Derek Ferguson's comments at a Show Racism the Red Card event today

[Victorian]

regardless of how many took part or how many bananas were seen to be thrown, the same 'type' of racist abuse occurred at both tynecastle and celtic park. both were equally as despicable.

 

for whatever reason - actually it's probably a couple of reasons - the incident at tynecatle is the one which has entered the public long term memory. certain factors saw to that.

 

therapist hit on a point earlier in the thread about 'the context of the times'. while it might not be the most palatable thing to consider that instances of racist activity should be regarded differently through the course of time, i actually think there's some merit to this. those were less enlightened times and the concept of black footballers was quite new to scottish football. sadly it brought out the worst of human behaviour in some people.

 

again just as sadly there will unfortunately be people out there willing to believe that hearts fans were/are in some way more racist than most others as a result of that match. it plainly nonsense. there are racist people everywhere, just as there was back then.

 

anyone who truly believes that hearts fans were more racist at that moment in time needs their head examined.

[leginten]

Butcher, and Woods were abused in a similarly offensive way. Or is calling someone an English ******* not racist?

 

It's funny - I didn't hear anyone call Walters an "English *******". Because the abuse he received was on the basis of his colour.

[Therapist]

anyone who truly believes that hearts fans were more racist at that moment in time needs their head examined.

 

Precisely.

 

The tim's reaction was covered up by the prhess and mhedia as it would have provoked the usual calls of anti-kafflik bias. Some things never change.....

[Buffalo Bill]

I once had a bicycle throw at me when playing football, and by my own brother no less.

 

 

That was insult to me a billion Chinese.

 

 

 

 

.

[Howdy Doody Jambo]

This seems to be a case of Weejieism where they stick up for one another to make them feel better about there religous fanatical beliefs and justify there bigotry warfare on Scottish football . Fergie has got to walk the streets of Glasgow and is not going to slate the other half of the city as having a racist element .

Mind you Hearts frans were very naughty that day ,our club was not and still is not whiter than white , Fyfes must have sold loads of bananas

It's a society thing , there wasn't such a politically correct code of conduct back then .

[Therapist]

It's funny - I didn't hear anyone call Walters an "English *******". Because the abuse he received was on the basis of his colour.

 

Race? Colour? Surely one's as bad as the other?

[Therapist]

I once had a bicycle throw at me when playing football, and by my own brother no less.

 

 

That was insult to me a billion Chinese.

 

 

 

 

.

 

Disgusting bicyclist action IMO.

[The White Cockade]

Oh dear.

 

1. There was a device known as television in these days, so loads of people had seen him play.

 

2. He was part of the English influx that so many TA-types despised. They had no problem calling him an English ******* so calling him a ***** ******* didn't present much of a hurdle.

 

You really are scraping the barrel on this one

The majority of the banana throwers and monkey chanters were also the same squad who sang the sash, born under a Union Jack etc

How you can claim this is the act of TA types is quite frankly pathetic

i'm sure you or some of your chums must have at some point chanted racist or sectarian abuse

are you TA types then?

and are you seriously suggesting that the reason that he was subject to vile racist abuse was because some people had

watched him on tv playing in England?

That is laughable and it has to be said you appear to be an apologist for these people

[maroonshrew]

Perhaps the OP can reveal if Ferguson made any mention of the Rangers fans who racially abused him OR maybe he was able to convince Walters that the Rangers fans were not really meaning the abuse that was chanted , instead of just bad mouthing Hearts fans.

Its not about Hearts being bad mouthed, its about a man suffering vile racist abuse.

 

this is why Scottish football will never be fixed.

[Craigieboy]

Were the bananas ripe or a bit greeny-yellow?

 

.

[dode]

Oh dear.

 

1. There was a device known as television in these days, so loads of people had seen him play.

 

2. He was part of the English influx that so many TA-types despised. They had no problem calling him an English ******* so calling him a ***** ******* didn't present much of a hurdle.

Ah now I'm with you, we watched this kid from Birmingham on Match of the Day and thought "what a tosser, dives and cheats.....hope he comes to Scotland so we can abuse him" lets take some bannanas to throw at him just in case he upsets us.

