David Penberthy: Not even barracking is safe from tut-tutting wowsers
Spending the weekend cheering on your favourite sporting team was once the great Australian pastime. But thanks to overzealous virtue signallers, even that’s being taken away from us, writes David Penberthy.
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Australians are generally a laid-back and laconic lot, but there are two things we cannot abide: priggish authority and dobbing.
These twin national hatreds coalesced at Melbourne’s Marvel Stadium last Saturday with one of the more pathetically schoolmarmish displays ever seen at an Australian sporting event.
The on-field contest was irrelevant. Of more interest was the battle in the stands between a fan, guilty at worst of being a loudmouth, and the authority figures cast in the role of tut-tutting wowsers.
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It was an encounter that confirms the continuing attempts in this country by the pedants and the straighteners to ensure sporting contests are free of beer snakes, beach balls, drums, trumpets, excessively vigorous barracking, and that most chilling of scourges — nasty names.
Stadium security — in conjunction with the umpires — identified and ejected a fan for what they regarded as unacceptable behaviour.
His crime? He called one of the umpires a “flog”.
He hadn’t sworn. He hadn’t abused anyone on the basis of their race. He’d made no homophobic remarks. If you wanted to be really politically correct about it, the one thing you could accuse him of was vilifying the long-suffering victims of alopecia, as he actually called the umpire a “bald-headed flog.”
For this transgression, AFL House launched an internal inquiry into the man’s expulsion from the match, the results of which I will get to shortly.
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Much has been written and said about the moves across sport, most noticeably in the AFL, to crack down on umpire abuse. I wrote about the topic a month ago when two players were hauled up before the tribunal for making disparaging remarks, with one fined for calling an umpire a cheat, the other fined for telling an umpire that he sounded like a girl. Since then, this blitzkrieg against umpire vilification has broadened at breakneck speed to start targeting the fans.
Off its own bat the Richmond Football Club suspended one of its members for three matches for shouting “be consistent, you green maggot” at an umpire during a game. A Carlton cheer squad member was investigated for banging a drum. Another was pulled up for calling an umpire a wanker. There have been reports of AFL operatives standing on the edges of cheer squads to listen out for similarly intemperate remarks. And last weekend, the fan known only as “Frankie” was evicted from Marvel Stadium at half time of the Carlton-Brisbane game.
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There was conjecture earlier this week about what Frankie actually said. It was reported variously that he called the ump a bald-headed flog, a bald-headed frog, or a bald-headed poof. If it was flog or frog, it seems no big deal, if it was a hate term such as poof, he definitely has a case to answer, but all I know is that if I were a bald man, or a frog, I’d feel like no-one had my back in this.
It’s all getting a bit stupid, isn’t it?
In an attempt to inject some sense and clarity into the debate, the AFL issued a statement on Wednesday confirming that the fan in question had been spoken to by both Marvel Stadium security and Victoria Police and now the AFL itself.
“The patron has received a warning and no further action will be taken,” it declared.
While the absence of further action is welcome, it would be interesting to know on what basis the guy was even warned. Was it the flog bit? The bald bit? Was it for shouting too loudly, leaning over the race in too menacing a fashion as the umpires departed at half time, or just the general vibe of the whole thing?
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The statement also contained the contestable claim that “in season 2019 there has been no change to the expectations of the behaviour of everyone at games.” It makes you wonder why the fans keep disappearing then. These football matches are becoming like Argentina in the 1970s, where people simply vanish without trace, posing a real danger that at some point, Sting might come to Australia and write a song about them.
Whatever the case, the AFL has at least tried to set out some clear parameters for what constitutes acceptable behaviour.
“The AFL’s zero tolerance stance on vilification remains,” it read. “Stadiums and police across the country have a zero-tolerance for members or supporters that abuse the opposition, umpires and other members and supporters, on grounds of race, religion, gender, disability and sexuality. Fans who breach the conditions of entry may face consequences.”
In fairness to the AFL, these boundaries sound sensible on paper, but the test will be how they are enforced by match officials and security in the heat of a game.
The fans remain unconvinced, with the nation’s most notoriously psychotic supporter, Collingwood cheer squad stalwart Joffa, saying he will not attend any more games until the AFL apologises for the manner in which it has treated the people who make the game a commercial success.
“Football is all about banter and fun booing and having a go at the umpiring,” Joffa said. “It’s about us you and me. I have never sensed outrage in the terraces as what we are seeing now. So AFL get your supporter cardboard cut outs to replace us, get your fake crowd noise over the loud speaker systems at all grounds to replace us. We are the game, or at least we thought we were!!”
Hear hear to that. To paraphrase Voltaire, as an Adelaide Crows supporter, I reckon that Joffa is a massive wanker, and I will defend his right to be a massive wanker until the day that I die.
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