Huistrinho

I saw my sister's love for them and, at the age of 4, I joined in. Hmmm.... I guess that analogy only stretches so far

From some of the responses I've had here, it sounds like there at least a few on here who have gone through that process and can comment. IMO it's a difficult thing to do. In fact, I imagine it's very similar to the process gone through by somebody who after 20 years of being happily married finds out that their spouse has been cheating on them. Why do they stay? Because the reality doesn't match their perception of what they fell in love with? Because they can't imagine being with somebody else? Because deep down they think things will change? Also, not using any of the posters on here as an example. Clearly.

I can. Assuming this settles down and Scotland gets back to playing football, there will be nothing for the Daily Record and Evening Times to write about. They've spent years relegating all other sporting news to a couple of columns at the back of the sport section and training their readership that it's all irrelevant in the face of Old Firm news. Their circulation figures have been plummeting for years, and this will kill them. Hence the need to keep such stupid stories alive.

Awww, you hurt my feelings

Clearly not what I said in my reply I made the decision not to renew my season ticket before the CVA outcome, when I thought that Green was little more than an asset stripper. And to be perfectly honest, the proposition that Sevco is Rangers is a leap of faith I'm not sure I'm willing to take. (Edit, to say this wouldn't have precluded me attending Rangers games if he turned out to be legit.)

Clearly some of your questions were rhetorical, but none the less: Not to my knowledge, although I'd be more than happy to be involved in one if someone with the necessary skills were to set one up. I've never been involved with any supporters club. I suspect there must be at least 1, but clearly the extreme minority. The ugly-heads of the MSM have been speaking out on a daily basis, haven't you been listening? It's clearly not a conspiracy, (although I did question Mark Daly's selection process for finding Rangers fans to showcase). I suspect it's partly a two way street: any prominent figures don't want attention, or don't want to find themselves ostracised, and the media aren't interested in talking to no-names with no pull. Why interview "Danish Pastry" when Mark Dingwall will produce the response you're looking for? Actually, I think adundeemonkey has mostly hit the nail on the head here. The majority of decent fans tend to see football as entertainment, and not the be-all-and-end-all of life that the bigots appear to. It's something they enjoy doing, not something that defines their existence. As a result this leads to them being less vocal and perhaps less likely to attend games. I don't think you can underestimate the effect that many feel driven away by the bigots in recent years also. Indeed, I'm looking forward to the start of the egg chasing season.

I should have, clarified - by ugly, I meant the songs being sung. I expect we'll see Billy Boys shouted out as a "proud act of defiance". I don't expect there to be any physical altercations (unless, of course, the away end gets filled by Celtic fans. Unlikely, but you never know...) I don't expect any problems at all by the time the team reaches the SPL (if it does), seeing as everyone and their dog is being boycotted for the rest of eternity

Yes - I always thought these people were a minority, however this saga has made me realise that they're not quite as small a minority as I originally thought. The only way to combat it is from the top down. There has been some effort to do so, but these people have landed us with fines on two occasions now for their singing, and many don't seem to care (if anything was going to stop them you would think it might be the realisation that their actions are hurting the club). "WATP and we'll sing what we like", they cry. I still don't believe RangersMedia is representative of the entire fan base (I'm lead to believe FF is worse, but I don't post there), but the paranoia, denial, blame passing, and victim-mentality that has festered there in recent months is quite frightening. Where there was once a home to sane voices, these are now hounded out with unified cries of "Declan", "t**g", and "tarrier". Don't even get me started on the death threats to Green, Doncaster, Regan et al. My big fear it that this mentality manifests itself even more strongly next season (assuming a license is granted and Sevco stays solvent long enough to start one). In fact, I don't think there's any doubt that the first few games will be ugly as the support as a whole blow off steam from the last few months. After a few games I expect the crowds to dwindle, and that's the time to properly address this. At that point I'll be writing to Green to ask what his master plan is for wiping it out. I'm not holding my breath for a reply through. Several of my friends have viewed this as time for a "clean break", and I can't say I blame them in the slightest.

Great post - particularly this. There will never be a better time to get rid this element. However, with the desperate need to bring in funds (and the rumour persisting about Mark Dingwall getting a place on the board at some point), I have my doubts.

My eyes may not be working properly this early in the morning, but your reply appears to consist of repeating the two thoughts I laid out, adding a "fucksake" at the start, and lacing the rest with your personal brand of irrelevant-to-the-point-being-discussed hatred. A shame, because stripping it back, we appear to agree.

