Canal Street Blues LGBT Supporters Group 2014

[Why Always Ste]

I understand it completely but I am a Lesbian... :p

The amount of times I hear fans calling other fans or players fags, faggots and all the rest of it is unacceptable.

Sure it isn't as much as when I first started going in the late 80's but one comment like that is one to many.

A fan wears a pink polo shirt and for 90mins he's getting abuse and his sexuality comes into question.

LGBT fans should march in my view, showing that there are LGBT fans out there and that everyone should be welcome to football.

Some of the most high profile Footy players out there are gay, yet don't feel they can say so through fear of abuse and also through the possibility of lowering their earning potential... now why is that?

Wouldn't surprise me if marketing Depts. At these big sports wear brands have had a quiet word in some players ears to maybe not mention their sexuality.

 

[gordondaviesmoustache]

LGTB MCFC Fans leading the line@London Pride join us for the Manchester parade Sat 23rd August

Why the need to parade i dont get it your a football fan like the rest of us, why do you have to tell us your gay and a football fan very stange, or is it me thats strange in this moden world.

What is the difference between wanting peope to know you're a City fan and wanting people to know your sexuality?

It's a natural part of the human condition to want others to know who and what we are.

 

[Didsbury Dave]

i cannot stand that homophobe line "Why do you need to parade it".

Sits up there with "as long as they keep themselves to themselves" as a stock-in-trade catchphrase for bigots.

The reason they are "parading" their sexuality is because gay people have been repressed and bullied for years, and still are within football. They are showing defiance and pride in the same way persecuted minorities always have done.

 

[tonea2003]

i cannot stand that homophobe line "Why do you need to parade it".

Sits up there with "as long as they keep themselves to themselves" as a stock-in-trade catchphrase for bigots.

The reason they are "parading" their sexuality is because gay people have been repressed and bullied for years, and still are within football. They are showing defiance and pride in the same way persecuted minorities always have done.

well said dave

 

[Ray78]

Keep up the excellent work lads and lasses. Football is for everybody.

 

[BlueMooney]

Why the need to parade i dont get it your a football fan like the rest of us, why do you have to tell us your gay and a football fan very stange, or is it me thats strange in this moden world.

With the weekend just gone, I saw plenty of half-serious-half-tongue-in-cheek tweets asking why there was need for a gay pride event because there was never any straight pride parades. "Heterosexual people don't feel the need to say they sleep with the opposite sex," they say, "so why do gays have to announce it and flaunt it everywhere?" On the face of it, a logical question, but as soon as you even being to think about it for one iota of a second an answer begins to form. Every day is a straight pride day, given we live in a hetero-normative society (understandable so, however).

The point is, a man can kiss a woman in the street and nobody looks. Homosexuals, however, still get glances and looks and comments (and occasionally worse) for doing it. "I don't mind gay people, but why do they have to show it off in front of everyone," is a comment I heard yesterday on Market St when two women were holding hands. How often would you hear, when a man and woman walk down the street hand in hand, "I don't mind straight people, but why must they show it off all the time?"

A man and woman kiss at a football match and nobody would bat an eyelid. Ask yourself if the same would happen if two men kissed three rows in front of you. In a place where players are routinely called all sorts of homophobic names because they go down easily or roll around after a tackle, I don't imagine the reaction would necessarily be positive.

In the same way that society has become more accepting of homosexuality over the last few decades, football is still miles behind. That's why there's need.

 

[Carstairs]

Will the group be applying for away tickets, and have the members got enough loyalty points ?

Are you suggesting it is simply a ruse to get tickets by the backdoor?

 

[Why Always Ste]

David, I see plenty of men kissing each other these days at city matches and nobody says anything ( that's because we're all kissing aswell)

Haha... the joys of supporting a winning team

Now having to kiss fat, middle-aged men :(

 

[DigglerUK]

Good to see a Blue at the front :)

Aye. Looks a nice bloke as well, kind face on him.

