Fury

I'm quite sure I have no idea what you mean....thanks for the heads up it has now been amended. :-)

http://chrisgraham76.wordpress.com/2011/11/11/regan-stokes-and-media-double-standards/

Yeah I never understood that one... ;-)

Haha. Perhaps I'll start including my address in future articles. Although judging by some comment from the dark side I suspect JD is not all that I would be sent!

Thanks chaps, My main aim with this stuff is just to get some messages out to as many Rangers fans as I can, who perhaps are not as aware of where all this negativity surrounding the club at the moment comes from. With that in mind I'll submit my blog articles here too since I'm sure that way many more people will get to read them. I'm hoping to have a Q and A with Humza Yousaf on the Offensive Behaviour Bill shortly as well, although how useful his response will be remains to be seen.

It's not easy being a prophet in the internet age. Obviously, in terms of getting your message out, there are advantages. You can quickly build up a faithful following, and with each disciple comes the potential for word to spread further. Twitter, Facebook (FB), blogs and other social media are the stuff of dreams for your modern day David Koresh. However, with this quick and easy access to rumour and gossip comes a major downside. It's easy to verify whether you are talking rubbish and when your miracles don't come to pass you are open to fast and widespread ridicule. With this in mind, the trick to being a prophet these days is to brainwash your followers to such a degree that even evidence of you getting it consistently and totally wrong is not enough to shake their faith. They will instead condemn the media who have failed to report your prophecy. It must have come true, right? "It's a conspiracy of silence" they will cry. In this respect Philip McGillivan has performed admirably. He's managed to get 99% of his prophecies wrong but still has a faithful and increasingly large following amongst the more eccentric in the Celtic support. These poor unfortunates will cling to anything in the face of their team faltering so badly in the title race. His prophecies are in the very narrow, and some would say unlikely, area of Rangers Football Club. It seems odd that a self confessed supporter of Irish Republicanism, the IRA, Sinn Fein and Celtic would be the recipient of information about Rangers but there we have it. God (and Philip's mind) moves in mysterious ways. Philip, we are told, has a hotline to the legal minds involved in Rangers ongoing struggle with the tax man. These legal minds are "staunch Rangers" men and yet have chosen Philip to disseminate the confidential and highly damaging information which he claims to possess. Now Philip, some of you may recall, was the mastermind behind the "Fakeover" campaign on Twitter and FB. The Craig Whyte takeover was all a sham. It was never going to happen. Craig Whyte was a front and a distraction invented by David Murray. All of this, of course, turned out to be total nonsense. Undeterred however, Philip just moved on to his next prophecy, putting the mistake down to an unreliable 'source'. Who knows, perhaps this voice in his head has now been banished, never to return. Suddenly, Philip had a new 'source' to which he gave credence with the news that this "staunch Rangers" man had actually told him that the "Fakeover" information was incorrect. If only he had listened... So it was with confidence that Philip and his band of brainwashed minions moved on to the next day in the 'Philipian' calendar. The 27/28th of October (it never pays to be too specific when making things up). This, we were told, was going to be a "momentous day in the history of Rangers Football Club". The inference being that the momentous nature of the day was not going to be positive for the club. In fact as the date drew nearer we were informed with increasing certainty, and not a little gloating, that this would be the day that Rangers went out of business for good. I believe the phrase "Game Over" was overused. Well Philip - Aberdeen, Celtic and the SPL league table would disagree. Philip to his credit does not give up. Even at 10pm on the night of the 28th we were told that Craig Whyte was holding a crisis meeting at Ibrox at which his 'source' was present. Rangers had "ceased to trade" he told us. Ibrox seemed like an odd venue for this meeting. Presumably somewhere more cloak and dagger would have been appropriate, had the meeting actually taken place, but this sent Philip's minions on blog sites and Twitter into a frenzy. The "huns" were out of business. Praise be to Philip. Well it turned out to be pish again. This prompted even Graham Spiers, no friend of Rangers and a serial apologist for any unpleasant behaviour at Celtic Park, to label Philip as journalism's "ultimate chancer". Personally I thought this was quite generous since Philip isn't really a journalist at all but Graham did then undermine his point somewhat by making a prophecy of his own - that Rangers would in fact be out of business within 14 days. It's difficult to resist the allure and attention of the prophet's life apparently. Now it seems increasingly likely that Rangers are going to face some form of administration unless they win the tax case or come to some mutually acceptable arrangement with HMRC. This will no doubt be met with cries of "told you so" from Philip and his minions. However, let us not forget that Craig Whyte himself has already acknowledged that administration is a likely outcome if the tax case cannot be resolved in our favour. It's hardly breaking news. Presumably guessing that every week is going to be the week that it happens is now enough for Philip's disciples. If, or when, he eventually get's it right he'll be hailed as a Celtic hero. The man who brought the "huns" to their knees. Well that's not really the truth but truth doesn't play a large part in the minds of these people. If Rangers emerge from this whole affair unscathed then something along these lines will happen. It will be declared a disgrace by Philip. Some shadowy, 'establishment' organisation will have taken matters into it's own hands and will be blamed for rescuing the club. Indeed this conspiracy theory is already being prepared and has been given some major consideration - just in case he's got it wrong again you understand. Disciples have been urged to contact Celtic (and any other SPL clubs they can pretend to be fans of) to ensure that they do not give any support to the idea that a "New Rangers" should be allowed to continue in the SPL. This of course ignores the financial realities of life in the SPL without either of the Old Firm, but reality, like truth, is not the currency in which Philip deals. If it does come to pass that somehow Philip has got it totally wrong again, then his disciples can be assured of one thing. Philip will strive to expose any Rangers related miscarriage of justice - if only his disciples can keep his website alive a bit longer with all their kind donations......

