I am, generally speaking, a pacifist.

A long time ago, when I was young (and some of you were even younger), I applied a certain image to myself, the image of the tough guy, the guy who didn’t give a shit, who could take a punch and dish one out in the same breath.  There were many young men like me where I lived, there still are.  At the time it could be attributed to faux-bravado, over exuberance of youth and all that.  But hindsight shows me, clear as day, that it was entirely driven by fear.  Pure and simple.  Pretending you’re tough gets you through the day if you live in Glasgow.  I couldn’t tell you why I was scared, perhaps it had something to do with the constant news stories of knife crime, of drugs, of the media buzz words of the time?

After I moved from Glasgow I realised that you don’t have to think like that, you don’t have to always be scared of being chibbed if you walked down the shops for a carry out, and once I became a father of two boys my mentality shifted completely to the point of abhorring any form of violence.  Violence is an animalistic trait, it’s morally reprehensible.  I’d rather forgive my enemy than stamp them out of existence because I believe in the value of human life and the right for people to be different and hold disparate views from my own.  Hell, I try not to even kill spiders anymore, I don’t like them and I’m pretty sure they don’t like me, but they too have their value in the world.

For all those who are not clear on the dictionary definition of the word Bigot here it is:

Bigot (noun) – Intolerant person – somebody with strong opinions, especially on religion, politics, or ethnicity, who refuses to accept different views.

A Bigot is guilty of Bigotry – the practise of having very strong and unreasonable opinions, especially about Race, Politics, religion and refusing to consider other people’s opinions.  This is synonymous (i.e. identical) with the word prejudice which is exactly the same as racism, intolerance, bias, narrow-mindedness...I could go on.  Each of these words has the same dark connotations, they express the same negative emotions and traits.

On its own, a bigot is a bigot, they hate people who don’t see the world the same way they do.  They try to do one of two things:

1)      Convert people to their points of view by either peaceful or forceful means,

2)      If that fails, stamp out the existence of people with opposing views.

On its own, one bigot cannot do much except stand in the street screaming at everyone who passes by that it’s views are correct and they, the people passing by, are all wrong...but what happens when there’s more than one, as there often are in this wide and varied world?  What happens when they are so numerous that they are not the minority but the majority occupying positions of power in almost every facet of government (be it political, sporting or the fourth estate) in the country?

When these bigots are allowed to govern a people, not only physically but mentally by passing off its governing brethrens agenda through every single media outlet in the country, then bigotry evolves into its more dangerous and bloodthirsty cousin.

Fascism (noun) – Dictatorial movement – Any movement, ideology or attitude that favours dictatorial government, centralised control of private enterprise, repression of all opposition and extreme nationalism.

Fascist (noun) – Someone who forces people to obey, who holds very right wing opinions and believes in fascism.

Tell me, which words in the above statement can be attributed to our “Old F*rm” counterparts?

1) Ideology – What is the Rangers ideology?  Protestant superiority, which in turn means that ideally they advocate the repression of Catholic religious views and practise in Scotland.

2) Extreme nationalism. - The quintessentially British club?  They hold far right extreme views “why don’t you go home”, “up to our knees in fenians blood”.  Sounds like a nice little ditty to goose-step to, doesn’t it?

As bad as having a single club that promotes the romance of, and revels in the idea of, being fascist, they are the establishment club.  The club of the government, the club of the media, the club of “‘ra peepil” (as we are constantly told).  They are the institution where modern fascism is bred and promoted with as much zeal and fervour as any religious school or extreme society on Earth.  This is the headquarters the jackbooted hordes stomp to every week to breathe in the air of “Protestant Superiority”, this is the home base from which they depart on their terror marches across the face of Europe and beyond, spreading chaos and destruction wherever they tread.

But no, they aren’t the demonic hordes we can clearly all see them as.  No, we are wrong.  We are told, again and again that they are the victim, as semi-destroyed cities clear up the devastation wrought by “‘ra peepil”, as wounded civilians of said cities lie in hospital recuperating from riots caused by “’ra peepil”, as the rest of the world cries outrage at the latest campaign of hate and violence by “’ra peepil”.  No.  Don’t you get it?  It’s “‘Ra Peepil” who are innocent.  It’s “heavy handed policing” that’s at fault here, it’s all blown out of proportion.  You’re so paranoid, timmy.

Big Jock Knew?  The Famine Song?  Och, that’s just BANTER.

Who tells us this?

The media.

Read back a few paragraphs.

Fascism (noun) – Dictatorial movement – Any movement, ideology or attitude that favours dictatorial government, centralised control of private enterprise, repression of all opposition and extreme nationalism.

