The reason i did not respond the first time was because i was rushing as i was ready to be picked up for a trip to a game (Stevenage) being played that evening. Didn't realise it was compulsory to respond on here haha. Although I gave a brief response via a phone with poor signal later I believe (without looking back) to the easiest part of your question to answer, also conscious i didn't want to start detracting from the OP. So i never avoided the topic, i responded as best i could within timings and internet restraints at the time and trying to remain respectful to the author. I certainly believe with Hillsborough, that the authorities tried to blame the supporters, whereas i would question the authorities themselves. As for the earlier comment from the other poster about witnessing it on TV, so did I as it was happening at the time. I could have sworn from memory, that it was assumed crowd violence, which was quickly retracted when in fact it was realised supporters were trying to escape the crush. I'm sure many a people have been in a similar situation, your standing on the terraces thinking when they going to close the gates. That's not about seating or standing imho, that's about knowing how many people you are letting in. If it helps the authorities, you count people standing in exactly the same manner as you do bums on seats. In response to the earlier poster, safe standing is working fine in Germany, so why not here and many a league club are starting to back it. You can still stand on terracing in lower league football now without safety concerns, because there are stricter controls on ticket sales, certainly compared to the days when it was pay at turnstiles. But no the authorities would rather use a sledge hammer to resolve a problem rather than look at their own stewarding and policing of a game. I went to Wolves this season, what a shambles for an ex premier league ground. We were allocated the lower tier and made to sit at our allocated seats, heavily monitored by stewards, while supporters in the upper tier and elsewhere in the ground were clearly allowed to stand at times. The upper tier were pelting us down with food objects, it wasn't until i confronted the stewards anything was done about it. Give someone a yellow jacket and they lose all sense of their brain cells and become all authoritarian towards the travelling support, rather than evaluate logically the entire situation. What i would better describe as jobsworths. Standing is not the issue, its the crowd control (numbers entering) that requires policing. You can't even drink alcohol at your seat, I've seen kids have cans of coke confiscated, totally ridiculous. But you can go and buy your kid a bottle of overpriced soda and have the lid taken off. Can people stand at any other major event(s)?. Like fran rightly states 'Any government would have asked for an enquiry following Bradford and Hillsborough and acted upon the findings. A dereliction of duty if they hadn't.' - but what if that derelict of duty at Hillsborough is the evidence itself and the subsequent legal implementations, reports based on it. http://www.yorkshirepost.co.uk/news...nquiry-could-quiz-suspects-in-weeks-1-6400859 http://www.theguardian.com/football/2012/apr/12/hillsborough-battle-orgreave You only have to look at certain aspects of the media to see how the scumbags are waiting to give football supporters a bad rapport. Positive news don't sell papers. I haven't even started on social cleansing otherwise i could be here all day. Which probably covers the 'used' aspect. As we say its all about opinions and debate and that's my view, not intended to cause offence. The Liverpool boards view: http://www.not606.com/showthread.php/248911-Hillsborough-disaster-survivors-threatened-by-police I will retract Bradford for this aspect of the argument as now i feel its inappropriate at this time.
What I was pointing out was that I witnessed Hillsborough on TV after witnessing Bradford unfolding in front of me with my own eyes as a child. I was there. Yes you can detract that one as it was not due to standing/seating however it was a full house that day too. I am not questioning the events at Hillsborough. We know what happened there. I am questioning your reasoning r.e. All seated Stadia. To say it is easy for people to count heads or monitor situations is just naive. I once watched the killers (before they were big) in a pub hall that had a 150 fire restriction on it. They were supporting another band that had just reached No13 in the charts. That room was full to the brim by the time the last 2 bands came on and you literally could not move. There were easily 250-300 people in that hall and it was intensely hot from body heat even though it was night-time and nearing winter. I remember when Lincoln played Brighton when they got promoted from L2 a fair few years back now and probably 8 or 9 years after Hillsborough. When we saw the official attendance of 8500 or something we were astonished. There were way more than the capacity of 10500 as it was so full there were people sitting up the steps, people sitting on the walkways etc. The answer to your question 'surely people can count numbers in etc' is Yes of course they can but the question is Will they count, Will they care, Will every single venue and every single occurrence where large numbers are 'housed' in an area make sure that all of these are adhered too? The answer is no. There will be and (I would safely say there are many times) when a mate on a turnstile lets some in for free. There will be times when clubs publish lower attendance figures than the reality to not pay tax on the 'invisble' section. There will be times when a venue lets in more than they are allowed and takes the extra money. It will only take one occurrence that something happens and all seated stadia have eliminated that risk. The worst you get now is having to ask someone to move if they are sat in your seat or in a lower league stadium than is full you can clearly see if people have not got a seat to sit in. This political slant is just madness. What happened moneywise was football costing clubs more and them having to finance that. Not all clubs have a sugar daddy and many still make massive losses. English Clubs want to compete on the continent and they can't do that by reducing ticket prices or reducing wages. Same applies all the way down the ladder. Every club wants to improve and move onto the next level and then the next. So blame the modern world for it as worldwide clubs are choosing to try and compete. As for the 'The working man's right to............' Smoking Ban? Really?? I am a smoker but even I would say I can't really try and demand the right to choose to smoke in a building. I can certainly say that my friends and anyone else has the right not to be forced to inhale my exhalations. Next you will be saying you should have the right to drive as fast as you like. Forget about other people's right to drive without having to be concerned for their lives due to other drivers 'exercising their rights'.
