Usually, when the little hand strikes Statement O Clock at Ibrox, it is time to snigger.
However, today is different.
Managing Director Stewart Robertson issued the following statement:
Alfredo Morelos was the victim of racist abuse via social media on Friday evening. This hate crime is now subject of a police investigation.
This is unacceptable, cannot be tolerated and must be condemned by everyone in Scottish football and society as a whole.
Furthermore, as a club, we stand firmly behind our players who have taken a knee prior to recent games. This is a strong stance against racism.
We will work tirelessly to protect our players every single day and will not tolerate the abuse or hatred that some have had to endure in recent days.
To be clear, if you are unable to support our players, regardless of their background, you are not welcome at Ibrox. Rangers is a club for all.
‘Everyone Anyone’, our groundbreaking diversity and inclusion initiative, celebrates its first anniversary on Wednesday. Recent incidents highlight the importance of our campaign which we will continue to drive forward.
The racist abuse of any player based is criminal, wrong and should stop forthwith.
However, that statement truly is a keeper for other reasons.
For it contains a fatal pathogen for the Ibrox matchday experience:
To be clear, if you are unable to support our players, regardless of their background, you are not welcome at Ibrox. Rangers is a club for all.
The search function on this site would yield up several articles from the 2008-2009 period where I analysed what would happen to the klan if Rangers signed a Republic of Ireland player.
In this scenario, I gamed out how the klanbase would react if their new star player, a first-team starter and key to their on-field success, played his international matches in Dublin.
I imagined him proudly standing facing the tricolour and belting out Amhrán na bhFiann and then returning to the club training ground wearing an FAI tracksuit top with the Saw Doctors blaring out of his car stereo.
If such a series of events could take place and the fans were merely happy to see their player back from international duty uninjured, then the klan belief system at Ibrox would be no more.
Sadly, that is very much still in the realms of the world as we wish it not as we find it.
Moreover, the pathogen of anti-Irish racism remains central to the Ibrox matchday experience.
Consequently, other racisms are tactility authorised.
Mr Robertson’s words today should be used by the Fitba Fourth Estate every time the Ibrox klanbase sing about their favourite member of the KKK.
Sadly, the Stenography Corps don’t do joined-up thinking.
They also don’t do courage, and that’s why they don’t pass muster as journalists.
That is why Mr Robertson can rest easy.
Discover more from Phil Mac Giolla Bháin
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
On topic…This Club talks shite…always has.
Hope not too much longer.
Off topic…Message to Chris Sutton…
They won the feckin’ cup…we didnae.
Concentrate on that Chris.
I know I am being cynical here but I do wonder how easy it would be to set up a few fake profiles on social media in order to spew abuse at a player in order to help drive them out of a club or city. Selling a player for any amount of money under such apparent circumstances would appear understandable to most supporters so it could be a strategy worth pursuing if a club were desperate to offload an asset that nobody is willing to pay top dollar for but would pay an amount that could keep the lights on for a few months.
On the topic of Irish internationals plying their trade at Ibrox, it’s all very well saying the Klub refuse to sign them but would the players actually be willing to sign in the first place?
Of course they would be willing to sign, Daly (I don`t know if he was ever in an international team) was desperate enough to sign and so was one by the name of Sheridan a few years ago. Daly was another who liked pulling the srockings up over the knees. He always waited until the cameras were on him and had a glance at the support while he was doing it.
You`ve got ones like McCann and O Halloran who would have qualified for Ireland who signed quickly enough and it is only a couple of weeks ago that Ray Houghton said he would have gone to them. They are all more fond of the cash than they are of Ireland.
Let me get this right. It’s important. Are we now saying the Bloo Noses are Racists and always been Racists?
Their hatred is racial hatred.
So it’s not religious (sectarian)? It’s not sectarian at all? Nothing to do with Catholics and Protestants?
The Battle of the Boyne was a racial war??
And it’s nothing to do with politics? Republicans/Nationalists and Loyalists/Unionists? and Fenians too?
Have I been wrong for my 50yrs thinking it was all about Politics and Religion? But it’s about racism?
Let’s get this perfectly straight.
A large section of the Sevco fanbase reserve their strongest and most vocal hatred for Catholics.
Catholics of any description!
They even hate the Argentinian one who is resident in Rome.
If it was just an Irish thing then they would hate all of Irish/Irish descent, but they don’t.
They even have a sizeable fan base in the occupied 6 counties.
They just like white Protestants.