 

Many TA types???.....why didn't we throw yorkshire puddings or jellied eels.

 

sorry but this was premeditated by a load of people who should have know better.

 

I do happen to agree with your comment re walters being a cheating sh*t but it didn't make me want to chuck anything at him

[Victorian]

Precisely.

 

The tim's reaction was covered up by the prhess and mhedia as it would have provoked the usual calls of anti-kafflik bias. Some things never change.....

yep. it serves as a reminded to us that - just as today - back then there was plenty appetite in the popular media to sweep the behaviour of the harder targets under the carpet.

 

we can't excuse the behaviour of the hearts fans during that time. we can however keep our eyes wide open to the fact that there would have been lots of similarly minded fans - and other people in the wider society - that held the same twisted views.

 

some hearts fans simply displayed their own racist views while others kept theirs under wraps.

[Therapist]

You really are scraping the barrel on this one

The majority of the banana throwers and monkey chanters were also the same squad who sang the sash, born under a Union Jack etc

How you can claim this is the act of TA types is quite frankly pathetic

i'm sure you or some of your chums must have at some point chanted racist or sectarian abuse

are you TA types then?

 

Look, it was wrong although maybe not in the context of the times.

 

This thread is absolutely pathetic and reminds me of Americans apologising to the "native Americans" for things that happened hundreds of years ago.

 

It happened. Move on.

[cosanostra]

When the only defence you have is pointing the finger at other people and saying "they did it too", you don't really have any defence.

 

100% embarrassment and no amount of finger pointing will ever change that.

[Jamhammer]

I was at the game and was disgusted. It wasn't acceptable then and the morons who did it did not do it because Walters was a cheat or English. They bought bananas to take to a football game to throw at a player they had never seen at Tynecastle before. It was despicable, inexcusable and cannot be defended on any level. Times have changed, yes but this episode shouldn't be forgotten. I seem to remember the club handled it very well. Unlike some other clubs who appear, even today to sanction sectarianism.

[The White Cockade]

Look, it was wrong although maybe not in the context of the times.

 

This thread is absolutely pathetic and reminds me of Americans apologising to the "native Americans" for things that happened hundreds of years ago.

 

It happened. Move on.

 

Yes time to move on

[leginten]

Race? Colour? Surely one's as bad as the other?

 

You haven't explained why Hearts fans had brought bananas with which to abuse Walters on the basis of his Englishness. Was the banana the national symbol of England back then?

[Guest Bilel Mohsni]

I think educated people are more comfortable with our increasingly multi-racial society. No-one in their right mind would let a TV programme like "Love Thy Neighbour" (sorry if that's before your time) be made now, let alone sit and titter at it. But racism is out there. It's there at Tynecastle right now. If you haven't heard any racist abuse of Nade and Obua or heard Suso called a '****, you've been lucky.

 

I'm reminded of conversations I've had in the past with people in and from different countries. I once made the mistake of telling a Turkish guy I knew in Stuttgart how nice and accepting I found the Germans to be of people of different race. His reply was: "You're talking about a certain social class" - and I knew immediately he was right.

 

I know what you are saying about the Germany thing as i have seen both sides of it. One of my best friends is a German girl from Wolfsburg and she is pretty socialist and very concious of her country's history, she is my girlfriend's best mate too and my girlfriend is Scottish born to Indian parents. There is not a racist bone in my friend's body and she is really sensitive about that sort of thing because of where she is from, she is the first to pipe up when someone makes a racist comment and I think this has a lot to do with where she is from... Well that and the fact that she is inteligent!

 

I saw the other side of German folk though when I went on holiday with my girlfriend and this friend and her boyfriend, we were in Crete and went on an Island hop on a boat, the majority of the folk on the boat were german and then there was us, a black family and a few English couples. the german's on that boat were rude, obnoxious racist pr***s and they were just chucking the racist comments around, thinking that noone who would be offended could understand German... My mate translated some of the things that they were saying about the black family and i could see the looks that my girlfriend and I were getting for myself, so i did not need to use my limited german or get a translation, to work out what they thought about me and my Asian girlfriend!

