Shillzz Posted September 10, 2012 Share Posted September 10, 2012 It shouldn't be part of football, and probably no longer is. But I saresay that Liverpool fans wouldnt have been the only group of supporters to act in such a way in the circumstances. But that doesn't make it right or that they are not to blame. I agree with your earlier comparison that telling Liverpool fans off (if they were to blame) is pointless and like telling a 2 year off for sticking a fork in a toaster. But at the end of the day, if the kid does that it's his fault. If Liverpool fans help cause the crush, it's part their fault. I'd agree with that. I think fault probably does lie with the Liverpool fans, but it was the responsibility of others to make sure that what happened, didn't. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kurtsimonw Posted September 10, 2012 Share Posted September 10, 2012 I'd agree with that. I think fault probably does lie with the Liverpool fans, but it was the responsibility of others to make sure that what happened, didn't. Agreed. That's about how I see it also. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bickster Posted September 10, 2012 Moderator Share Posted September 10, 2012 If there truly is anything against Liverpool, it's probably down to the absolute disgraceful attitude your club has completely summed up by the Suarez saga. Don't think you'll find anyone who doesn't have sympathy for those familes. But we're also not naive enough not to refuse to put any blame on Liverpool fans. The Suarez affair is utterly irrelevant to Hillsborough Why not wait and see what the report says on Wednesday before you apportion blame. The whole collective "Liverpool fans" isn't how this should be viewed in the first place, they were a crowd of individuals, there was no collective decision by said crowd. Collective decisions however were made by the FA, South Yorkshire Police, Sheffield Council etc. Blaming "Liverpool Fans" is a bit like blaming "Pearl Jam Fans" for the Roskilde Festival Tragedy in 2000. It's an utterly bonkers thing to do. You can't look at this as a partisan fan, us and them, crowds aren't like that Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kurtsimonw Posted September 10, 2012 Share Posted September 10, 2012 The Suarez affair is utterly irrelevant to Hillsborough Never said it was. This was in response to his "World against us" claims. Why not wait and see what the report says on Wednesday before you apportion blame. Have you not blamed the police previously? The whole collective "Liverpool fans" isn't how this should be viewed in the first place, they were a crowd of individuals, there was no collective decision by said crowd. Collective decisions however were made by the FA, South Yorkshire Police, Sheffield Council etc. Blaming "Liverpool Fans" is a bit like blaming "Pearl Jam Fans" for the Roskilde Festival Tragedy in 2000. It's an utterly bonkers thing to do. You can't look at this as a partisan fan, us and them, crowds aren't like that You're getting unnecessarily picky here, Bicks. I'm not going to get into a slagging match with you, but a previous post you blamed 'the police' when clearly not all of them made the decision to open the gates. Me saying that fans need to shoulder some of the blame is because that individuals within the crowd deserve to do exactly that, I don't know them by name or how else best to describe them. On the link you posted for the BBCi Hillsbrough peice they showed a diagram of what the reasonng behind the opening of the gate was (to releive tension from the outiside areas and to disprese the crowd a little). It also mentioned that the fans headed to the 'most obvious' entrance (suggesting there was more than 1) and there's no reason why they couldn't use other entrances. You can also see a few members of the crowd climbing over the turnstile walls on the video outside of the stadium to try and get in, which is why I don't believe they are completely blameness. I am not in any way saying the police are faultless in this and never have. The police are undoubtedly to blame for poor decision making that could've saved lives, but I do not believe for a second that fans did nothing wrong and that in no way did they cause this. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mjmooney Posted September 10, 2012 VT Supporter Share Posted September 10, 2012 If it was any other club there'd be an outpouring of sympathy from the whole country but because its Liverpool and peoples perception of them they don't stand a chance. Sorry, but this is nonsense, and sums up the very "victim mentality" that constantly emanates from many LFC fans. Whatever blame is attached to the police, there can be no doubt that bad behaviour by fans contributed massively to what happened. It could have been any club - I would have said exactly the same thing if they had been Villa fans (we have as many dickheads as anybody else). An "outpouring of sympathy" may be due to the bereaved families, but to paint the fans in that ground as little angels persecuted by the LFC-hating establishment is just absurd. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