Clubs have a data base, they know how many seats they have to sell, the same logic would apply to standing. Areas numbered if need be. This same logic is applied to safe standing. I have seen people dismiss the safe standing view, even club chairman but that's because they have failed to do proper research. Hence why the safe standing roadshow is out there promoting the cause for awareness of what it has to offer. I believe Safe Standing will come to the UK and people will look back and say why didn't this happen sooner. If applied correctly I'm not talking about whole stadiums, just behind the goals. Our grounds have become sterile, no atmosphere anymore. You take my smoking comments out of context, I'm not going to cover the point we could be here forever. All I tend to see in contrary opinion is argument about why something can't be applied and referring to the past, rather than do research to what can be applied to reach a safe sensible medium. People these days just fall readily in line with the legislation and governmental controls rather than challenge public conform. http://www.safestandingroadshow.co.uk/the-proposal Sadly we will never agree in debate because I see it in this view; quote 'English Clubs want to compete on the continent and they can't do that by reducing ticket prices or reducing wages. Same applies all the way down the ladder. Every club wants to improve and move onto the next level and then the next. So blame the modern world for it as worldwide clubs are choosing to try and compete.' I don't wish for my club to compete on the continent, that's all part of 1992 decease that i spoke of earlier. I wouldn't care if my club was competing at its current level league one or down in the conference, I'd still be there, I go for the football not the glory, although yes, it's nice if it happens once in 50 years, which is the last time my club won such a trophy. It's like what your club paid for Gazza, laughable truly laughable, I loved the lad, but reality was we picked up the keeper for absolutely nothing thanks to Hessy, sugar daddies eh...no wonder clubs go bust.
brb I certainly believe with Hillsborough, that the authorities tried to blame the supporters, whereas i would question the authorities themselves. As for the earlier comment from the other poster about witnessing it on TV, so did I as it was happening at the time. I could have sworn from memory, that it was assumed crowd violence, which was quickly retracted when in fact it was realised supporters were trying to escape the crush. I have taken this sentence first to look at: this discussion was not about the blame, that is a well trodden path and I don't think there is a decent soul around who thought the supports were to blame, it was about the "use" of these tragic events. I just think that it is ultra suspicious/paranoid, or whatever term should be used to assume that these events were pounced upon by the powers to take away our game. Changes were made to try and genuinely improve the experience of going to a game. It was never going to please everyone as with any decision in life. For you, the experience is now worse due to the atmosphere, but for others it is better because it is safer. I agree that there may have been other options, but they chose one of the options and instigated the changes. Someone was always going to disagree whatever they did. Doing what they did was better than doing nothing. Football was the game of the working classes, problem was the governments back to the days of the Wicked Witch of the West damn well knew knew it. Our game was ingrained into our life, but the minds in the Westminster corridors knew that they could play on tragic events, Hillsborough, Bradford. Then general politics such as the miners strike. Change and price us out of our basic enjoyment, so it becomes a middle class game where you take your idealistic 2.2 children This is taken from your original post and I just don't get it. I never understand the "football was a game of the working classes" line and I have read it from many different people; so what? What does that mean? Is it written on a stone tablet somewhere that only the working classes can play it or enjoy it? Next you'll be telling me that it's our game (English/British) and that the world has taken it away from us. What is working class? I am the son of a milkman, a man who for 50 years of his life delivered milk in all weather conditions to people's doorsteps and by many of those was seen as there to 'serve' their needs and deliver their goods. He made a good living from it; not a wealthy living, but a good living. He grafted as hard as any man I knew in his circle of friends, who all seemed to have white collar jobs. I don't know if this means he was working class, whether I was or not. Did his earnings dictate whether he was working class or his job? All that is actually irrelevant, because he and my mum took me down the local field when I was a kid and got me to join in with the older boys playing for a team. I fell in love. My parents already had a love of the game, but mine surpassed theirs. To quote you, "our game was ingrained into our life" and it still is. If my Dad was a minor or a lawyer, or if I was a Doctor or a road sweeper, that should not play any part in my desire or qualification to watch football. I love going to watch the game as much as I ever did and believe me when I say that I don't care whether it is in a plush box at Wembley (I was lucky enough to get an invite recently from someone who had access to this) or watching a kids game down the park. The venue and manner in which I am watching doesn't bother me in the slightest. I love the game. The thought that the powers are trying or have been trying to take that game away I nonsensical to me and each time I read comments like yours I just feel that I am reading the words of someone with a political agenda or a strong political view that will always be blind-sided by their political views. Me, I just try and get on with my life, though I am slightly intrigued to know what 'class' I sit in and how that is judged. Life changes; football changes; I still choose to enjoy football. And no matter what happens, I'll still be loving and supporting Southampton FC, whether that be in European competition or Division 2. My last comment on this is that it is so hard to express points against views like yours without it sounding political. I don't think politics should be on the forum or I our game. I know we can't control politics getting into the game.
I was quite happy to leave the debate after expressing my first comment. Generally i just post and move on. People can then make of it what they want, their own interpretation, but several times you came back to me, asking me to more or less expand on my views for want of debate on here. As soon has i do that, I'm met with this response at the end of your last comment: 'My last comment on this is that it is so hard to express points against views like yours without it sounding political. I don't think politics should be on the forum or I our game. I know we can't control politics getting into the game.' Therefore I shall now leave your board in peace.