 

The love thy neighbour and Death us do part programmes were typical of the sort of casual racism that was common at the time and most people who laughed at it would probably never have behaved in such a way in their local asian run shop but it was more acceptable to make fun of people who were different to you back then as the vast majority of Britain was white.

 

Society has changed and for the better imo.

 

The world has got smaller which means we see people from all over the world all the time. Back then we didn't and that was probably part of the problem. As was poor education.

 

Is "******" a racist slur anyway? If someone is from Pakistan that is surely what they are? I'm from Scotland and I'm a Scot. Thats not racist. I suppose it's the way its used.

 

The education thing is important in the way you mean it but there is another benefit to that also... People go to university and meet other kids their age who are different races and more often than not, see them for the quality of their character rather than judging them by the hue of their skin.

 

as for the P***i thing... I know folk who say that and are not racist and their reasoning for that is because they have always called asian people that and it is not meant as an insult, but rather as a shortened term like Scot etc. This is not the way that it is taken by a Scottish girl who was born here of Indian parents, when someone casualy slips the term into conversation at a time when she is happily laughing and joking away with everyone else but is suddenly left feeling everyone's embarrassed eyes on her during the akward silence or furious back-tracking from the guy that let the term slip.

 

Trust me, my girlfriend has a really thick skin about these things but that makes her feel really embarrassed and self-consiious when someone uses that term to refer to any Asian person who could be from any number of countries and not just Pakistan, I hate the term personaly but that is more to do with the way it was used and the way it was spat at folk, rather than what the word actually means in a literary sense.

[Tasavallan]

I must agree with Therapist on one point regarding the context of time. The Walters incident happened when there were few blacks living in Scotland let alone playing in the SPL and Hearts supporters of a certain minority did not know any better. I remember being ashamed of my fellow supporters that day, but maybe that was just me.

 

Racism v Sectarianism. I know which one is still swept under the carpet by the powers that be.

 

 

 

[Mr Sifter]

I was there that night, I was about 14 at the time and, if I recall, I threw a couple of bananas.

 

At that age, I also used to sign the sash, rejoice in playing my bootleg 'orange' cassettes, and was, without doubt a little bigoted racist.

 

In my defence tho, I was at that young 'impressionable' age. It was a case of 'do what the rest do' up the back of the shed. I had only just started going to Tynie with my pals (as opposed to with my dad) and probably thought I was a wee hard man.

 

As a matter if fact, I was just a wee tit.

 

I remember vividly realising one day not long after that, that what I was doing was wrong. Thankfully I grew up.

 

I'm not defending my behaviour, no way. I'm just telling it like it is.

 

I'm now 33, and consider myself to be a decent well rounded individual. The funny thing is tho, I know certain guys that now, 20 years later, still act exactly the same way.

 

Thank f?ck I grew up.

 

Cue the posters shouting me down now.......

[Guest Bilel Mohsni]

 

 

Cue the posters shouting me down now.......

 

Nah mate, I was an erse at that age, never threw 'nanas or anything like that but I sang songs and used terms that I would never use now... Being 14 does not excuse the things we did but in the context of the times, it does go some way to possibly explaining them.

 

i am embarrassed by the way I was as a kid and back then i would have probably called the modern day/adult me a "hand-wringer' or something and thought that I was really clever and controversial because of it... Thank god I do not think the way i did when i was 14! that would be embarrasing at 31 year old!

[IMA MAROON]

Butcher, and Woods were abused in a similarly offensive way. Or is calling someone an English ******* not racist?

 

That type of racism has been excused a thousand times and is now called rivalry.

 

As most people say, the banana thing happened everywhere in Britain. Folk done it for a laugh and without thinking. It was just a wind up.

[KennyMcP]

Don't know how bad it was a darkheid but what I do know is that it was despicable at Tynecastle that night,never have I felt so sorry for an opposing player,I was right in the thick of it in the jungle(pardon the pun),there were loads of impressionable kids their as well(why not have a go about that).

 

All this "it was worse with them" reeks of pesh,it happened in a huge way at Tynecastle enough for MW to comment on it and now DF.