blandy Posted September 10, 2012 Moderator Share Posted September 10, 2012 If it was any other club there'd be an outpouring of sympathy from the whole country but because its Liverpool and peoples perception of them they don't stand a chance. Sorry, but this is nonsense, and sums up the very "victim mentality" that constantly emanates from many LFC fans. Whatever blame is attached to the police, there can be no doubt that bad behaviour by fans contributed massively to what happened. It could have been any club - I would have said exactly the same thing if they had been Villa fans (we have as many dickheads as anybody else). An "outpouring of sympathy" may be due to the bereaved families, but to paint the fans in that ground as little angels persecuted by the LFC-hating establishment is just absurd. That's ignorant bollocks Mike. " there can be no doubt that bad behaviour by fans contributed massively to what happened" - Fan behaviour was not the cause or a massive factor. The whole issue is not about the cause, the cause is known. It was investigated and found to be primarily the Police actions together with the state of that end of the stadium, particularly the entrances to the terrace and the fences. The fans were not a massive factor in the cause. That's a fact. This time round, it's about letting people see the undisclosed documents and information that was essentially kept private/covered up* at the time (delete as applicable) - to let the whole picture see the light of day, not just an "official version". Don't blame the fans, they didn't cause it and they weren't a massive factor in causing it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheBear Posted September 10, 2012 Share Posted September 10, 2012 If it was any other club there'd be an outpouring of sympathy from the whole country but because its Liverpool and peoples perception of them they don't stand a chance. Sorry, but this is nonsense, and sums up the very "victim mentality" that constantly emanates from many LFC fans. Whatever blame is attached to the police, there can be no doubt that bad behaviour by fans contributed massively to what happened. It could have been any club - I would have said exactly the same thing if they had been Villa fans (we have as many dickheads as anybody else). An "outpouring of sympathy" may be due to the bereaved families, but to paint the fans in that ground as little angels persecuted by the LFC-hating establishment is just absurd. You missed my point completely mate. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bickster Posted September 10, 2012 Moderator Share Posted September 10, 2012 Why not wait and see what the report says on Wednesday before you apportion blame. Have you not blamed the police previously? You do know the Police were to blame? Fact. Its in the Taylor Report. Thats without the police cover up. It is telling that you don't appear to know this. You are meant to sit down at football matches as a consequence of this, its affects all of us. Yes it affects the 95 families but the consequences go much further. The Police were responsible for something, they also seemingly covered a lot of stuff up, they also seemingly lied. As a consequence of that, laws changed, laws that affect every football fan in the country Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kurtsimonw Posted September 10, 2012 Share Posted September 10, 2012 You do know the Police were to blame? Fact. Its in the Taylor Report. Thats without the police cover up. And the actions of the fans are to not? Even in that video you linked it shows a few fans climbing over the turnstile walls to get in. Again, as I previously said a number of times, I believe the police clearly deserve blame for this - but fans are not without blame.If you feel the fans at the game as a whole are completely innocent then that's up to you, I don't agree and I'm not going to argue. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bickster Posted September 10, 2012 Moderator Share Posted September 10, 2012 You're still falling into the trap of blaming actions of individuals and transposing them into the actions of a whole crowd. It's a nonsense A bloke climbs over a wall, that action does not kill 96 people. Opening the big **** off gate does that, that action is what kills 96 people, the Police opened the gate and it really is that simple. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kurtsimonw Posted September 10, 2012 Share Posted September 10, 2012 You're still falling into the trap of blaming actions of individuals and transposing them into the actions of a whole crowd. It's a nonsense A bloke climbs over a wall, that action does not kill 96 people. Opening the big **** off gate does that, that action is what kills 96 people, the Police opened the gate and it really is that simple. It's not just 'a bloke' climbing over a wall though is it? There's thousands of people causing a crush outside of the ground. A crowd trying to force their way into the stadium and causing a very dangerous situation is on them, police were refusing fans into overcrowded areas but due to the crush caused by the crowd those fans were unable to get out. They forced the police into a decision which in their minds would ease the trouble. But obviously they were wrong and that is the lead cause in the end, nobody is denying that. But to say the crowd are all innocent is completely wrong in my view. The police didn't open the gate for a laugh, they opened it because the situation outside was getting dangerous - a situation caused by the crowd. That's it for me on the matter. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
