Soccer Hooliganism

Representation of Football Culture in Contemporary Fiction

In ‘Understanding Soccer Hooliganism’ John H.Kerr talks about a group of Chelsea supports called ‘Chelsea Headhunters’. Some of the members of the group were average people, working normal jobs who you wouldn’t really associate with hooliganism. “For instance, the age of the convicted gang leaders ranged from twenty-three to thirty-one, well beyond the teenage years; all four were working and one was a former Royal Navy cook and Falklands War veteran. Indeed, journalists seemed surprised that the gang’s ‘field commander’, Terry Last, a slightly built non-drinker, worked as a clerk for a top firm of London lawyers and thus ‘hardly fitted the conventional image of the football hooligan as a mindless lout’” explaining that these were people you would not associate with this type of behaviours.

He goes on to explain how one of the main features of the ‘Headhunters’ hooliganism was how much thought and planning went into arranging meetings with other rival hooligan firms. It was never spontaneous, as the fight had previously been organised. But, both rival groups could muscle up a good few hundred people between them, marching through the streets like they are part of the armed forces. These meetings were planned weeks in advance, if not month depending on the opposing group, if the rivalry was so great. For away games, the police had special operations in place so they were ready for hooligans. They would go out of their way, stopping at places where trains to London didn’t normally stop. The gangs also planned diversions for the police to keep them busy, so that they did not get caught. They did this around the Chelsea football stadium.

“In other words, by planning ahe...

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...to reconcile men to the loss of social power and the taboo in at least middle class society. Sport is seen to be natural, and it is seen to show males natural abilities and qualities, and aggression is seen to be a male characteristic, not something that can just be learned. So is sport allowing these types of males with these strong characteristics to practice aggression in a controlled environment? Evidence shows that violence in sport is something that can be learned, the aggression seen in sport is then projected outside of the sporting world.

Works Cited

Mackinnon, Kenneth. ‘Sport and Masculinity”, Representing Men: Maleness and Masculinity in the Media’, Arnold, Great Britain, 2003.

Kerr, John H. ‘Understanding soccer hooliganism’, Open University Press, Great Britain, 1994.

http://www.scribd.com/doc/4007339/45/Telic-and-Paratelic-states 06/01/2011