The newspapers, the hallowed Fourth Estate, essentially, ideally exists as a deterrent for errant governments to get away with whatever they want.   They should exist as a private enterprise, disseminating the truth to the people of its country of publication.  That’s what the press should be ideally.  However in any fascist state the media is invariably commandeered by the fascist forces in order to spread its propaganda, lies and party policies.  In our country it’s no different.  The problem is that it’s been so prevalent yet so sly in its insidious nature in Scotland, nay, in Glasgow in particular, that most normal people do not notice it.  We’re fed daily stories that undermine Celtic and the Catholic religions place in society.  We are consistently bombarded with subtle yet powerful suggestions that we are somehow less than everyone else, that we don’t deserve to be treated as equals.  So much so, so saturated is the Scottish culture with this indoctrinated mindset that we do not even notice it and for the most part blindly and without argument accept our place in it.  Propaganda is an underhanded way of conducting psychological warfare on a race or people that one wishes to rule over and destroy.  It’s a way of spreading the party line, of disseminating half-truths and downright lies.  There is no greater example of this in modern day society than the Scottish press.  I don’t have to list the instances of the party line being sown this year, I don’t even have to list the instances of it happening this month.  They are far too numerous to list in one article and far better writers than me have corralled the information and statistics of this systematic spreading of the fascist doctrines in Scottish culture and released entire books on the subject.  Any dissenting voices that attempt to cry out are silenced by its chief instigators, Jabba Traynor being chief amongst chiefs in our case.

Then we come to our last part of the meaning of the word Fascism.

Fascism (noun) – Dictatorial movement – Any movement, ideology or attitude that favours dictatorial government, centralised control of private enterprise, repression of all opposition and extreme nationalism.

In Football, we are governed by many confused and overlapping bodies.  The SPL, the SFL and the biggest and most biased of all of these, the SFA.

This week saw an unprecedented public display of fascism.  We all know the story of the “Shame Game”, the subsequent hounding of Neil Lennon, the attempted 12 game banning of Neil, which only by their own incompetence was reduced to five games, and is subsequently being reported as a ONE GAME BAN by certain sections of the press.  This week the SFA declined to admonish the key players in the “Shame Game.”  Not only did they not punish the offenders, they practically patted them on the head and apologised for the inconvenience.  After desperately trying to tarnish the Celtic image only to have Celtic stand up for themselves, the SFA have now given up any underhand attempts at footballing fascism and have overtly shown their hand.  This week they made a very clear statement, this week they have shown, publically, that they are well and truly biased, bigoted and above all fascist.  They have allowed Rangers players and one assistant coach (and manager in waiting) to do whatever they please, to behave in any way they feel like without any fear of reprisal.  This week they have made the statement clear to Rangers.

“Go ahead.  Do whatever you like, kick, punch, spit, attack dugout personnel, referees and whomever else you feel like.  You have our blessing.”

Media wise this will be played out as “common sense by the SFA” and they will somehow manage to turn this whole debacle against Celtic.  Mark my words – this will end up being “Celtic go to war with SFA...again.”  We’ll be told how tiresome this is all becoming, how we should shut up and get back to football.

At the beginning of this article I said that I was “generally speaking a pacifist.”  That statement holds true until a number of things encroach on basic personal freedoms and the welfare of the people and things that I hold dear.  Celtic and the Celtic support are things that truly encapsulate my values and ideals of what this world and the people who populate it should be like.  Right now my values, my friends, my brothers are being attacked.  They are being told, “Don’t F#ck with us” by a fascist dictatorship of a country, of an establishment.

I say to them “Don’t F#ck with us”.

People, to all the Celtic family reading this, it’s time to put an end to this.  We can do OUR part to attack the fascist forces at the heart of Scottish society.  Don’t buy the papers, don’t listen to the radio phone ins.  Don’t go to the Scottish Cup games, not because we don’t love our football team, clearly we do, but this has to end.  These people have to be put out of power.  What we are bearing witness to this week is an affront to decency. It’s an affront to all those who actually fought against fascism in 1939-45.  For the “Quintessentially British Club” to so flagrantly flaunt nationalism to the extreme that it does yet fail to see how that flies in the face of the sacrifices made by millions so that they could even hold their own opinion in the first place is sickening and shocking.

I say no more.  Fascism was defeated before and it can be defeated again.  We can only do so much, the rest is up to Celtic.

It’s time to stick the boot in, Celtic.  It’s time to cut the many heads off this hydra and free ourselves from its slimy grasp.  The Black Iron Prison of fascism must have its walls torn down from the inside out and completely.  We can’t be content to remove one man from his position at the SFA, the whole lot must go to the (metaphorical) gallows.  The whole system has to be consigned to the scrap heap and Celtic must lead the charge against it.  The systematic repression of our people cannot go unopposed any longer.

At this time in history we need heroes, not only on the park, but off it.  It’s time for Celtic to stand up and we must amass behind it.  We must offer Celtic the support it needs and be unflinching in whatever challenges our enemies throw at us.  The road will be hard and long and fraught with danger, but we must prevail.

I reiterate my headline.

Celtic...

please...

It’s time to stick the boot in.