blandy Posted September 10, 2012 Moderator Share Posted September 10, 2012 The police didn't open the gate for a laugh, they opened it because the situation outside was getting dangerous - a situation caused by the crowd. More ill informed drivel - see page 2 of this thread The report also highlights that there were only 7 turnstiles made available to admit 10,100 Liverpool fans to the terraces. At the normal rate of 750 people per turnstile per hour, it would have taken two hours to admit all these fans into the stadium. It was inevitable that there would have been a crush outside of the ground with this lack of foresight. Contrast this to the other end where 60 turnstiles were made available to admit 29000 fans. plus Bicks earlier post, detailing the travel/traffic issues causing delays for many fans going to the game Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jimzk5 Posted September 10, 2012 Share Posted September 10, 2012 i cant see how blame can be put on anyone, to me hillsborough was a horrific accident caused by a chain of events that culminated in 96 people losing there lives. mistakes were made by police in crowd control but these officers were under pressure due to the above mentioned roadworks making fans late for the game, ticketless fans trying to get into the ground and lack of communication about how full the pens were. speaking to some of my family who attended games during the 80s at the height of hooliganism it was only a matter of time before something like this happened. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bickster Posted September 10, 2012 Moderator Share Posted September 10, 2012 The report also highlights that there were only 7 turnstiles made available to admit 10,100 Liverpool fans to the terraces. At the normal rate of 750 people per turnstile per hour, it would have taken two hours to admit all these fans into the stadium. It was inevitable that there would have been a crush outside of the ground with this lack of foresight. Contrast this to the other end where 60 turnstiles were made available to admit 29000 fans. plus Bicks earlier post, detailing the travel/traffic issues causing delays for many fans going to the game Yes exactly. For this the local council were culpable for licensing the ground. The FA were culpable (along with the Police) for not delaying the kick off, kick off used to get delayed for crowd congestion, delays on the motorway etc back then as they do now. But not in high profile matches that TV companies have paid good money to show... can't have the paymasters schedules being ruined because of fan safety, no siree that's a preposterous idea. The Police were culpable for opening the gate. And on the emboldened lack of foresight, it's even worse than that, no foresight was required, they could have used hindsight. the exact same thing nearly happened one year previously, in the exact same fixture, in the same venue with the same teams in the same ends. I know, I was there. The crushing outside was almost as bad then, the game should never have been played there the following year. The FA were again culpable here (no doubt following Police advice). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
joey55 Posted September 10, 2012 Share Posted September 10, 2012 The report also highlights that there were only 7 turnstiles made available to admit 10,100 Liverpool fans to the terraces. At the normal rate of 750 people per turnstile per hour, it would have taken two hours to admit all these fans into the stadium. It was inevitable that there would have been a crush outside of the ground with this lack of foresight. Contrast this to the other end where 60 turnstiles were made available to admit 29000 fans. plus Bicks earlier post, detailing the travel/traffic issues causing delays for many fans going to the game Yes exactly. For this the local council were culpable for licensing the ground. The FA were culpable (along with the Police) for not delaying the kick off, kick off used to get delayed for crowd congestion, delays on the motorway etc back then as they do now. But not in high profile matches that TV companies have paid good money to show... can't have the paymasters schedules being ruined because of fan safety, no siree that's a preposterous idea. The Police were culpable for opening the gate. And on the emboldened lack of foresight, it's even worse than that, no foresight was required, they could have used hindsight. the exact same thing nearly happened one year previously, in the exact same fixture, in the same venue with the same teams in the same ends. I know, I was there. The crushing outside was almost as bad then, the game should never have been played there the following year. The FA were again culpable here (no doubt following Police advice). To be honest I could see myself making a mistake like that. It did seem like a logical thing to do. You look back and think how stupid it was not to think of the jam it was cause in tunnel, but at the time I bet the focus was purely on sorting the turn-style back log. It's easy to look back and say they should have thought ahead, but people make errors of judgement like this on a daily basis. I think the only really bad thing was the police officers who lied about who opened the gate, but I bet a lot of people would have done similar when they came to understand that their actions had been the biggest contributing factor. I bet in the immediate after math no one was gently enquiring about the gate, rather asking "how the **** to that gate get open?" Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bickster Posted September 10, 2012 Moderator Share Posted September 10, 2012 Simple honest mistakes are still punishable in law. There's no crime that defence is "well it was an honest mistake", sure if believed it can be taken into account in sentencing but it doesn't absolve one of the crime. If it had been a Sheff Wed employee who made the decision, they could easily have been convicted of Corporate Manslaughter because it was the Police, that wasn't possible Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