 

What i can gather form all this is that you yourself were not anywhere near Tynecastle that night or you wouldn't be bringing the whole sad affair back up on a message board with young impressionable kids able to gain access to it.

 

 

eh?

[Le Chat]

This seems to be a case of Weejieism where they stick up for one another to make them feel better about there religous fanatical beliefs and justify there bigotry warfare on Scottish football . Fergie has got to walk the streets of Glasgow and is not going to slate the other half of the city as having a racist element .

Mind you Hearts frans were very naughty that day ,our club was not and still is not whiter than white , Fyfes must have sold loads of bananas

It's a society thing , there wasn't such a politically correct code of conduct back then .

 

My mate's sister used to work in Lumsden's Fruit & Veg shop in Gorgie Road and they were taking orders for bananas in the week leading up to the game demand was so high

 

Your first point is bang on by the way. Rangers and Celtic people who are in the public eye to any degree will never ever have a go at the other side. Far easier to have a go at Hearts, Hibs, Aberdeen etc. Fecking cowards the lot of them.

[kennyblack'sshot]

I was at the game and was disgusted. It wasn't acceptable then and the morons who did it did not do it because Walters was a cheat or English. They bought bananas to take to a football game to throw at a player they had never seen at Tynecastle before. It was despicable, inexcusable and cannot be defended on any level. Times have changed, yes but this episode shouldn't be forgotten. I seem to remember the club handled it very well. Unlike some other clubs who appear, even today to sanction sectarianism.

 

I was also at that game and, because of it, only rarely went back to Tynecastle for many years. John Colquhoun also became my favourite Hearts player of all time for standing up to the racists. And they were racists. Forget it was a different time and all that rubbish. Anyone who chooses to racially abuse someone is a racist. It doesn't matter what decade it is or the fact that fans of other clubs did it - a racist is a racist. Any Hearts fan who considers the Walters incident a) funny, harmless, c)understandable or d) all of the above is a racist. They may deny it but then most racists deny being racists.

[Guest Bilel Mohsni]

Butcher, and Woods were abused in a similarly offensive way. Or is calling someone an English ******* not racist?

 

 

You had a go at another poster for being stupid and not understanding the differences between bigotry and racism, when they referred to the french as being a bit racist in their actions towards Muslims and their head-scarves, I said that i knew what he meant, even if it was the wrong term.

 

Are you now saying that the English are a different race from the Scots? please exoplain as you have completely lost me in your logic here. :blink:

[Thundercats Are Go]

Butcher, and Woods were abused in a similarly offensive way. Or is calling someone an English ******* not racist?

 

Not on this board.

 

abusing the english is more seen as a passtime.

[Guest Bilel Mohsni]

Not on this board.

 

abusing the english is more seen as a passtime.

 

 

Again... Is there a race of Scots and a race of English now??? Nobody told me???

 

I want England to get beaten in every game they play, because they are the rivals of my national team scotland, i also have many English friends.

 

Am i now a racist because that would make it convenient?

[EC_Hearts]

Never mind Mark Walters was there no opportunity to skelp Steve Kirk in the coupon with a ball from close range and see how he liked it !!

[IMA MAROON]

Not on this board.

 

abusing the english is more seen as a passtime.

 

In years to come some of them will hold their hands up and admit their shameful behaviour was wrong. Others will carry on regardless, it is the way they were brought up.

[leginten]

 

Again... Is there a race of Scots and a race of English now??? Nobody told me???

 

I want England to get beaten in every game they play, because they are the rivals of my national team scotland, i also have many English friends.

 

Am i now a racist because that would make it convenient?

 

You will find that those on this thread who are "putting in context" the Walters incident are desperate to equate not wanting England to win football matches with calling people "English *******s". They've been trying to muddy the waters for years on this issue and are too thick to see that it hasn't worked.

[Dusk_Till_Dawn]

Look, it was wrong although maybe not in the context of the times.

 

Or to quote David Brent, it was in the days before racism was invented.

 

You're some fisherman by the way.

[magicTs]

Who organises 'Show Racism The Red Card' events such as this ? Seems a good idea on the face of it but Derek Ferguson, Stevie Kirk and Mickey Weir ? Holy feck. You have got to be having a laugh. Three of the dumbest players of their era and I can't imagine they have joined MENSA in the intervening years !

