Cod Almighty | Article
by Nell Farrell
7 November 2007
I'm an Arsenal supporter who lives in Sheffield. Last December, I went to Bramall Lane to watch Arsenal play Sheffield United in the Premiership and last week I went again, to watch the two sides meet in the League Cup.
In December I couldn't get an away ticket, so I went with a friend who's a United fan and watched the game surrounded by Blades. It was a strange experience, the first time I'd ever watched a match in 'enemy territory': the majority of my non-televisual football-watching has been done at non-League level and in that world fans of both teams mix freely.
But despite all the stick Robin van Persie got, triggering a match-long serenade to our cheatin' hearts, at no point on that dark winter afternoon did I feel threatened or any more uncomfortable than my position and our overall performance warranted.
Last week I sat in the visitors' stand with my fellow Arsenal fans. We won 3-0 and played some truly gorgeous football. And I had what is probably the most horrible evening I've ever had at a football match.
The reason? Homophobia.
Not even directed at me. Directed at someone who wasn't even there and for whom I have as little fellow feeling as it's possible to muster for another human being.
Ashley Cole.
And it must have been National Ashley Day because I'd spent my lunch break at work reading a piece about sporting autobiographies. It included that lovely paragraph from Ashley's book - the one where you realise he's so removed from what passes for normal life that he assumes we'll understand and share, rather than be appalled by, his outrage at being knocked back to a mere £55,000 a week in his contract negotiations.
So I very much share the universal view of him as a greedy, shallow and disloyal man.
Yet when the opening strains of "One man went to bed, went to bed with Ashley/One man (and his mobile phone) went to bed with Ashley" sounded out from several rows back my response was instant and visceral.
My stomach lurched.
A voice in my head went oh no!
My pulse began to race.
And by the time we got to "Thirteen men went to bed..." a nasty pain had settled somewhere in the region of my heart.
Not for Ashley. Ashley can look after himself. Or if he can't, at least his ridiculous salary can offer him some consolation.
It didn't end there. The song was reprised, in full, about five times before the final whistle.
The whole evening was punctuated with shouts of "Ashley Cole is a Chelsea batty boy".
And as we caroled through the Arsenal players' individual musical themes I learned that we have welcomed poor Lassana Diarra by composing a tuneful piece of homophobia in his honour:
Diarra ooh-ooh-ooh-ooh He had to leave the scum 'cos Ashley wanted his bum
I'm not alone among football fans in having a personal honour code. Key features of mine are:
- Don't gloat - it's undignified and it always comes back to bite you
- Don't get worked up about deranged refereeing decisions - they even out in the end (check it out on my imaginary website www.footballkarma.com)
- Don't bottle out when there's racist or sexist or homophobic abuse going on
All three principles have, in their various ways, involved me in some interesting discussions.
Last night was hard. But doing nothing usually leaves a worse taste than at least trying. So I turned to the row behind me, where two smartly dressed, gel-coiffed, twenty-something guys had been singing merrily along and asked, in a kind of general way, of anyone close enough to hear: "Are we happy with all this homophobia then?"
One of them says, as if I might be unaware of this vital piece of the jigsaw: "Well, he did go to Chelsea." When he sees I have not been won over, his next gambit is: "Well, it's not having a go at all of them is it?" And he shrugs. There's always a lot of shrugging at this point. And embarrassed laughter.
But he has guided us to the heart of the matter. Because actually "having a go at all of them" is exactly what is happening - in the same way that sexism tells women we don't have full citizenship rights on planet football, and racism sends that message loud and clear to black and Asian fans.
I take some faint comfort from hearing the arch-homophobes up in the stand, the ones leading this, the ones shouting out their North Bank and Clock End credentials, unwittingly demonstrate their devotion to the gorgeous hybrid of black and gay cultures that is disco. "D, I, A, B, Y," they sing - to the tune of 'D.I.S.C.O.' And the minute it's "one-nil to the Ar-se-nal", everyone can hear what big fans of the Pet Shop boys they are.
When you analyse it, several hundred men are spending an evening hurling abuse at a man who isn't playing in the game they're watching and whose crime is to have deserted them (some considerable time ago now) for a different group of men. Hmmm...
