UEFA getting the big stick out

[Sexual Ealing]

The only racism Sid sees is against the poor old landed gentry.

[trinityoap]

I don't know anyone who was there who saw this flag. Does anyone know what the offending words were?

[chrisw1]

The Villa end was far more than just the usual away support Doggie.  We had c 11,000 allocated tickets, which included st holders and members. 

[algy]

"Lest we forget" indeed!

One of the local funeral places always puts up a “Lest we forget” flag on armistice day.

It makes me laugh every time as they also have the prices advertised on a vinyl sticker thing on the window too so it reads something like.

“Cheap cremations only £600

LEST WE FORGET”

[algy]

I find the use of remeberance imagery extraordinarily offensive, from white vans to trainers and "poppy Christmas" displays to football flags.

Are you offended if someone wears a poppy?

I personally find poppy-wearing an intriguing guessing game.

Is the person wearing the poppy doing so in the spirit it was intended; as a mark of respect for the fallen, regret that such an event ever took place and a reminder that such slaughter is tragic on both sides?

Or are they the kind of twat who thinks it's a symbol of patriotic pride and an excuse to sing Ten German Bombers?

I used to wear a white poppy, until somebody I knew who also wore a white poppy was beaten up because of it.

These days I don't wear any kind of poppy and just say I had one but it fell off.

Round the mid-late 00s there was an old boy who’d fought in WWI who lived in cathedral close in Lichfield. On Remembrance Sunday he’d hang a German flag out of his window. Used to get loads of shit for it, but he’d just reply that Germans died there too and it wasn’t any less of a waste of young lives.

[Meanwood Villa]

I don't know anyone who was there who saw this flag. Does anyone know what the offending words were?

[Meanwood Villa]

The Villa end was far more than just the usual away support Doggie.  We had c 11,000 allocated tickets, which included st holders and members. 

There were at least 20k Villa in the stadium I reckon

[Somniloquism]

I don't know anyone who was there who saw this flag. Does anyone know what the offending words were?

The assumption is that was the flag, but nothing has been officially confirmed has it?

[Flamingo Lane]

I'm not going to repost the photo of it, but that flag is fucking atrocious.

[Brend'Watkins]

Yep, it’s massively shit. I can see it’s appeal to the worst of our fan base mind.

[AV82EC]

Apart from the Villa badge it’s a conflation of someone’s idea of nationhood, St George’s Cross, Royalty, leadership and remembrance, 4 concepts in and of themselves simple cultural hand holds but when paired with Stop the Boats, it just becomes a crass xenophobic and racist mess. I’ve said on here before everyone’s got a different view of their nationality and how they express it, it still beggars belief that this simplistic view of what it means to be English is peddled when even the most basic research would give a breadth of culture and history that pales this to insignificance. Still all hail the English Education system.

[Dave]

That element is there in ours and other clubs support unfortunately.

Somewhere between 10-15% of the country are racist c***s (a figure that's probably the lowest it's ever been, but it's still millions of people). Stands to reason that 10-15% of our support would be too.

Did they send out an email asking if you were racist? Where do you get those % from, have you access to those records?

I'm guessing Sid.

A guess based on polling / voting for Restore (mostly racist), Reform (mostly not racist but very racist-friendly), plus of the course the smattering that remains in the Tories / Greens / Labour / Lib Dems / others, 10-15% feels about right.

Maybe I'm a bit too high or a bit too low.

Either way, however many people are, the point remains the same - unless your contention is that racism doesn't exist in the UK anymore, then there will some racist c***s who follow Villa.

[Dogtanian]

The Villa end was far more than just the usual away support Doggie.  We had c 11,000 allocated tickets, which included st holders and members.

Yes, but predominantly it was people who have been to European away games, but at most it was people with a regular history of attending Villa games.

That's why I think it's so important to find out if the sign was in the stadium and if so, in a Villa block or a UEFA one. If it's Villa, then there is a possibility to identify them and make sure they can't buy official tickets again.

If it wasn't in the stadium or it was in a UEFA block, I don't know what the club can do.

[Bent Neilsens Screamer]

I find the use of remeberance imagery extraordinarily offensive, from white vans to trainers and "poppy Christmas" displays to football flags.

Are you offended if someone wears a poppy?

What Rory said.

Fair enough. Must be hell for you walking round in a state of being offended when you’re second guessing their reason for wearing it, especially as not everyone conforms to a stereotype.

[Olneythelonely]

Wasn’t the that whole point in Rory’s post? That everyone doesn’t conform to stereotype. So don’t know if they’re wearing it for actual remembrance reasons, because they’re a racist flag shagger or if they’re wearing it because they feel they have to.

That’s not being offended is it?