Hehe I agree ... and cheers IrelandSuperman ;-)

Yep - that person is me. Normally go on another (less busy) forum and lurk here occasionally but found this thread through Google images of the pictures posted above.

Was a great day down there apart from the weather - yes it does also rain in London it seems.

I recently decided to become involved in helping to set up Canal Street Blues with John and the others after our home match against Chelsea - I was sat right next to the away fans and of course there was the usual banter between supporters.

However this Chelsea lad who had been quite vocal throughout the first half, and hardly paid attention to the game started hurling homophobic comments such as "Meet me outside after the game you f**king faggot", "grow a set of balls you f**king bender" to a city fan a couple of seats to the right of me (who'd been giving grief back also to the Chelsea fan).

Obviously made me mad, but also very uncomfortable to be there and I was ready to say something to him, but to the credit of a city steward who overheard this, he then stepped in and told him that using that kind of language is unacceptable, and if he did it again he would be ejected. Was a proper "telling off" and it did shut him up!

This spoiled the game for me (as well the 0-1 scoreline with our first home defeat for so long), as I was concentrating on him as much as the game after this point.

That event is probably why I decided to get involved in CSB - as we should start working with the club and the wider football world in general to try and let people know that using these kind of words is just as unacceptable as the racism black and ethnic minorities fans and players encountered over many years.

The group (for me anyhow) is not about shouting about your sexuality - I can understand when people say "why do the gays have to shout about it by having these pride parades" that it can seem that way (and maybe many LGBT people attending these pride events are indeed doing it for that exact reason).

For me, it's about letting all fans know that LGBT people do attend football matches - there is a common stereotype that it's a "man's game" and therefore is only straight people who enjoy football and attend matches. The only way to let other fans know this is to be visible and public - attending pride events is one way to do this but there are others.

It's about our club having a representative of LGBT fans that they can work with to help make it a more welcoming place for all fans who may have witnessed discrimination in the past.

It's also about the club also having an LGBT supporters group as other clubs also have their own or are forming them now (Arsenal, Spurs, Everton, Liverpool, Norwich so far).

But for me another important reason is also about letting gay fans know that there are other gays fans out there - and if they have (for example) felt uncomfortable at a match due to chanting and that may stop them going again, that they can meet other LGBT fans through an official supporters group, and maybe start attending games as will feel safer through "safety in numbers".

We're a small number so far (only being formed for a few months), but if anyone reading this wants to become a member of CSB once we've set-up fully, you can visit the (currently in development) website at http://www.canalstreetblues.co.uk and fill in your details there, or http://twitter.com/CanalStBlues, or https://www.facebook.com/pages/Canal-Street-Blues/601567279917236

I know the majority of the blues fans will be behind the reasons the Canal Street Blues formed - but of course it is to be expected we will get the odd one who for whatever reason doesn't agree as to why we need to have such a supporters club.

I'll get off my soap box now and go and wash that London smog out of my new city shirt....!

Cheers all.


Derek

 

[Big Yaya Wilko 12]

The responses to this thread make me a bit sick. The "but why do you need to announce it/flaunt it" line we hear a lot about homosexuality these days, and is springing up all over this thread, is just 21st century airbrushed homophobia. You'll all break Into faux-indignation over this of course, you people always do, but I don't care to be honest.

If anyone wants to start a supporters group that's up to them, whatever common ground they share. Good luck to them.

Absolutely this. It's that ambivalent (almost insouciant) attitude to homophobia that needs to be addressed. It shouldn't matter who you're instinctively attracted to, it shouldn't matter who you love, but in todays society it does seem to matter. And it's the oppressors of our society who make it matter and then have the gall to subvert that and claim it's the oppressed who self-segregate. Madness.

Anyway, sorry for the rant. Good luck to you, OP. I think it's a great idea for an LGBT supporters group. A place where fellow blues feel they can thrive in an open environment. My boss is gay and I have many gay friends and they would love the idea as well. My girlfriend is bisexual and a massive blue and she's genuinely excited about the group! We might pop in for a game next season! I hope we can all enjoy watching City together!