix.

3. harassment of attractive females passing by.

4. alcohol consumption to the point of absolute stupor.

5. horrible body odor. do these people bathe whence on their european football forays? imagine the stench of human sweat, urine and stale beer all mixed into one.

6. is it necessary to used the words "f*ck" or "f*cking" in every single statement?

[comme]

also some of the english.

what's the story with the fat, shaven-headed, drunk, tattoed set?

who are these people?

are they the UK equivalent to "white trash" in the US?

what type of idiot tattoes a football club crest on his forearm or a cross of st. george across his torso?

my unpleasant observations of them:

1. refused to give up our reserved seats on the train. had to threaten to call the conductor and german police. was cursed when they vacated.

2. asked a japanese family of 4 if they had games tix on the train to the england-trinidad game. tried to buy all 4 for 400 euro after cussing among themselves that these people were given tix.

3. harassment of attractive females passing by.

4. alcohol consumption to the point of absolute stupor.

5. horrible body odor. do these people bathe whence on their european football forays? imagine the stench of human sweat, urine and stale beer all mixed into one.

6. is it necessary to used the words "f*ck" or "f*cking" in every single statement?


Sadly pretty much all of this stereotype fits with a significant portion of the England travelling support.

Some of the people that follow England are just unbelievable. It seemed as if Wormwood Scrubs or Strangeways had allowed all their inmates out for a few weeks jolly over in Germany.

The bad thing is that some people automatically assume that because you are English that all the English supporters are the same.

[wetc]

I (an almost-senior-citizen female wearing a USA shirt) politely said "Excuse me" to a Czech fan on a tram on the way to the USA Czech game, when the little old German lady seated next to me was trying to get off the tram. He started with "p-tooey--USA: Vietnam, Bosnia, IRAN" I was, like, whoa--did I miss the news, we invaded IRAN? But before I could go into a long discussion of my views on Vietnam and Iraq, a nice German-Indian guy told the Czech that football was no place for politics and to clamp it. He did.


I agree, football is no place for politics, and the Czech was out of line. I was travelling when lots of the matches were taking place and people would get into fights in the airport lounges over calls from the referee.

[SkyBlueCity]

Interesting thread. The German hosts were fantastic. It seemed that the English travelling supporters were the only ones out of line and this first hand during my travels to Cologne, Stuttgart and Munich (I hope no one takes this as a complement). I did have a couple political run-ins (possibly USA shirt targeted) but nothing undeserved, considering US foreign policy.

[WLDBIL6]

Looks like the UK fans are taking most of the criticism. This is unfortunate because it's really a minority that create this reputation. I think this is generally true about the "Ugly American" stereotype also.

Questions: Why is it that our two countries seem to produce a noticable supply of citizens that shouldn't be allowed to leave the country. Why are these people so arrogant and narrow minded that they can't function in an acceptable manner in a (slightly) different culture.

My theory: In U.S., it's our geographic isolation from the rest of the world. We're 300 million people and you have to make a real effort to learn about other nations. It's hard to apply this to the U.K. Both countries can be considered to have a successful history and this could caused a misplaced sense of superiority. Misplaced in that neither country has been a beacon to the world lately.

Any other ideas/opinions?


One more question to my fellow Americans, why can't we express our dissatisfaction with anything with declaring "It sucks." To me this shows a total lack of cultural curiousity or even tolerance. I hate it more than the all the "F*CK's" that I hear for the U.K. fans.

[TheTreasurer]

I thought the English were bloody good when i was with them in Frankfurt. They had some D**kheads but there were just as many Aussie d**kheads as well.

[Crowdie]

I agree, football is no place for politics

I agree and disagree.

There is a school of thought that sport and politics should be completely seperate but I don't agree with this. This was a HUGE issue in New Zealand when, in 1981, the Springboks (the South African rugby team) toured New Zealand in breach of the Gleneagles Agreement on sporting contacts with South Africa (www.anc.org.za/ancdocs/history/commonwealth/gleneagles.html). If you want to see the effects on New Zealand society of this tour have a look at the images and video at http://www.nzhistory.net.nz/gallery/2291. When Nelson Mandela was released from prison he commented on how important it was to him to see the large number of protestors disrupting the tour. That is how you can use sport to send a political message.

Where the Czech was wrong was that he/she assumed that anybody wearing a US soccer shirt supported the current administration's foreign policy. He/She obviously doesn't but for all he/she knew the person wearing the US soccer short could agree with him/her and be out protesting every weekend against the war. Nothing a little communication couldn't solve - if in doubt listen, understand and learn.