There is a section of Sevco fans who are pretty decent but are very quiet about it, so maybe they should speak up so we can hear what they have to say.
Well that’s Religious hate, inter Christian or Sectarian.
Yip you have been wrong for 50 years. A blue noise hears an Irish accent and straight away they hate. You could say it is religious but most people who attend church or chapels don’t hate the others because of the way they worship. Just go onto follow follow and look at the thread about the statement rangers put out about racism yesterday. The majority of the fans posting were happy with the statement but then when on to state it was probably taigs online making false accounts to give sevco fans bad PR.
They don’t seem to realize that “taig” is a derogatory term for Irish people, just the same way the “N” is derogatory for black people.
You are also forgetting that the loyalist were actually British citizens who were given land to lord it over the Irish population. So right from the get go they believed they were a better “race” of people. The battle of the Boyne with king Billy was funded by the Vatican.
So although in your 50 years on this planet the argument had been about religion and politics, that isn’t were the argument started.
It started with the British wanting to rule the world as they thought they were god’s chosen people. At that time the British were a Catholic country.
Read a book instead of the papers
I was hoping for something better than this Paul. You’re surely not railing against plantations from 1556? Or even Norman plantations from the 12th Century?
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plantations_of_Ireland
The UK is full of waves of peoples all comingled over 3,000 years. Including conquerors; Angles, Saxons, Celts, Romans, Vikings, Normans…Lately; Indians, Pakistanis, Carribean folks, commonwealth citizens and more recently South Africans, Europeans and Polish. Lots of Irish too for over 1,000 years.
Are you saying Ulster Protestants are a different race to Ulster Catholics and Irish Republic Catholics are a different race to Irish Republic Protestants? The South being racially different to the North too?
I think what you’ve said is that it’s all about Religion and politics, in the context that few of them go to church or base their hatred illogically on Christian theological differences.
They’ve all had the hate so long it’s not about religion nor politics nor race…
IT’s just about hating for hate’s sake.
How could they possibly object to their players “genuflecting”?
If you take out one of the six paragraphs it could be read that Mr Robertson is pulling up fans of other clubs for verbally attacking Sevco players. Too little emphasis on the offending Sevco fans.
Other thought i wanted to float is making himself look tough to tout himself for a job elsewhere…would not blame him for wanting away if it was.
I hope Goldson n co are as vocal in their anti racism when their fans are back and the singing commences … I fear not mind
Strong words, but I seem to recall the second-last proprietor of the previous entity based there stating on television that “There is no room at Ibrox for the FTP brigade”. That, as I recall, didn’t make much difference…..
Racism has always been encouraged at Ibrox, it helps to sell the orange strips. Nuff said.
I commend their strong words and hopefully they follow follow through to condemn all racism on match days no matter the player or the team he plays for.
Scottish football and Scottish society will benefit if their fan base adopts their stance and the “minority” ( I know) stay away from games
Hail Hail
Oooh my! This is gonna be an interesting season with Robertson taking a stand,I sincerely hope he takes many scalps throughout the upcoming season.
We may even see Scotland’s finest actually do their job and arrest the singers of said banned songs,lifting them right out of the Ayebrokes stands.IF that scenario plays out,ALL CFC🍀 fans can expect very close scrutiny at every game,including Celtic Park.
IF the polis lift perpetrators @ibrox,we can almost guarantee they will be looking keenly to do the same @Paradise…
We are all on notice and should all act accordingly,no way they’ll make arrests of that lot and not increase the same at CP🍀NONE.From personal knowledge of the polis @CP they are NOT to be trusted;at all.
No mention of Goldson? Sevco may be hunting down all those who took a stance and made their racist comments against the taking a knee. Prolly part of the MINORITY who on match days gets the song book out.
A lot of their fans supported England over the country of their birth a few years back. As a Celtic man from a mixed religion family I couldn’t support England over ANY team. Mixed up bunch who turn on their own if there is anyone deviating from the necessary staunchness..!! I didn’t hear of the Morelos information and I hope they get those responsible. Did they get that guy who tampered with his brakes though !! 🙂
This is probably a bridge to far by the knuckledraggers, the statement is weak and flaccid. Players and agents are becoming more aware of their hatreds and irrespective of our pathetic media their mask is slipping. Even the arrogance of playing in strips with a bet club sponsor in France when this is clearly banned says it all.
it was the only strip they own ..lol ,but true
‘ Everyone Anyone ‘ – my rear end ! Verbal diarrhoea. It makes as much sense as the ‘ decent sevco fan ‘ saying – no such thing exists at ibrokes.
