First Minister of Scotland Alex Salmond is walking into swamp over banning songs....

[ian1964 10,386]

The deadpan Welsh comedian, Milton Jones â?? you can see him regularly on Mock the Week and Have I Got News for You? â?? has a joke which goes: â??When I got back from work the other day my wife was already home.

 

â??I called out, â??Hi, Hon!â??

 

â??It wasnâ??t a term of endearment â?? itâ??s just that my wifeâ??s German.â?

 

OK, OK â?? itâ??s a joke that depends on how you hear it, not how you read it. And if Milton wants to press charges for murdering a gag, your correspondent is done bang to rights.

 

Hereâ??s the point, though. If he had used that routine in a Scottish nightclub and changed the punchline to: â??It wasnâ??t a term of endearment â?? itâ??s just that my wife is a Rangers supporterâ?, would he fall foul of the Scottish Governmentâ??s proposed laws in respect of sectarianism in Scottish football?

 

There are times when Alex Salmond exudes the powerful impression that he supposes he can walk on water. By now, though, you would have thought that a politician as astute and opportunist as Salmond would realise that, on this issue, he and his SNP colleagues are marching into a swamp.

 

The Tories at Holyrood also tipped head first into the mud when their new leader, Ruth Davidson, discovered she was employing (or rather you and I were, because his pay comes out of the public purse) a researcher called Colin James Taylor, who tweeted about â??Timsâ?.

 

Now should you be a reader who happens not to have the requisite information to divine meaning from this term, it is used among some Rangers supporters to refer to Scottish Catholics in general, Catholics of Irish extraction in particular and Celtic supporters likewise.

 

The origin of the term is not certain. Some say it refers to a mythical generic Celtic supporter called Tim Molloy or Malloy, others that it originated from a Glasgow Irish Catholic gang of the 1930s, a rival to Billy Fullertonâ??s Protestant gang â?? the Billy Boys of the proscribed song.

 

There was, if memory serves, a witty echo of the name by a metals firm in the east end of Glasgow which traded under the title of Tim Alloys. Be that as it may, when Taylor, a Rangers supporter, Tweeted about Tims, he was told by his new governess to withdraw and say sorry, which he duly did. That he caused offence â?? possible, actual and self-generated â?? is likely, perhaps certain, in the current climate.

 

Would he, however, have committed an offence under the Offensive Behaviour at Football and Threatening Communications (Scotland) Bill?

 

After all, there are Celtic supporters who refer to themselves as Tims, just as they refer to Rangers fans as Huns because of the clubâ??s traditional attachment to the Union Flag and the Royal Family, with its distant German ancestry. And, again, if a Celtic supporter replied to Taylorâ??s Tweet and referred to him as a Hun, would both of them be dragged off by the thought police?

 

The answer, says the Scottish Government, depends on context. Badinage is one thing, malice is another. Intent to cause offence would therefore presumably play a part in determining whether or not a crime had been committed â?? yet offending one another is also the stock in trade of football supporters and the fiercer the rivalry, the more calculated the offence.

 

You might think that Scotland is already well provided with laws that deal with anything that crosses the boundary into menacing behaviour, especially since there is now a range of crimes which can be aggravated by religious, racist, sexist or homophobic abuse. The SNP, though, insist that we need even more and are hell bent on delivering them.

 

They do this despite the example of muddle-headedness set by Uefa. The governing body of European football is admirably dedicated to the eradication of racism within its domain, but it is notably uneven in its enforcement and haphazard in its methodology â?? especially with regard to Eastern Europe and Spain.

 

Closer to home we have Rangersngers fans banned from away games in Europe because some were reported for singing The Billy Boys â?? with its line about being â??up to our knees in Fenian bloodâ? â?? a sanction imposed for an incidence of a song sung at a game and reported by FARE (Football Against Racism in Europe) but not by the match delegate, in one of the two instances.