They are going to be raging when this is all cleared up. I wonder what they will do with their time?

Hope it's ok to post up my new blog on here. Here's the link. If it's a problem then please just chop the thread. http://chrisgraham76.wordpress.com/2011/10/24/barmy-bloggers-and-the-bbc/

I know I haven't posted on here much but can I please implore anyone who reads this thread and is going to Ibrox that day to come along for even 30 mins and show support? We have to show that we won't take this kind if reporting anymore. Even a fraction of the crowd attending Ibrox that day outside BBC HQ would make big news and it is surely a point worth making for an hour or two of your time before the game. Also not everyone is on a fan site or uses Twitter or FB so please, whether you can make it or not, tell other Bears about this and why it's happening. Stick to the facts. Some people (I'd include myself) are not predisposed to demonstrations but we have to get our point across here. The BBC, and their pals who run Celtic minded blogs, are expecting to sit back and laugh about how few people turn up at this. They want to have a laugh at our expense. Don't let them.

Anyone know the name of the scumbag who writes this blog?

But it won't be. The SNP don't need anyone to pass this bill. It's going to go through. I'd rather be trying to influence what is in it rather than opposing something we can't stop.

I haven't but I think it's interesting that Salmond came out and specifically mentioned IRA songs the other week. If they introduce this bill and then the police are still inactive on dealing with their terrorist pish then I think he's going to look very, very stupid and that isn't something he likes. I think we agree on the bill in it's current form but what I'd like to know is why the RST and other supporters groups are taking the rather immature view of just opposing the bill when it's clearly going to become law? We have to influence these things not just bump our gums about how unfair it all is. The responsibility of the RST is not to uphold free speech, it's to make sure that Rangers fans at least get something out of this shambles of a bill.

Again this is my point. That language is not in the bill. The police asked for it to be clarified because at the moment they feel they can't enforce it. These are notes about the submissions. If you read the actual bill there is nothing there to cover this and people like Devine are terrified that it could (and should) be included. They want to be able to sing songs about the IRA. They've been quite explicit about that. They want to use the word "Hun". Jeanette Findlay said as much in her submission for the Celtic Supporters Trust. They want this bill to apply to us and not them and at the moment there is no language in the actual bill to ensure that does not happen.

Which is precisely my point. If this bill goes through in this vague form then it allows that kind of pressure to be exerted. The bill should be mentioning the outlawing of songs and chants in support of terrorist groups in the same way that it mentions "sectarian" chants and songs. If not then I've no doubt that it won't be applied that way.

Well this part of the bill is not that part that pertains to actually attending the football but covers, internet message boards, Twitter, Facebook etc. I was really referring more to the offensive behaviour part. It's so vague and so open to interpretation that IRA songs for example, might be covered or, despite what Salmond said in the press, might not.