 

The Walters incident was a disgrace. Fortunately as is still the case to do this day now and again it was only a minority of erseholes who shamed Hearts.

[alwaysthereinspirit]

oh dear this is not one of your better attempts

the racist abuse was at his first ever game at Tynecastle

the fans had never seen him play before

do you reckon the banana chuckers raided the greengrocers before the game just in case he cheated and they could protest

by chucking bananas and making monkey noises?

is anyone brave enough to admit to being one of the racists? - there were plenty of them

 

 

I'm glad I'm not the only one that finds certain posters on here absolutely disgusting in the way they try to cover up their own spiteful, hateful agenda.

To write that Mark Walters used his skin color to make himself out to be a victim is f****** gross. Mark Walters was pelted by bannanas for no other reason than being black.

[bighusref]

"Yon bad man didnae gie ra sellick as much as a slaggin' as us so he didnae".

 

It amazes me the levels that people will go to get offended.

[heehaw]

I was at a Show Racism the Red Card event with pupils from my school this afternoon, and heard some comments from Derek Ferguson who was on the panel which really angered me.

 

Basically Ferguson began a story about how he had been friends with Mark Walters at Rangers and continued that he had witnessed racist abuse from a set of rival fans in the form of chants and bananas being thrown. He descibed how he appealed to the police for something to be done, all the while he did not mention which fans until he then said without warning that it was the Hearts fans. He said Hearts subsequently banned several fans.

 

I was unaware of this incident, so although shocked I was also angered that he chose not to mention that it had happened at Celtic Park, and that in fact Rangers banned several fans for perceived racist abuse directed at Walters.

 

Ferguson claimed that Walters suffered racist abuse at "every away ground", but only specifically mentioned one club - Hearts - to 90 impressionable 11-year-olds. The same club he was happy to sign for Hearts 2 years later and no doubt pocket a massive signing on fee. The same player who is by his own admission "Rangers through and through", a supporter of one of Britain's most vile football clubs.

 

Mickey Weir was also there, as was Stevie Kirk. But those are stories for another day!

i was there that day and i was for the first and only time embaressed to be a jambo,i have always had a dislike for all things rangers but that day i felt for walters,by the way i have also heard rasict chants against our players by our"fans"in the past ie fashanu he took pelters

[heehaw]

What a neanderthal Derek Ferguson is. What angers me is that he chooses to bring this incident up. It happened. It was 20 odd years ago. I don't condone it, but he is so thick that the irony of the incident was lost on him. At the time his beloved RFC "fans" had recently chanted "I'd rather be a (N-word) than a Tim". His beloved RFC was a bigoted vile institution and their fans indelibly linked with rampant sectarianism and sponsorship of terrorist murder. This was institutionalised bigotry. It poured from the stands of Ibrox and the streets of Scotland every week. In recent times, it was referred to as "Scotland's shame". RFC are, and have always been, a focal point for this behaviour.

 

He might as well have talked about anti-semitism in Germany during the war or that "love thy neighbour" was a top rated TV show in the '70's. They all happened, but way before any of the people he was addressing was born. The Mark Walters incident was regretable but in the context of modern anti-social behaviour it is completely irrelevant. The type of racism displayed at Tynecastle that day, I expect never to witness again in these parts. Sadly the same cannot be said of Scotland's Shame. Show Derek Ferguson the red card.

"completely irrelevant"????? are you for real

[Thundercats Are Go]

I was also at that game and, because of it, only rarely went back to Tynecastle for many years. John Colquhoun also became my favourite Hearts player of all time for standing up to the racists. And they were racists. Forget it was a different time and all that rubbish. Anyone who chooses to racially abuse someone is a racist. It doesn't matter what decade it is or the fact that fans of other clubs did it - a racist is a racist. Any Hearts fan who considers the Walters incident a) funny, harmless, c)understandable or d) all of the above is a racist. They may deny it but then most racists deny being racists.

 

Are you getting paid by the use of the word racist?

 

why did you not go back? are you Mark Walters?

[Dusk_Till_Dawn]

Are you getting paid by the use of the word racist?

