Poppy Thread.

So you hope Celtic F.C,are using the deaths of Ex-Players to have a dig at the GB.

Shame on you.

 

For * sake people are so ignorant - the Green Brigade aren't against the Poppy remembering the death of soldiers, its the fact that it is used to support current illegal wars as well as being forced upon our strips. The Green Brigade are just as happy to remember the deaths of the fallen war heroes, but not by using the Red poppy.

 

pathetic

 

I have said all this since last year,no matter how many times you tell some people here,they will still choose to ignore facts,and twist someones view to suit themselves.

 

yup mate but they bhoys atre scum though according to some

 

Sad but true Bob. I'm sure if they had an issue about WW2, they would have vented their feelings on it.

 

Anyway we'll see what the "minority" think about the red poppy and the British Army tonight

 

Are they wearing it tonight or just on Sunday?

Noticed the English teams had it on last night.

 

just sunday i think?

 

2 english teams wore it on saturday. One of whom was playing last night :icon_mrgreen:

 

In the occupied 6 counties nobody can be forced to wear the poppy as it is a "emblem". All sides understand that this is a sensitive subject, maybe the SFA/Media should take note

 

but they wont mate!typical

 

I thought this article by Graham Spiers in today's Times was worth posting on here. I really like Graham Spiers and think he is far and away the most balanced and moderate Scottish football journalist and this article, for me, shows that. Interesting read and although I don't agree with all of it, it seems a valuable and responsible contribution to this debate. It's posted below:


"This is the annual week of Remembrance, which means trouble for Celtic FC. Down in Glasgow’s east end they already have the dogs and the torches out, tracking down those miscreants who held up their anti-Poppy banner. Banishment, we are told, awaits the dissenters.

It is the same every year with Celtic. The club’s following is distinctly heterogeneous — predominantly Catholic, but with a large Protestant constituency, plus burgeoning numbers of Asian and ethnic minorities — and this is primarily a source of pride at Celtic Park. But where you find such variety, the danger is you get every shade of opinion, and, in the case of last Saturday, a protest against the appearance of the Poppy on the club’s shirt.

Every club in the Clydesdale Bank Premier League, to the best of my knowledge, wears the Poppy during Remembrance week. It is a recent fad, and one welcomed by most, but at Celtic it is a thorny scenario.

Celtic’s main political “baggage” is rooted in the club’s Irish-Catholic tradition, and this particular wing, rightly or wrongly, is the trigger for the annual anti-Poppy protest. “Ireland, Iraq, Afghanistan: no bloodstained Poppy on our Hoops” a banner proclaimed at Celtic Park last weekend. This coming Sunday, officially Remembrance Sunday, there might be more of the same when Celtic play St Mirren in Paisley.

Are Celtic morally right to assert that they will track down the protesters and ban them from their stadium? The Poppy debate is one that is going on all across British society right now, with various private and public figures arguing why they do or do not wear the symbolic flower. To the best of my knowledge no one has yet declared that being against the Poppy is a case for a swingeing punishment.

It is a confusing debate for Celtic, and Peter Lawwell, the club’s chief executive, and John Reid, the chairman, must know it. This is a club that is excessively proud of its Irish roots, and these roots, as history attests, are steeped in struggle. Can Celtic openly encourage their Irish heritage while at the same time outlawing some of the attitudes that flow from it? If so, it makes for a weird type of tradition.

There is a corps of Celtic supporters — a small minority, most would say — who are against the Poppy, some for valid reasons, others for mere posturing effect. The latter group — those who posture — are always easily spotted, be they Rangers supporters or Celtic supporters, haplessly and ignorantly espousing a cause. They are usually still teenagers and tend to over-excitement. But those others who feel real, deep-rooted convictions over certain political principles shouldn’t necessarily be disdained. The fact is that Celtic, unlike Rangers, are never going to openly welcome the British Army to Celtic Park, for obvious reasons. Too many of the club’s supporters, if not openly vehement about it, would feel unease, as probably would both Lawwell and Reid in this context.

The history of Celtic, with their links to Ireland’s struggle, makes this a brute fact. No one today needs to tip-toe around this subject, or decree it to be a taboo, as it was 30 years ago. We’ve moved on from that.

In football the question is not one of protest, so much as of tone and decency. If people want to protest — without being racist or bigoted or excessively sectarian — then is it really a problem? These days at Ibrox and Celtic Park there are far greater vocal crimes being committed than being against the Poppy, yet these attract not half the amount of condemnation and hot air that we have heard in recent days. It has been quite strange.

Like it or not, politics plays a part in the lives of many football clubs. Try taking it away from Barcelona, or Real Madrid, or Benfica, or Napoli, or Austria Vienna, let alone the Old Firm, and see where you get. The same rule of decency applies: “dirty” politics or sheer prejudice on the part of supporters is to be deplored. But certain values, and their protesters, do not deserve to be lynched.

Jon Snow, the Channel 4 news anchor, is right. The phrase is not one that sits comfortably, but there is a certain “Poppy-fascism” at work. For some reason, in recent years, some who wear the Poppy have not just been happy and content to do so, but also turn hot-blooded and faintly venomous towards those who choose not to.

The irony of it is inescapable. People fought and died, among other things, to avert the tyranny of ideas. And yet, here we have groups of Poppy-wearing diehards who will not tolerate any other opinion.

Amid the Old Firm saga this debate is becoming quite transparent for what it is. While Celtic are uneasy about Remembrance, due to some of their followers’ views about the British Army, Rangers can sometimes hardly await their next opportunity to have military personnel parading on the pitch at Ibrox in full regalia, to the throaty adulation of the stands.

It doesn’t take much calculation to know what is going on here. This is old-style tribalism at work. This is cultural *-for-tat being played out on the pantomime stage stretching from Celtic Park to Ibrox.

Celtic are in a mess over their hunt for their Poppy dissenters. The club’s stance is essentially at odds with every other egalitarian value which is allegedly held dear at Celtic Park. It makes for an odd hotchpotch of values."

 

Hope the PLC, and a lot of the deluded bunch on here were listening to the "minority" tonight

We made our feelings well known tonight, loud and proud. A credit to the club.

 

Yeah singing IRA all the way, FTQ and the UDA was a real credit

 

Aye, it's given me a bit of a sore throat right enough. Hopefully it'll be fine in the morning.

* bless the "minority"

 

Well done, hope your really proud.

 

Extremely.

 

Youre a bleedin disgrace to our club.

 

That'll just be like the rest of the "minority" aye ?

Disgraces like me will be there on Sunday as well, I expect a repeat performance.