fans and class/where do you draw the line?

[reggie35]

The mob attack of C's fans at the Staples Center last night are clearly despicable and over the line. I also went to a Sox game in Oakland a few years back where a 10 year old boy with a Nomar jersey was pelted with popcorn and water bottles after he got too excited over a Sox run. This, too, is clearly over the line.

My questions is where do you draw the line? Obviously if you're getting into fist fights over a game as a fan you've got issues but what about chanting "No means no!" or calling Kobe a rapist? Is that classless? What about making fun of Jason Kidd for beating his wife? throwing snowballs onto the field or chanting BS after a bad call?

[Roy Hobbs]

Interesting question.

I would say, in terms of a black-line rule, that the following are always inappropriate:

1) Anything physical.  Whether it be throwing, pushing, punching, or whatever, there's no reason to escalate things towards physical violence.

2) Profanity.  There are kids around; try to act like something other than a drunken buffoon.

3) Anything racist.  Totally unacceptable.

4) Directly harassing fans of other teams.  This bothers me.  If a Lakers fan wants to go watch the team in Boston, let him do so.  There's no reason to get in his face or jeer him, so long as he's respectful.  If he's *not* respectful, find an usher.

The other stuff is trickier.  I think the fans want to get into the heads of opposing players, and that's why you're going to see chants about steroids, domestic abuse allegations, criminal charges, etc.  Those maybe aren't the most tasteful things to chant about, but they serve as a distraction to the opponent.  I wouldn't participate in a "rapist" chant if I was at the Garden, because of concerns about children and the questions that raises, but I can at least see why fans do it.

[kw10]

I have to say I myself is a pretty hot-headed 18 year old, just ask my friends. But what happened in Staples center (both fights-I think they were separate incidents?) was absolutely disgusting and unacceptable. At times I do find myself wanting to 'start' something, but I always restraint myself, I just go blow steam off somewhere else. Noone IMO should ever start doing anything physical to other fans, no matter what, especially when you are the majority. As well as racism, they are unacceptable at all. But I think Roy made some good points about what is too far.
With that said, I do find myself participating in some un-classy chants at times, but I dare say they weren't at out-right inappropriate times (I mean no eight year olds around etc) and they weren't 'rapist' or those sorts but rather just chanting someone's name and saying they 'su*k'-I would consider these borderline.

[Frontierboy]

I went to the Rocket's -Celtics game when we ended their 22 game win streak .  I wore my Garnett jersey and people were yelling " Celtics suck" and the 4 letter F word before and during the game..... when we blew them out, everyone around me seem so quiet.... when everyone was leaving the arena, people were telling me how great the Celtics played...... guess winning quiets the other team ( except if your a classless fan/player/organization)

[nickagneta]

I think Roy put forth some excellent starting points to begin the conversation so TP4U Roy for saving me the time to write pretty much the same thing.

Unfortunately unaddressed is what to do when something of this kind occurs to you through no fault of your own. Do you retaliate a push with a shove? Do you voice your opinion to the people concerning their issues because you are with a child or wife or girlfriend? Do you sit there and take someone's racial harassment or do you counter? Is running to security and getting an unexceptable resolution really helping you?

These, I think, are all very tough questions to answer and toward that end I do applaude the Kraft family for their very harsh stance of instant ejection and loss of season ticket forever if you are part of any of this. Even to the point of someone else losing their ticket because they sold it or lent the ticket to someone who acted inappropriately. It has only taken a very small amount of people complaining about unfairly losing their seasons tickets for the whole place to become a more well behaved environment.

Or at least better than it was at the old Foxboro/Sullivan/Schaefer Stadium where public drunkeness and fistfights were the norm not the exception.

But in the times I've been at the Garden, I don't get the feeling that the security people there or maybe the management people feel the same toward crowd behavior. I've complained more than once to security about profane language and racial slurs being used and have never gotten anything more than a quick "Knock it off guys" before the idiots went right back to doing the same thing.

After twice complaining a second time and not getting any results, I just don't do it anymore. Now I go over myself and tell the people to knock it off. Being 6'1" and 260lbs has it's advantages sometimes when talking loudly to loudmouth 180 lb teenagers and young men in their early 20's. But I have half expected and was ready for a fight. I guess you have to be.

But I didn't exactly set the best example in front of my young teenage boys. They thought it was cool but I thought it unfortunate that I had to go there.

So besides Roy guidelines that are probably written in fine print on the back of every ticket you buy, what is considered classy or the right thing to do or where is the line drawn when others do this stuff around you?

Self defense is obvious but after that, what?

Personally I stick to the regular chants, will generally point out to the refs how much more intelligent I am than they are, and basically scream myself hoarse. Anything else I just don't feel is necessary. And I continue to give the security one try to get things correct about handling people who act inappropriately. After that I voice my opinion.

I haven't had to go to the next step. Luckily, at Gillette the place is rather mellow than at the old park. Fenway is now more of a tourist attraction and you just don't see a lot of the stuff you saw in the 70's and 80's. The cultural diversity there has also tremendously helped that.

The Garden still has it's problems, but it's only once in a while that I'm around idiots.

I've sat next to the opposition's fans in all three Boston venues and have some of my best times talking ball to them about their teams and doing the one upsmanship kind of thing with them. I actually got a new customer that way and the guy is now one of my best and most loyal customers. He's on my personal X-mas card list. I like him, I don't care that he's a Jets fan.