Great post. I spent some time discussing this issue with friends at the weekend and we struggled to get a handle on it. It seems to be something immaterial, but that isn't particularly useful when you have to make some concrete decisions based on it. I think there's two views you can take on Rangers with respect to the ongoing SFA discussions might inform a future definition. Namely: Companies are what matter. Rangers are dead. Sevco are therefore a new club (in which case they should be nowhere near a league). Sevco can somehow "become" Rangers, if they're willing to inherit the crimes, punishments and sanctions imposed on the previous club. There seems to be some kind of merit in the second approach, however the distinction being made between paying back all debt vs paying back footballing debt only doesn't sit well with me. Equally, the idea that the company is the club also has some merit, but also doesn't seem entirely satisfactory. Even with my own biases I'm not entirely convinced that Sevco and Rangers are one and the same thing.

I caught up on Scotland Tonight a little late, but after spending a few months lurking and more recently posting on P&B, I think I finally begin to comprehend the full extent of the disconnect between the MSM and Scottish footballing reality. It's crazy that perhaps the main voice of sense in all of this is a Channel 4 journalist with no prior connection to the Scottish game. Spence, English, and Cosgrove come out of this with credit, Daily appears to have disappeared since his last TV show (which I thought was amateur in presentation, and contained far too much in the way of implication for my liking). However, here we stand in the midst of one of the biggest stories in all of Scottish Footballing history, and why does this list not contain more names? Why have none of the questions raised by clubs like Clyde been given any airtime by the MSM?. On the eve of this vote, what does any of us know of Sevco? And why does the Scottish media not care to find out? (This last part is somewhat rhetorical, seeing as they are of course dependent on the cash cow...) Archie mentioned that bad governance was present before Doncaster and Regan. I wonder if that was a veiled dig at the man sitting to his left? For a man previously in charge of the SFA, Smith's contribution to the show was nothing short of reprehensible. What truly worries me is that the same people who appointed Smith are the same people who appointed Regan, and they will be the same people to appoint his successor. The problem of governance is not confined to the figure at the helm. However, the thing that undoubtedly struck me the most about Scotland Tonight was the general acceptance (I exclude Thomson) of this idea that SPL 2 is inevitable, the fans will be ignored, and somehow that's okay and we'll all build a bridge and get over it. Perhaps I'm being naive; perhaps, indeed almost certainly, I've been overexposed to this thread, but it seems to me that any such move would spark an exodus of supporters from the game - and that's something we would truly never recover from. Sadly, I'm going to miss this weekend's watershed events unfold - I'm flying out in the morning to a beer festival for the weekend. I look forward to catching up on the inevitable 500 pages of posts on my return.

And, if anyone seriously takes the view that showing some humility would have made a difference, I doubt that sporting integrity is their prime motive.

All the points you make about "punishments" are good ones, but this last part is a revisionist view of how many observers looked on (and you only need to examine the early pages of this thread to see it). Any attempt to shoehorn the newco into the SPL, even if McCoist came out and said, "sorry guys, our bad", would have been resisted by fans. There's no way at all the newco would or should have been admitted to the SPL, even with a massive dose of humility - and this is fair, just, and entirely correct.

This bit caught my eye: “I congratulate supporters for putting integrity and good governance of the game to the top of the agenda. The fans have done a good job, but it’s now time for them to join us in 
addressing the other issues in Scottish football.” Delivered like a true politician. Oh... wait....

I'd happily throw down a few £100s just to watch this meeting take place. There's one way to boost income. I read somewhere else that the vote will be done by secret ballot. Can anybody confirm this?

I think I've covered most of what you refer to in my earlier posts today, but I'll add a couple of comments. I don't claim that there wasn't a "signing policy", but there were a good 30 or so Catholics in the Rangers team (a couple signed directly from Celtic) before MoJo. That's a matter of record. The club has undeniably been a focal point for bigots, but this has visibly reduced in last 25 or so years I've been going to matches. Like I said, some people are morons. I support the team - I despise the bigots. I hoped to see it change. If Sevco amounts to anything (I have my doubts), I'd hope to be part of the change if I decide to support them. As I said, it's not intrinsic to the club - just because you don't know much of the club's history before 1920, doesn't mean you get to ignore it in a debate. As for my morals, I have twice today discussed the conflict I feel - mark my morals as dubious if you wish. You might call me thick, but bigotry isn't the product of Rangers, rather it, and other nasty characteristics such as racism and homophobia are the problems of society and will always find some way to manifest (I'll leave out glory-hunting, as any individual or team achieving success is affected by that problem). With Rangers dead, and if Sevco amounts to nothing the same people will pop up somewhere else with their bile. I hope none of them attach themselves to your club. We both agree that bigotry was exploited by former governors of the club for commercial gain but I repeat my view that it is not intrinsic to the club, and hasn't been part of the governance in the time I've been following football. I know not everyone respects my views, and plenty deal only in absolutes, and that's fine. I was asked some pages back to explain why I came to support Rangers and I did so. Whether anyone agrees or disagrees with my explanation doesn't make my explanation untrue and I'll put it to bed here so we can get back to talking about the issues at hand. Feel free to PM me if you want to continue conversing.