And then, they spend another section of the evening begging the manager of their football team to give them some attention, much in the style of small children pulling on the coat of a beloved but slightly distant father. "Arsene, Arsene give us a wave, Arsene, give us a wave..."
That was a point at which the chasm between the views they were expressing, and what I would imagine Wenger's views on sexuality to be, literally made me feel light-headed - but I think I was holding my breath quite a lot too.
I wanted to shout back: "He's not going to fucking wave to you 'cos he can hear what you're singing and he doesn't like it." And Arsene Wenger certainly has far reason to feel disgruntled about Ashley Cole's ramshackle moral universe than they have.
So, last night I walked home in a kind of cramped silence from a game that should have left me singing and dancing.
And it's at this point that I often feel the need to trot out my football credentials. That I've been watching since I was seven. That I'm from a working-class football family. That my dad is one of the longest-serving club secretaries in non-League football. That I've occasionally deputised for him in writing match reports. That I shout and swear and scream at football matches. That I have a sense of humour... because really often, in discussions about homophobia or racism or sexism, especially if you're a female fan, taking up a position opposed to bullying and harassment is characterised as middle-class supporter-come-lately-ism.
Bullying and harassment and racism and sexism and homophobia are not football problems: they are societal problems. It's just that football culture has a uniquely un-evolved way of dealing with them - particularly with homophobia.
This has been analysed at great length and interpreted in the light of many factors - class and masculinity being foremost among them. We all know there are no out gay footballers. We all know the terrible things that happened to Justin Fashanu. We all know how disastrous it's going to be for the first big-name footballer who comes out. I'm really tired of the analysis. What I want to know is what fans who give a damn are actually doing about it. And what the FA is doing about it. Because on top of all the other reasons for action, we now have some significant sexual orientation legislation on our statute books. It includes goods and services legislation. I paid £25 last night for the experience of being surrounded by homophobic chanting for two hours. I have no clear idea what the stewards would have done if I'd made a complaint - especially as it wasn't just a few people joining in: it was a considerable section of the Arsenal supporters.
One of the interesting things about homophobia is the way people can make out they just don't get it. Maybe they don't get it.
But it's actually really simple. If you insult or make fun of or harass or bully someone and it's because of something to do with being lesbian or gay or bisexual, then you are being homophobic. It doesn't matter whether or not they actually are gay, lesbian or bisexual. And it doesn't matter whether the thing you are picking on is true about lesbians or gay men or bisexual people or is a myth or a stereotype.
The point of homophobia is to make someone feel uncomfortable, odd, ridiculed, bad, unnatural, different, isolated, unwelcome.
Another interesting thing about homophobia is the "Don't let it upset you" gambit. As if being affected by the above list of unpleasant experiences were: (a) your own fault and in fact some kind of weakness; (b) entirely controllable; (c) wrong.
A third interesting thing about homophobia is the hypothesis that the most virulent kind is a form of projection - where someone defends and distances themselves from something they fear (at however submerged a level) may be going on inside them by attacking it in other people.
The bottom line for me is, I love football and I think football is better than this. Better than what I heard at Bramall Lane last week. Better than the really gut-churning abuse Sol Campbell was on the receiving end of from Spurs fans.
Football does have room for difference and diversity - just look at how many different styles of players we love and all the myriad levels at which the game is played. And the way we are so often entranced by individuality, both of skill and of personality in the game.
And it does have room for equality and social justice - look at the impact the Kick Racism Out Of Football campaign has had.
And it has room for wit and teasing and giving wankers a hard time! But that is a world away from bullying and harassment and vile abuse.
I've been browsing the FA website a fair bit since last week. There is a Kick Homophobia Out Of Football campaign, but it's hard to get a handle on what exactly it's up to. Only very few clubs are ever mentioned in connection with it: Man City, Man United, Burnley, Coventry City and Brighton & Hove Albion (whose fans are on the receiving end of a lot of homophobic chanting). I'm not sure whether they are the only clubs who've expressed interest or whether they are some kind of 'trial run'. Anyway, I've registered my details with the FA and logged a formal enquiry about details of the campaign, because I really want to get involved now. And I've formally reported the homophobic chanting.
It would be really great to hear from anyone out there who knows anything about the campaign, or who has any ideas or experiences to share.