joey55 Posted September 10, 2012 Share Posted September 10, 2012 Simple honest mistakes are still punishable in law. There's no crime that defence is "well it was an honest mistake", sure if believed it can be taken into account in sentencing but it doesn't absolve one of the crime. If it had been a Sheff Wed employee who made the decision, they could easily have been convicted of Corporate Manslaughter because it was the Police, that wasn't possible So it's understandable why the police the other side of the pen were so slow to react. On one side you have the police taking actions into their own hands and on the other side you have them choosing not to. I think more than anything this demonstrates that the tragedy was in part a result of a wider problem football had during that period. One would imagine that the police viewed the potential for trouble was far greater then than they do today, when it's more of a family game. On one side you have fears that if the fans don't get through the gates there will be trouble and on the other side there were fears about letting them on the pitch. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bickster Posted September 10, 2012 Moderator Share Posted September 10, 2012 Simple honest mistakes are still punishable in law. There's no crime that defence is "well it was an honest mistake", sure if believed it can be taken into account in sentencing but it doesn't absolve one of the crime. If it had been a Sheff Wed employee who made the decision, they could easily have been convicted of Corporate Manslaughter because it was the Police, that wasn't possible So it's understandable why the police the other side of the pen were so slow to react. On one side you have the police taking actions into their own hands and on the other side you have them choosing not to. I think more than anything this demonstrates that the tragedy was in part a result of a wider problem football had during that period. One would imagine that the police viewed the potential for trouble was far greater then than they do today, when it's more of a family game. On one side you have fears that if the fans don't get through the gates there will be trouble and on the other side there were fears about letting them on the pitch. Absolutely correct, it was a culture that developed where football fans were treated like cattle in the main. They were seen as a problem, no worse than that they were treated like criminals, their crime was liking football and they were being punished for the crimes of a minority of football fans. This tragedy did lead to improvements in the way things were handled but as ever there were also gross over reactions that were needless, ironically that was how the mess started in the first place. Banning standing at football matches being one such gross over reaction. What happened at Hillsborough couldn't have happened at many grounds in the country. Where else was there an end that backfilled into a stadium which was below ground level via a tunnel which made things even worse. The Leppings Lane end was a tragedy waiting to happen, its design was simply dreadful and bore no relation to most other grounds in the country. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AvfcTheObsession Posted September 10, 2012 Share Posted September 10, 2012 My take on this, having done a lot of reading on the subject and watched tonight's programme. Liverpool fans' passion to do whatever it takes to watch their team play (especially in the big games - FA Cup Semi Final, Champions League Final, etc.) did make them more likely to suffer a tragedy such as this one. The biggest factor, was clearly the gate being opened. However, a chain of events led to that happening, and part of that chain of events was the frenzy amongst the Liverpool fans caused by too many of them turning up, and finding any way possible to get in to the ground. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bickster Posted September 10, 2012 Moderator Share Posted September 10, 2012 My take on this, having done a lot of reading on the subject and watched tonight's programme. Liverpool fans' passion to do whatever it takes to watch their team play (especially in the big games - FA Cup Semi Final, Champions League Final, etc.) did make them more likely to suffer a tragedy such as this one. The biggest factor, was clearly the gate being opened. However, a chain of events led to that happening, and part of that chain of events was the frenzy amongst the Liverpool fans caused by too many of them turning up, and finding any way possible to get in to the ground. Read some more then. Read this topic, read this page even and you'll discover that's bollocks. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts