I hear you. I really do. I never went through any of that. Too old, and living far away from Manchester at that point.
But given how cruel and what dickheads children can be, and how the pack mentality that characterises humans is sometimes particularly prominent among children (I'm seeing it to some extent with my granddaughter's primary school these days), I salute each and every blue who was aged between seven and, say, eighteen, between 1993 and 2009 or so. The shit that must have been handed out in secondary schools and even primary schools in the Greater Manchester area must have been wellnigh unbearable. Fisticuffs too, I imagine, from time to time.
In a pub, on holiday, or wherever, you can walk away from these cretins.
Well, I'm not a vindictive person by temperament, but they can have it back now — and in spades.
That said — and I have always said this — I have known rags from Manchester and around who were basically sound. Alright, they're cunts. But they're sound cunts. I have never yet met a Liverpool fan that I could have a normal conversation about football with.