 

why did you not go back? are you Mark Walters?

 

 

No he's Kenny Black

[Thundercats Are Go]

Again... Is there a race of Scots and a race of English now??? Nobody told me???

 

I want England to get beaten in every game they play, because they are the rivals of my national team scotland, i also have many English friends.

 

Am i now a racist because that would make it convenient?

 

there is a difference between rivalry and the bile that can be posted on here without fear of being shouted down as its all just banter isnt it? the loveable TA are just as vile as the rangers and celtic fans being discussed here.

 

and why again? when did you ask me the question initially?

[Therapist]

Are you now saying that the English are a different race from the Scots? please exoplain as you have completely lost me in your logic here. :blink:

 

I suggest you get off your high horse and do a bit of research. Check in the direction of a case brought by the CRE.

[Thundercats Are Go]

No he's Kenny Black

 

Not black Kenny?

[Thundercats Are Go]

I suggest you get off your high horse and do a bit of research. Check in the direction of a case brought by the CRE.

 

was a fan not charged in connection with calling john hartson a welsh *******? and it wasnt the ******* bit that caused the bother.

[Therapist]

was a fan not charged in connection with calling john hartson a welsh *******? and it wasnt the ******* bit that caused the bother.

 

He was indeed. Convicted too.

 

But the other one is much more interesting as it's a "non-celebrity" case.

[Thundercats Are Go]

He was indeed. Convicted too.

 

But the other one is much more interesting as it's a "non-celebrity" case.

 

Ill have a look for that.

[portobellojambo1]

So basically you heard the truth and it hurt?

 

 

That seems to be it. It was something which those who participated in should be ashamed of, as they not only shamed themselves but HMFC that day.

 

As for Derek Ferguson, couldn't give a flying **** which team he grew up supporting, still one of the best footballers I've ever seen in Maroon and White, way ahead of all around him in the team at that time, in fact was held back by the huge lack of comparable quality around him.

[Guest Bilel Mohsni]

I suggest you get off your high horse and do a bit of research. Check in the direction of a case brought by the CRE.

 

 

High horse love it.

 

I ask you again are 'English' and 'Scottish' different racial classifications? I would suggest xenephobia and not racism... Much like anti muslim sentiments are not racist but bigoted.

 

Don't know why you are getting so offended though... Surely if someone has as strong unwavering opinions as you clearly do, then someone pointing out hypocrisy in them is a good thing as it will stop you from making the same contradictions again in the future and blowing apart any points that you are passionately trying to make? I thought I was doing you a favour, i remember how much ridicule you handed out to someone making a similar mistake.

[siegementality]

First, let me say I do not condone racist abuse. Having said that, I should point out;

 

1. Walters was one of the most despicable cheats I've ever had the misfortune to witness. He dived all over the shop and often used his colour to make out he was somehow a victim.

 

2. At the time the incident happened, calling someone a ***** ******* was not uncommon. One has to view the incident in the context of the times.

 

3. Get a grip and get off the easily offended bus. It was ages ago, so who really cares?

 

4. Walters also got hit by a bag of chips that day.

 

Well done, you've reached a whole new low. You'll soon be eye level with your snake mate Pressley if you slither any lower.

[Therapist]

are 'English' and 'Scottish' different racial classifications?

 

Yes.

 

So in the eyes of the law, if you've ever shouted or made an anti-English comment - and by your reaction I'm pretty sure you have - you are a racist.

[Guest Bilel Mohsni]

there is a difference between rivalry and the bile that can be posted on here without fear of being shouted down as its all just banter isnt it? the loveable TA are just as vile as the rangers and celtic fans being discussed here.

 

and why again? when did you ask me the question initially?

 

 

There certainly is a difference, you only need to ask the staff at any A and E in Scotland to realise that... Check out the incidents after an Old Firm game and then compare that with after a Scotland game.

 

Dunno about the anti-English 'bile' though, as I never participate in that sort of thing myself.

 

Sorry, you are correct, i never asked you anything twice... I asked the question twice but only once did I ask it of you... It is amazing how these little mistakes in diction and prose can lead to confusion, won't happen again old chap.