 

Now Celtic have been cited â?? though not by FARE â?? for â??illicit chantingâ? at their 3-1 home victory over Rennes. Again, the match delegate was not the originator of the charge, which was instigated by the police match commander, the former Scottish Premier League referee, Eddie Smith.

 

Celticâ??s chief executive and the Assistant Chief Constable of Strathclyde Police want to meet the Green Brigade to discuss the legality of their songs and chants. I assume there will be a lively argument, especially since, last time I looked, the Green Brigadeâ??s manifesto included a 32-county united Gaelic-speaking Irish republic, an independent Gaelic-speaking Scottish republic and a demand for boycotts of global brands whose sponsorship underwrites the game at various levels.

 

They might well ask Peter Lawwell, the chief executive of Celtic, what he supposed they were likely to sing and chant when he invited them to act as Celticâ??s resident glee club. If he is then sucked into a debate about how one manâ??s terrorist is another manâ??s freedom fighter and how one clubâ??s support hears a hymn of hate when another believes it is singing a ballad of liberation, then he will have something in common with Mr Salmond.

 

They both set in train a course of events without anticipating the consequences, no joke for either of them â?? or a laughing matter for Scottish football.

 

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/football/competitions/scottish-premier/8897701/First-Minister-of-Scotland-Alex-Salmond-is-walking-into-swamp-over-banning-songs-on-terraces.html

[chilledbear 16]

'just as they refer to Rangers fans as Huns because of the club’s traditional attachment to the Union Flag and the Royal Family, with its distant German ancestry'.

 

You made that one up Roddy.

[GovanAllan 0]

'just as they refer to Rangers fans as Huns because of the club’s traditional attachment to the Union Flag and the Royal Family, with its distant German ancestry'.

 

You made that one up Roddy.

 

Had to read that three times to make sure, I hope he's just fishing.

[Frankie 8,136]

Dreadful attempt to try and take the pressure of Celtic.

 

Roddy is a hypocrite.

[GovanAllan 0]

Police release figures showing 58% of sectarian crime is against Catholics. Now the story is back to them as victims again you couldn't make this shit up.

[calscot 0]

That statistic probably comes from the fact that more notionally Catholic victims will claim that the crime is sectarian in nature. I think that Celtic fans in particular are likely to claim sectarianism if they believe are victims while wearing a Celtic shirt. The fact they see that shirt as a daily uniform also means they are very likely to be wearing one.

 

Ergo, most crimes against Celtic fans are probably reported as sectarian.

[chilledbear 16]

Police release figures showing 58% of sectarian crime is against Catholics. Now the story is back to them as victims again you couldn't make this shit up.

 

 

http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Resource/Doc/362943/0122956.pdf

 

 

 

'A large proportion of the behaviour referred to in these charges included the

direct targeting of police officers with religious abuse and the police were the

most common target of this kind of abuse in 42% of the charges reported. The

general community was targeted in nearly a third of charges. These charges

included occasions where religious abuse was carried out in a public space

and did not necessarily target a particular individual'.

[Danny 0]

Tim and hun are not equivalent.

 

Tim and bear are. Hun and fenian are equivalent.

[Guest Dutchy]

That statistic probably comes from the fact that more notionally Catholic victims will claim that the crime is sectarian in nature. I think that Celtic fans in particular are likely to claim sectarianism if they believe are victims while wearing a Celtic shirt. The fact they see that shirt as a daily uniform also means they are very likely to be wearing one.

 

Ergo, most crimes against Celtic fans are probably reported as sectarian.

 

In fact, I was listening to Radio Scotland and they broke the figures down a bit. They also said that it was more or less the police that classified what the nature of the crime was.

 

There was also a high incidence of alchol involved.

 

One could imagine an Plastic Paddy getting a bit political, getting a smack on the chops, then the police saying it was sectarian.

 

Political, or sectarian??? We need clarification!!! lol lol lol

[aweebluesoandso 290]

The Catholic 16% minority of the population commit far more sectarian crimes per head than the Protestant 60% majority of the population is how i read these statistics .

Edited November 18, 2011 by aweebluesoandso