It’s time to have an honest discussion about our home support and the SJ Ultras

Did I misinterpret your comment about the Timbers Army being anti fascist pow wows?

 

Yes. "antifa" and "anti-fascist" are not synonymous terms.

The progressive left does not have a monopoly on opposition to fascism, but they do appear to be the only ones who feel inclined to publicly advertise their opposition, to the point where some of them act like fascists themselves. Believing it acceptable to punch people whose politics you abhore (even if those politics are objectively abhorrent) is a good indicator of an authoritarian impulse.

 

I suppose that’s true if you accept that fascism is solely a political ideology.

 

Sat with the Ultra's at an away game in Portland a couple years ago. Was taking my grandkids (Portland residents) to their first MLS game. They still talk about it. I thank the Ultra's for their hospitality that day.

I think the tifo that they did at Avaya's first game was one of the most remarkable things I've ever seen. Without them the atmosphere at Avaya would be dire. Maybe a go fund me type page where us non-ultra's could kick in money to go towards buying the materials needed for tifo's....

1. Until the FO shows that they actually care about the team and support it, large crowds aren't going to show up. Just look at the Oakland A's attendance. Owners don't give a sh*t about the A's, a good team with embarrassing small crowds. If ownership showed they cared (like the current Warriors ownership has shown their fans) things would change. But until then it's going to be the same old sh*t every season.

2. The FO wants the soccer mom/dad crowd as their key demo. I don't think soccer moms/dads look at the Ultras in a positive light. In their eyes I believe they see the Ultra's as rowdy drunks and nothing more. The soccer mom/dad crowd, for the most part, is not passionate about the sport. To them going to Avaya is not that much different than taking the kids down to the park to play on the swings. When I was a STH I was amazed on how many people attended the game and it seemed weren't even paying attention to what was going on down on the field. Seemed the conversations were about Billy's new braces or how Marsha is gong away to camp for the first time.

3. The FO doesn't seem to make things easy for the Ultra's, and I get the impression they never will.

I for one enjoyed the smoke and thought it added to the game day experience. But I was over in section 106 and it didn't blow over into that section and bother anyone that may have asthma or other breathing issues, but I can understand how it can be an issue for some sitting closer to their section.

4. The bay area doesn't have as many passionate MLS fans as other cities. I would take the heart of one Ultra over a 1000 hearts of the Timber Army or any other supporter group. Quakes fans are as passionate, if not more so, than any other MLS club, there just aren't very many of us. The bay area is all about the Warriors (since they started winning), 49ers and Giants. A's, Sharks and Quakes get little to no love.

Sorry for the rant...

 

if i may interrupt all the earnest posts here, i'm pretty sure Don expected somebody to post this (had no idea about the actual title of this song...)

 

I hope it never happens again any time soon, but whenever the quakes were getting spanked, I'd go stand with the Ultras, because no matter what, win or lose, those guys are ultra with the quakes. You just get caught up in the support and its really what i needed to lessen the impact of another loss. Plus their chants are catchy af and i always found myself singing them in my cubicle the week after games. tbt i probably sang the wrong words but whatever.

But it's true tho, the FO seems to do everything in its power to demonize the Ultras. I'm not holding them completely innocent, the Ultras got some history, but every time we hear about a clearing of the slate, the FO just can't help itself. You can be wearing quakes everything but you cant just join up in their section anymore. The FO forces crowd engagement with the drum and Krazy george. I like KG, but it's so basic to do his simple cheers for 30 seconds, and then the section claps for themselves lol. ANd then they always come during weird times. Last game, I think KG led his chant in my section during the You're my Wondo chant from the Ultras smdh. The section the ultras are in, is terrible & muted and just symbolizes how cheap the organization was/is. We should have had the wonderwall from the inception, but little input was given to the SGs.

i mean i get some peoples apprehensions with the Ultras, but with all the losing this team has endured, and the rocky relationship with the FO (who is more than willing to showcase their support), I also understand the Ultra's own guarded presence.

 

No offense to @USA Saint, but why bring all this up if you are leaving town anyway? I think it would be great if a young person with your energy were here to lead an effort for SG change.

While I am thankful for this year’s product on the field, every time I look at the diminishing Ultras, they seem so emblematic of our small market, irrelevant, mls 1.0, Oakland A’s-ish team

 

Every time I look at the Timbers Army at Providence Park, they seem so emblematic of a Nuremberg rally.

 

The fetish with size (by which I mean numerosity) is kinky (by which I mean silly).