I think what the good Doctor says is quite correct, however where were all these people crying out about freedom of speech when Rangers fans were being arrested left, right and centre? I posted this on another board but these are my thoughts on this in a nutshell... My stance would be this. If I had my first choice I'd prefer that people could sing what they liked at football matches. It's a sterile arena in terms of the likelihood of any violence but obviously someone attempting violence can be dealt with anyway. However that is gone. Rangers fans are lifted for singing anything religious at all no matter how tenuous it's link to "sectarianism" might be. That is going to continue whether this bill comes into force or not. My second choice is a level playing field. At the moment Celtic fans can sing about "Huns", " FTQ" and their wide and varied repertoire of IRA songs without any fear of arrest. With some tighter definition within the bill then this can be eradicated. We still won't be able to sing The Billy Boys but we can't anyway. We still won't be able to sing FTP but we shouldn't anyway. The only difference will be that they and other fans across Scotland will be subject to the same rules. Stuart Waiton is quite right to complain about free speech. However free speech is not currently available at football in Scotland anyway. My fear is that this bill, whilst formalising a situation already in place for Rangers fans, will not necessarily deal with the issues on the other side of the city. I know Salmond came out and mentioned IRA songs specifically but I've read the bill and I don't see them mentioned anywhere in there. The Celtic supporters groups are already mobilising to stop this bill applying to them. Without it being more specific they will probably get their way again. In my opinion, rather than saying we want the bill stopped - which won't happen anyway - we should be focussing on making sure it deals properly with the "problem" the politicians feel is there. Otherwise we end up with the status quo under a new name. Does anyone really think that if this bill is defeated then everyone can go back to singing what they like?

I wouldn't support it in it's current form no matter what it achieved. However, with some proper definition of what is termed to be "offensive", even if that is under broad terms such as "support for terrorist organisations", "sectarian singing" etc then the bill would merely be rubber stamping what is already being enforced on Rangers but is not being applied across the city.

Why are we opposing it? I understand the bill in it's present form is wooly, lacking in detail and needs a large amount of work but are we happy with the current situation where Rangers fans are lifted for pretty much anything while the fans of the sporting wing of the IRA sing their songs and assault ball boys, stewards and police with absolutely nothing happening? I'd prefer people could attend football without having to worry about any of this stuff but that ship has sailed. How do we achieve anything approaching a level playing field without something new?

Are these personal questions? Do you have such a bear? If so I think we all want to hear about it. ;-)

Frankie, I have indeed and it's definitely something I'll be asking about. As you say these stewards will be the people who bring much of the 'offensive' behaviour to the notice of police. I very much doubt they will be any clearer than anyone else at this point as to what constitutes offensive behaviour under the bill and any other type of offensiveness that is not covered. Many thanks to you all for the questions and please keep them coming.