Lies, all Lies. Giovanni Di Stefano is taking us to England. I won't hear otherwise, I read it in the Sun...

An expansion of 2? Is that all that's being placed on the table? I can't see anybody going for that. There must be additional details to come out. If the SFA and SPL really want resolution ii) to pass, they're going to have to promise the land of milk and honey. Unless of course there's a Plan C afoot....

That's exactly what I just said... And I completely agree. Glad we got that sorted

I can completely understand why you take this view - but I disagree to the extent that the club itself is not intrinsically bigoted; it was founded on no such principle, and indeed was widely regarded to enjoy a very friendly relationship with Celtic until the 1920s. At this point, the story changes, and a lot of bigots assume control of and associate themselves with the club - but it's only intrinsically bigoted to the extent that Germany is intrinsically fascist, that is to say, it's not (it seems about time to invoke Godwin's law). It wasn't established as such, it can disassociate itself with it given enough time, effort and changing social conditions. An element of the support is clearly bigoted, the club itself? In its most recent incarnations, no. And if there is still a club, i've no idea what Charles Green thinks... To the extent that I'm actively supporting hatred and bigotry? I deny the charge - I've written to the club a couple of times about my thoughts and I'd love to stand up at every home game and shout these people down, but I don't want my head kicked in. Do I help sustain an environment in which it can hide - yes, I'm guilty of that - I said as much in my previous post and I feel heavily conflicted by it. If Rangers die, those bigots associated with the club don't just disappear in a puff of white smoke and suddenly all is rosy in Scotland - there are massive social and education problems that need addressing in this country; that lies at the root of the problem. These people would inevitably find something else to attach themselves to. Hell, Killie play in blue and while, maybe they'll take a trip down the M77. How'd you fancy Bomber Brown as your new chairman?

IMO, not a single one of them comes out of this with much credit. Everyone listed above seems hellbent on portraying that god awful combination of a sense of entitlement and a "we're the real victim here" mentality. I am disappointed to see it.

The same could be said about this whole situation at the moment... I don't disagree, and as I said, they're not doing nothing: songs are banned, banners are removed, people are getting chucked out of Ibrox. It's not being done with the impact, authority, and consistency that I would like to see.

I'll try to give you a serious answer then. The summary is basically this: as a 4 year old kid, I fell in love with football and Rangers were my local team. I knew nothing of certain fans' "traditions" until I was a teenager, and no idea their true impact on society until later still (as it happens, I'm a Scottish republican atheist, who lived in Dublin for a number of years - I'm remarkably far from the stereotype). The club certainly wasn't established as a bigoted institution and I'd say that in my time of supporting the club, it hasn't resembled one. While those in charge in the 1920s may have tried to capture anti-irish feeling in the country, these days the only remnant of that is an element of the fan base (especially so if you want to view Sevco as a new club) - they're the "bigoted institution", and a slowly dying one at that. Every support has morons; a large support has more morons than most. If the club were actively promoting the views of this element of the support, I'd be off in a shot. But they're not - even though they're not going to the lengths to eradicate it that I wish they would. I readily admit to feeling conflicted. I often think of Rangers fans with similar views to myself (whom I believe are the vast majority) as being like the moderate religious, in that through their existence they implicitly give the fundamentalists justification and a place to hide. At heart, I'm still that kid that fell in love with football and with a football team - as I assume most of us are. That's why I'm still a Rangers supporter.

I'd argue that that's an initiative to keep existing fans, not get new ones. However, I think you picked me up wrong - I was aware my question might have been interpreted as me stating "clubs aren't doing anything", which is why I added the clarification. To expand: what initiatives are clubs already employing that aren't supporter driven? Free tickets for kids? Community events outside of football games? Supporters days with discount tickets?