Show me a so called sevco fan who attends the cesspit of hate, has always and will always refrain from singing any sectarian or bigoted songs, thinks or opines a similar train of thought, doesn’t hold any ill feeling towards the catholic faith, nuns , priests, people from ethnic origins, one who not only believes in but upholds the law, doesn’t indulge in domestic abuse, treats their fellow man / woman as equal in all things including employment and vocally derides and reports anyone who participates in such conduct whilst physically present at the stain on the Glasgow landscape – and I’ll show an outright liar.
U can’t tar them all with the same brush. There are decent gers fans. 2 of my friends, good guys. I’m not denying there is a huge problem, in general, with racism at sevco though, but they are not all the same
They aren’t all the same hermanmurman but one is one too many. HH
I have only found out (don’t know where I’ve been) that the red stripe at the top of the Rangers and Sevco socks was and is supposed to refer to a line in a certain song. I hope it didn’t and doesn’t but any questioning of it would only be seen as paranoia.
If true, it is quite subtle and sickening.
Charlie Green, like you I was unaware of the significance of the red band at the top of their socks until its meaning was gleefully revealed – I’d go so far as describing this disclosure as bragging – by a guy I worked with ( I won’t call him a “workmate”) in the 90s. They revel in this type of stuff and are truly vomit-inducing people.
I noticed a few players used to wear the socks right up passed their knees, so the red was showing, Lafferty in particular, with his origins said it all.
I’ve heard the rumour big Amoruso used to tuck the red downwards towards his shin in his own quiet protest. He’d tippled to what he’d joined. Similarly: remember Marco Negri? The goal machine who suddenly started looking sullen on the pitch and ceased to celebrate whenever he scored? His rangers career mysteriously ended abruptly soon after after appearing in public with a black eye following an accident in a squash match with a team mate. Aye right!
Anti Irish chants are just as racist as anti Black, anti Pakistani or any other ETHNIC group. This is universally accepted now, and any attempt to obfuscate by talking exclusively about race, as seems to be the sevconian response, should be seen for what it is; a pathetic excuse to deflect from their own inherent racist attitudes primarily but not exclusively to Irish people, as witness the weekly outpourings from their vile song book, and their disgusting attacks on their own black players.
Just ask Maurice Edu.
I seem to remember an Aberdeen player being subjected to racial abuse by Celtic fans so please remember that no team or club are lily white.
But one of the two big clubs have really bad fans.
Every club has some members of their support they could do without, but only one club encourages them.
No one is claiming their club is perfect or that none of their supporters are racist however, take a look at what that clubs’ supporters posted on the official club site to their own players and you’ll see why we are all appalled.
To be fair to Stewart Robertson, although his statement is just words at this stage, fair play to him for having the balls to actually say what needed saying.
No one is suggesting that any team or it’s supporters are ” lily white” ( Irony by pass anyone)?
However the point is that anti Irish chants are just as racist as anti black chants, and I seem to remember such chants at Aberdeen, Hearts, Kilmarnock and many other grounds in Scotland.
So we won’t be taking any lectures from other clubs’ fans regarding racism.
No. What I remember is an Aberdeen player having a Celtic player’s Parkhead future terminated because of unsubstantiated accusations on grounds of what the SFA called “balance of probability”. Hardly cast iron proof. I don’t have a lot of respect for the accuser and it’s absolutely nothing to do with race or ethnicity. The guy’s a horrible human being, pure and simple.
No…. it was abuse by a Celtic player… who was dealt with and expelled from the club. Properly dealt with.
My ring!
Is this where we are now? Shay Given’s only got to say something for it to be true. I’ve been through all this garbage before when industry in this country took on the new Bullying and Harassment at Work legislation – no a bad idea to begin with but it rapidly turned into the most effective tool at a bully’s disposal. The onus of proof was immediately placed on the accused and management figures were terrified of failing to prosecute malicious allegations – however ridiculous – made by individuals with an axe to grind against the accused. Never mind the fact that the management figure who hosted my diversity training sessions had only days previously called me – within earshot of several others – a bead-rattling bastard. There’s no scientific examination of evidence anymore. You’re accused therefore you’re guilty.
This could get nasty. Guarding statues of slave traders won’t quite cut it I’m afraid. This is a global movement. And any deviation or deflection by the kulturists will swiftly be seized upon, and broadcast worldwide. HH
Shay Logan, no Given. Oops!