Gies A Minute?

The Queen Mum
Holly and Jessica
9/11
Princess Di
Princess Margeret

Yip it's minutes silences...it appears in these days of ours the nation cannot gain "full closure" until it had seen montages of fans around the country with their heads bowed in "silence".

Time was when bein a fitba fan was simply a case of meeting yer mates in the pub, getting drunk, goin to the game bein a bitty rowdy, singing a few libellous songs and maybees a wee post match pagger wi yer opponents, then retiring to the same pub gettin even mair drunk, home wi a mock chop supper, Sportscene, shag/fumble wi the "wife" and black oot...

These days fitba fans cannae get drunk, face arrest even if they contemplate bein rowdy and God forbid they get up and actually start to sing! Yep the heaving masses have well and truly been tamed perhaps best personified by the fact we now collectively hold the honourary title of "Official Mourner (Nation Events -Working Class)".

In that light "Scotsport SPL" looks less like a sh*te highlights show and more a punishment from the Football Gods.

Now dinna get me wrong I'm nae against minutes silences per se...nah I just occasionally wonder why the hell we're having them.

I mean the Queen Mum...nae exactly a reknowned fitba fan was she? In fact I dare say she found Fitba and Fitba Fans frightfully "common", indeed she probably only knew they existed cos her old man had to hand out a few cups from time to time. Now trot out all the "Queen Mum was great" stuff all ye want and it may well be true but lets be honest here.....she had f*ck all interest in fitba.

But guess who took their usual place heads bowed? Cue fans montage from Old Trafford to Exeter and beyond and BBC voiceover "and around the Nation football fans showed their respect"...

BOLLOCKS! That ain't fans showing their respect. They're just doin the "duty" and whats excepted of them - for most it's spent scratching their balls, staring at the watch hoping that will make it pass quicker etc...it has nothing whatsoever to do with showing respect. I can honestly say while I've observed these many silences not once have I been in deep contemplation or mourning for any of the people I was meant to be so somberly remembering.

Minutes silences are as credible as the 'spontaneous' parades Tin Pot Dictators get their people to do to express their "love and respect" for the aforementioned Tin Pot Impressario though admittedly they haven't brought in armed guards and vigilantes to ensure we 'mourn' sufficiently over here yet...though no doubt this heinous oversight will be dealt with in the next Criminal Justice Bill.

Indeed so programmed are we these days that during the mourning for September 11th we ended up observing the minutes silences from TV games...until that is one of us refused to do it any more with the line "F*ck it!! No more!!! That's 6 minutes I've given the c*nts!!!" Perhaps not expressed in the most appropriate or indeed sensitive of ways (he was fae Turra) but he did have a point of sorts.

Of course this has been dragged up once again by the death of the Pope and specifically the non-minutes silence at Fir Park on Sunday. Well at the risk of being accused of heresy here I'm gonna come dangerously close to backing the huns on this one: why have a minute silence for him?

Ok, so he was apparently a pretty decent 'keeper back in his day I'll grant ye and he once met 'Jack Charltons Republic of Ireland' (I beleive that was Irelands official name at the time) squad in Italia '90...but apart fae that what's his link to fitba let alone to 2 insignificant tinpot SPL sides?

I mean being credited wi helpin bring doon communism - aye thats a big een but it's hardly fitba related now is it? I mean if it was we'd be having one for Gorbachov as well...well aside from the small matter of him not actually being dead yet...but the point stands.

There is no need for a minutes silence for the Pope, there are umpteen ways those genuinely affected most of them organised by a body calling itself the Catholic Church (apparently when the Pope wisnae bein a Celtic fan he ran a major world wide religon) who are organising services of rememberance and providing guidance and comfort for those who feel the Pope loss.

Now call me an unreconstructed 20th century type geezer here but thats precisely how grief should be handled: privately and respectfully, not wi Diana-esque wailing and empty gestures.

The official mourning by the Catholic Church will be a infinitely lot more genuine and heartfelt than the pointless gesture of gettin a few thousand fans being quiet for a bit in a rather cold fitba stadium in Caledonia....still we've got to get those "respectful" images for the TV montage mind...and lets be honest here wi millions upon descending on Rome for the funeral I very much doubt any noticed let alone took offence.

Well I've rambled for a bit basically to say that "minutes silences at fitba games should be for Fitba Folk" but even there I'd bin them.

For the simple fact they are far to easy to "break" - phones/pished up latecomers/blokes shouting to each other at the pie stall/folk booing guy at pie stall being the main cause of "broken" minutes silence rather than any malicous forethought or intent to show disrespect which then provokes national outrage..I could go into a patented Dandies style rant about the double standards of the West Coast Press here but want to avoid the old "Youseareworsererthanusbyraway" cul de sac.

But my main complaint about them being used as the main way to commemorate footballing great as for me they are entirely inappropriate.

Sadly one day mortality will do to the Gothenburg Side what Real Madrid couldnae and beat them. Now for me it would be more fitting to send them off in the Italian way of making a minute's "noise" and so when the fatefully day comes that God goes back up to Olympus and kicks oot thon usurper that we should commemorate him by belting out for one last time "THERES ONLY ONE WILLIE MILLER!!!"

That would be in my opinion a far more fitting send off for the Greatest Ever Red than a silence broken by seagulls screechin and feckin moby phone ring tones...

Minutes Silences - Together Let's Get Rid Of Them.



The Red Avenger