What turns “everyday normal people” into screaming firebrands of pent up energy? What too has the power to split families, create rivalries, draw lines across the country and paint areas, ghetto-like, in one colour? And what gives thousands upon thousands of people intense delight and gut-wrenching frustration on a weekly basis? Lastly, what has created a universal language of comradeship and togetherness which can explode into intense rivalry and mutual hatred without the need for actual words?
Employment? Unemployment? POLITICS? Cult religions? Race relations? The gender pay gap?
Never..it can only be football.
There are two types of people in this world – football fans and others.
Football!
Modern man’s tribal bonding; the display of club colours, the chanting, the imbibing of alcohol and more alcohol, the mass hysteria, the rituals. By rebooting our ancestral roots, football resurrects the caveman still dwelling within us – and awakens his fears! Standing as one beside the fire amongst many like-minded fellows was to survive. Repelling one’s enemies with a group display of aggression – to appear to be the bigger “monster” – was to be safe. To lose the fight, to suffer humiliation, to be second best, was to die. That is football too! The terraces replicate the hunting grounds we thought we had left behind in our evolutionary journey. Maybe we have not evolved very much at all.
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