One of my fondest memories of the Ultras (and I have many), is a group of a couple dozen mostly teenagers, maximum, in the south end zone at Spartan Stadium for the Comeback in 2003. They were animated and they had an impact on the match. Troy Dayak did a Lambeau Leap into the group.

It does not take more than a handful. And while the San Jose Ultras may not be the largest supporters group in MLS, they are assuredly the best.

 

I would suggest that you won't find much agreement in any other MLS city...

 

Why would I care about the biased opinions of other teams' fans?

Several years ago, a German observer (the deTocqueville of MLS), whose objectivity I have no reason to doubt, attended MLS games across the league, and blogged about his assessment of the various supporters groups. San Jose's, then known as the 1906 Ultras, graded as the best, despite others having larger numbers. I wish I could locate the link, but I cannot, so you will either take my word for it or pore through years old postings because I know I posted it on here contemporaneously.

I only accept the German's perspective because it coheres with my own (admittedly biased) view. The Ultras' capo is fantastic, light years above any other capo in the league. He's an in-game maestro, which the German was able to see, and he never misses a home game or a rivalry match away on the west coast.
Out-of-game he manages the group with an obsession, despite a full-time job and living several hours from the stadium.

The proof is in the longevity. The Ultras are 16 years old. They survived the loss of the team. (The Casbah effectively did not.) They have survived a dozen years since of almost incessantly losing, and sometimes league-worst, soccer. They have survived efforts from MLS HQ and the Quakes FO to have the group disbanded. They have survived bogus criminal prosecutions and collective punishment. They have survived defections and defamation (which continues to this day on this very thread).

I defy the front-running clowns in Seattle, Atlanta or LAFC to survive what the Ultras have survived. It's easy to gather large numbers when you've never had any adversity.

 

Exactly the face I make when I see a bunch of clowns engaged in the pageantry of flying Iron Front flags celebrating Weimar-era street thugs, or worse, flying un-ironic images of Che Guevara and (until recently) the Japanese Imperial War flag, which represents genocide and mass rape. The Timbers Army has a sizable brown shirt (or maybe you prefer Stalinist) element, whether you appreciate it or not.

 

You should get more rep for this!

 

I miss the old name

It had both Earthquake relevance, and was the last little bit of the California Victory still in existence.

 

Maybe it's just me, but I find the term capo disturbing, because to me it's too close to kapo, the term used for concentration camp prisoners who were tasked by the SS to supervise labor details, etc. I will never follow a capo or kapo!

 

The origin of "kapo" is unclear . . . It could have also come from the Italian word for "head" and "boss", capo . . .

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kapo_(concentration_camp)

 

Here’s a great alternative to smoke ==> confetti! (A lot of it)

#Borussia #Dortmund confetti choreo ahead of kick-off vs. #Barcelona this evening #bvbfcb #bvb pic.twitter.com/UeR9aruLkv

— Matt Ford (@matt_4d) September 17, 2019

 

So, are they brown shirts, or the people that fought the brown shirts? You jump back and forth between describing them as fascists or anti-fascists.
Those Timbers Army guys you and I drank beers with before the last Portland game at Avaya seemed to be fairly agreeable and harmless fellows.

 

Antifa are fascists. I'm not jumping between descriptions. They engage in false advertising by projecting their own disgusting worldview on others.

The Timbers Army embraces fascism when it promotes the use of the Iron Front flag. And just because Timbers Army does, or did, claim all Timbers fans are members of their group doesn't mean they all subscribe to the group's formal inimical ideology. In fact, from the things I've read, a significant subset of members are upset with the group's leadership over the recent controversy.

The Iron Front were a paramilitary organization -- a gang of street thugs, the antithesis of civil society. Their simple existence disclaimed the rule of law and the legitimate monopoly of violence for the state.

https://www.thevintagenews.com/2017...go-was-designed-to-be-painted-over-swastikas/

It doesn't matter that the Iron Front opposed Nazis, or more specifically the Nazis' own street thugs, the Iron Front's own tactics (brown shirt tactics, the same as the Nazis) were also fascist. Engaging in (or glorifying, as the Timbers Army does) paramilitary extra-state violence, street thuggery, punching Nazis and declaiming free speech for those you disagree with -- all things the Timbers Army embrace when they wave Iron Front flags -- is itself fascist, whether or not the people who do those things own up to it or are even smart enough to realize it.

 

I also remember when they had 'confetti cannons' that shot out lots and lots of mylar confetti (that shorted out a transformer and forced the postponement of a game ('98, '99?)

 

Same game, I think! 99 or 2000 maybe?