Please read from bottom up as this in an email chain. Dear Chris, Many thanks for your reasoned response, my apologies for the slight delay in responding back to you – we’re in the process of moving offices and it’s all a bit hectic. In respect to clarifying my comments to Rangers fans – I don’t think Call Kaye would have me back on air to simply clarify what may have been communicated/interpreted wrongly. I am more than happy to post a clarification on my social media sites i.e Facebook and any other forum, website (including my own when it goes live hopefully next week). In addition, I am happy to invite a group of Rangers fans to the Scottish Parliament, or meet them in Glasgow to clarify those remarks but perhaps more importantly chat to them about the bill and concerns they have. In relation to the Bill, I don’t disagree that Police discretion can end up with decisions that on the face of it look arbitrary. However, if any Celtic song, or indeed a song from any other club, had lyrics pertaining to violence against Protestants, other supporters or for that matter anybody I would fully expect the police to take action – due to its potential to cause public disorder and offensive nature. Also the key phrase in the legislation relating to offence is those behaviours that ‘a reasonable person would find offensive’ (and related to public disorder). The term ‘a reasonable person’ is a standard legal definition and understood that common sense would prevail. However, I completely understand your concerns because there are grey areas – just like with most pieces of legislation (breach of the peace perhaps being a case in point). My understanding is that the chanting from Celtic supporters at Tynecastle a couple of weeks ago is indeed being investigated by the police – the fact that they felt unable to take action at the time perhaps underlines the need for this legislation (this was the case made by many of the officers giving evidence). As I said and highlighted at the committee, the fact that the term Hun is seen as acceptable amongst certain (most?) Celtic fans shows that there is a lot of work to be done to educate folk about what is deemed as offensive to people’s race, nationality, faith and identity and the problem is not one sided as can often be misrepresented. Happy to take questions from your blog – or as I say I’m always willing to meet in person with yourself or indeed a group of fans to discuss concerns surrounding the bill. If it would be worth doing I’ll pull in reps from the different Rangers FC supporters groups and some of the main RFC bloggers (such as yourself) and have a roundtable with police and politicians again in relation to the proposed legislation. If there are any amendments you think from your discussions with fellow supporters that you think would clarify and improve the bill I’m also happy to look into them. Kind regards, Humza Subject: Re: Call kaye Interview Dear Humza, I appreciate you taking the time to respond to what I’m sure you agree is an important issue. I also note your apology and that your intention was not to state that the singing you were discussing took place at Ibrox. I think there are two issues that I would like to address. The first is your comments on the radio show and the second would be the wider points you have made about the Bill. If we take your comment on the radio first. Whilst I think your apology is appropriate and I am happy to accept it, I think the damage was done on the show and your apology should therefore take place to the same audience. I know other fans have contacted you about this issue, and that you have apologised to them also, but I think you have to acknowledge that your comments were taken to mean that there was indeed sectarian and bigoted singing at Ibrox. Almost every Rangers fan I have spoken to – and there have been many – felt that you had made this accusation. I think it is also clear from Dr Stuart Waiton’s response to you during the discussion that he also felt you were making this accusation. So whilst I’ll take your explanation at face value I think it appropriate that you either appear on the show again to clarify your comments or have them read out a statement from you to that effect. That is really the only way that ‘neutrals’ who listened to the show might be better appraised of what you meant to convey rather than what you actually did convey. If we take the wider issue of the Bill in general I am heartened to hear your condemnation of the word “Hun” and also that you are putting aside your football allegiances to ensure the Bill is not one sided. However, I think the SNP are having huge problems conveying what they are actually trying to do with this bill. Sadly, the terms being used and the framing of the bill is so vague that football fans have no idea how it will effect them. With that uncertainty comes opposition. It may well be that the SNP’s intentions are good but so far the implementation of this piece of legislation has left much to be desired. I’d like to just give you one example of what I mean from your own comments. You state that “no fan, who does not have the intention of invoking public disorder, will have anything to worry about”. How is that going to be measured? If Celtic fans sit in their thousands at Ibrox chanting that Walter Smith is a “Sad Orange Bastard” then that is quite clearly both sectarian and offensive. However, creating disorder at a football match is virtually impossible. These events are highly policed and fans are segregated. It would be nonsense to suggest that those Celtic fans were trying to start a fight. Likewise the most publicised song which RFC fans have been criticised for is The Billy Boys. Now if we put aside an argument over whether the word fenian (now heavily in use by Celtic fans to describe themselves) means Catholic or the original meaning of Irish Republican, it’s quite clear to me that RFC fans singing that at a football match are also not intent on creating public disorder. So we have a situation where RFC fans will be arrested for singing The Billy Boys at a football match despite their intent clearly not being to start any kind of disorder but merely to offend their rivals. This already happens. Certain singing by RFC fans is already being punished whether it’s intent is to create public disorder or not. I presume that your response will be that it is down to the police to decide but frankly that is where most fans have an issue. That means that from force to force and game to game decisions will be made in an arbitrary way. This leads to the ridiculous spectacle of the past couple of weeks where police wade into the crowd at Ibrox to arrest a man with a water bottle (who was allowed entry into the ground by another policeman) then the following day hundreds of Celtic fans at Tynecastle can chant IRA songs for 60 minutes without the police intervening at all. I would be delighted to hear your views on this and if you would like to answer some specific questions for my blog then I would be happy to put across your view on it. I’m not against the legislation per se. I would like to be able to take my son to a Rangers vs Celtic game when he is older without having to explain to him what Oh Ah Up the Ra means and if this bill is the only way to achieve that then so be it – my concerns lie around the fact that no clear message is being given as to what is and is not acceptable. I’ll await your reply on whether you are willing to issue an apology on the Call Kaye show. I hope you will because it would go a long way to restoring the faith that Rangers fans have in this whole process. On the other points I’d be happy to mail you some questions for my blog and perhaps try to get into the specifics a bit more to make things clearer for people. Kind Regards, Chris From: Humza.Yousaf.msp@scottish.parliament.uk Dear Chris, Thanks for providing me with your email address. Just wanted to try and clarify some of the inaccuracy surrounding what I have said. Let me say at the outset I’m happy to apologise for what is probably a miscommunication on my side. Firstly, let me say at no point did I say there was sectarian or bigoted singing at Ibrox – that is an accusation I simply would not make. I said there was offensive songs being sung, but did not mean specifically at Ibrox - though having listened to it again I understand it may have come across that way and I should have added ‘regardless of what football game you attended’ – happy to apologise for it coming out sounding the way it did. My point was a very general one, at every football match regardless of whether at Celtic Park, Easter Road, Tynecastle etc there will of course be offensive songs being sung and of course even at Ibrox. This may be about a rival player's height, colour of hair (red in particular!) or any other offensive chant such as those often sung towards Aberdeen fans and a certain barnyard animal (as mentioned at the Justice committee by the Aberdeen Supporters Trust). The point I was making was those offensive songs should not be prosecuted, they may be offensive and unpleasant but they should not, and under the new bill would not, be prosecuted. The freedom to offend is explicitly a part of the freedom of speech - though of course this is not an unfettered right. If anyone goes to a football ground and says ‘there was no offensive songs being sung’ I would be astounded and again I mean this not in the context of sectarian songs but songs that would no doubt offend others. This is usually the point of most chanting at a football ground, to rile up the opposition etc. This was certainly not a comment on sectarian signing at Ibrox and I congratulate Rangers on the laudable steps they have taken in tackling this problem, they have done a lot more than most clubs and I'm happy to state that publicly. As I have said previously, I hope football fans, of which I am one, are able to have a mature and reasoned debate whereby we can agree that there is clearly a problem in and around football matches by a minority of fans. Unfortunately, their actions are tarnishing the majority and bringing our national game into disrepute – with the ridiculous spectacle of UEFA fining our nation’s football clubs while Scottish footballing bodies look on at the side-lines. In addition, as the accusation has been made, my own football association has no bearing on how I tackle this issue - I do not see it as 'an old firm' problem. For example I was very critical of the use of the term 'Hun' by many Celtic supporters, for which I was lambasted by many supporters of my own club telling me not to 'step foot in Parkhead again'. http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/Apps2/Business/ORSearch/ReportView.aspx?r=6437 (click on "Offensive Behaviour etc" tab) and scroll down to 10.45) I’d be more than happy to discuss this with you over the phone, blog on your site or even meet with a group of Ranger’s supporters to discuss their concerns about the Bill – if you think this would be advisable. I am happy to reassure anyone this is not a conspiracy against any particular club or supporters and no fan, who does not have the intention of invoking public disorder, will have anything to worry about. Let me once again reassure you I certainly was not referring specifically to the game you were clearly in attendance at but having listened once again to my interview I can see how you might have derived that conclusion so therefore let me apologise again if the communication error was indeed on my side, it certainly was not intended to mean sectarian singing was taking place at Ibrox. Kind regards, Humza

I should of course have added his correspondence to date as that will help people know where the situation lies. I'll do that in the next post.

Some of you on Twitter or other Rangers forums may know that I have been in discussion with Humza Yousaf MSP (Member of the Justice Committee) over some comments he made on the Call Kaye show on Radio Scotland a couple of weeks ago. The general nature of the comments can be found here: http://chrisgraham76.wordpress.com/ He has now offered to do a Q&A about the new bill which I plan to do either in person or via email. I'd like to get as wide a cross section of questions as I can so please post anything on this thread that you want to know and I'll try to include it. Please keep it clean and to the point - I know many are frustrated at the implementation of this bill but we have a chance to properly question one of the people responsible for it's implementation and perhaps get some key points across. Thanks,