As an American, I’m baffled. I was told that in Milan, the red stripe guys are right wing and the blue stripe guys are left wing. And then there’s two teams in Scotland that seem to represent the Nationalists vs. Unionists conflict in Northern Ireland. Or something?
In America, sports are seen as an escape from all that. If you want a country redneck and a black guy from the city to get along, just say the word “football” and they’ll have something to talk about for the next three hours.
19 comments
It used to be more widespread, but yes, they are; you have to remember, that many sports teams in Europe grew out of class organisations; trade union football clubs or bourgeoisie sports associations, is the most common origin story. Basically, football clubs originated in either explicitly or implicit political organisations.
In the last years, it has become less political, but it is still visible in some areas. In Denmark the most famous such derby is in Copenhagen, between *Brøndby IF*—a club formed in the working class suburbs—and *FC København*, an inner-city upper class club, with origin as various sports associations in the affluent neighbourhoods. Until very recently, it was expected, that supporters of the latter were right wing, meaning either liberals or conservatives, while supporters of the former were left wing, meaning socialists and social democrats. It was class struggle on the pitch. Nowadays, with professional football, it is not the case any longer though, and the old class opposition between teams have been replaced by professional athletes making millions.
You also see it other places in Europe, in Rome and Vienna, for example, Lazio’s and FK Austria Wien’s supporters often bring far right imagery, such as Swastika flags and banners with SS symbols to matches. The latter team even made [this publication, telling their supporters what symbols they wanted them to stop bringing](https://i.ds.at/EtWzHA/rs:fill:750:0/plain/2013/11/29/1385195439364-geh.jpg). FK Austria Wien’s rival is SK Rapid Wien—also “my” team in Austria—a team with a deeply working class background, being formed as the _Erster Wiener Arbeiter-Fußball-Club_(First Viennese Workers’ Football Club.) In Italy, I’m a supporter of Torino FC, though most assume I’m a Livorno fan, as that would allign more closely with my politics. [This](https://external-preview.redd.it/PVjRyZY7P8REYl-758YVDOdbKSUTEh1B20fjNtG1d4U.png?auto=webp&s=6f0e3e97259b85b2c8ffee93c57128bceed55bed) is a picture of US Livorno supporters, here is [another](https://image.shutterstock.com/image-photo/livorno-italyjanuary-06-2005-soccer-600w-247517107.jpg), less staged.
Another rivalry of note, is the one between Real Madrid and FC Barcelona. Especially during the fascist years, Real Madrid was Franco’s representation on the stadium, while Barcelona was, and still is, an important symbol for the Catalan autonomous and independence movements, and anti-centralisation efforts.
In Scotland it’s definitely a thing for Celtic (catholic, Irish republicans) and Rangers (Protestant, loyalist, unionist) and Hibs and Hearts to a lesser extent. England’s not quite the same but there are possibly stereotypes or generalisations, for example Liverpool fans are left wing, Chelsea fans are known as being right wing, this generally comes from Chelsea’s hooligans in the 80s known as the Headhunters, had a very right wing following. Of course for all of these (including Scotland) it’s not the rule but just generally speaking.
Not really. There are only 2 cities here that have multiple teams on the two highest levels, Rotterdam and Eindhoven, so that makes it easier, most people just support their local club.
Oh boy, the dark side of the football culture in Europe with it’s hooliganism, fights, drunkedness, vandalism, its dirty or way too often sexist, racist and homophobic fan songs, how fans of different teams sometimes not out of tradition but out of safety sit in different places, how many games and seating areas of the tribunes are considered far from child friendly… it’s an entire rabbit hole.
From my perspective the opposite question is more interesting. Why is the US sports atmosphere so civil? What have you done right?
Eastern German footie teams especially in lower leagues, and more prominently Eastern European teams, have a reputation of having more hooligans among their fans than others, and hooligans are considered more likely associated with extreme right wing views besides their attraction to violence. That said many of these people aren’t footie fans passionate to the point of violence, they merely use footie as an excuse for a good brawl.
On the opposite end there’s second league footie team FC St. Pauli in Hamburg whose reputation of a left wing fanbase not only in the region but across and beyond Germany precedes it.
Officially upper league sports teams will distance themselves from political affiliations however, and can and will receive sanctions from the leagues if they show no such efforts.
I have never heard of this red/blue strip thing. However, even though I don’t know how things have been going recently, the red stripe team (I think you are talking about “Milan”: the name of the red stripe Milan football team) was owned for a long time by [Silvio Berlusconi](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silvio_Berlusconi), which is a center/right-wing politician.
Football in general in Italy has been allowed to become a breeding ground for extreme right hooligans, so the difference is subtle. There are just a couple of teams that are more associated with certain political affiliations, like Livorno is usually seen as having a left wing following.
Then there’s the infamous Lazio team, whose ultras (Italian slang for organised supporters) have put shame on themselves and the country routinely for the past decades, with their vast array of swastikas, Anne Frank reference, fascist salutes, you name it. But it’s not like Roma AC is that much better.
[removed]
>in Milan, the red stripe guys are right wing and the blue stripe guys are left wing.
Not exactly true. It used to be that Milan (red and black team) was more popular with the lower class and therefore left wing, while Inter (black and blue team) was associated with middle and wealthy class, so more right wing. This distinction got thinner and Berlusconi becoming owner of Milan didn’t help. People don’t really identify with a political area and therefore choose a team. Both teams are also *very* popular (2nd and 3rd by popularity in the country) and with so many supporters it’s difficult to put them in a specific category. Most teams have a similar history (Juventus was popular with both the very high class and the FIAT workers, people from Turin and immigrants from the south). There are still some clubs associated with a political identity, most notably Lazio (from Rome, right wing), Hellas Verona (right wing) and Livorno (left wing). Generally speaking ultra are very right wing but they don’t represent the average supporter.
>In America, sports are seen as an escape from all that.
In Europe sports have basically the opposite history.
Traditionally yes. For instance football (soccer) club [KTP](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kotkan_Ty%C3%B6v%C3%A4en_Palloilijat) (Kotkan Työväen Palloilijat) literally translates as “Kotka Workers’ Ball Players” which indicates that the club is left-aligned. [HJK Helsinki](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helsingin_Jalkapalloklubi#History), Finland’s most successful football club historically supported Finnish nationalism and their colours blue and white were chosen to reflect that. [HIFK](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HIFK_Fotboll), the other football club from Helsinki in Finnish football league was historically aligned with Swedish-speaking population in the city.
Nowadays nobody really cares and all of the teams have supporters from different political affiliations but it’s certainly still visible in e.g. names of the teams.
As an outside, I see some anarchist undertones in the German ultra culture, though some clubs especially in the East are pretty fashy.
They used to, but not that much anymore, and I don’t know much about football. And most places have only one professional club anyway.
I know that FC Zürich used to be the worker’s club and GC (also Zürich) was for the upper class; and my uncle still remembers that quite vividly. He played in a small club that was affiliated with the FCZ called “Dynamo” and they had friendly exchange with Red Star Belgrade. Playing against the GC was “to rough up some princelings”, although he was from a wealthy family as well.
Anyway, I looked up the history of some clubs here and the only club that is regularly associated with “working class club” seems to be the FCZ.
The BSC YB of Bern is very familiy-friendly and even has one gay/lesbian team.
In Switzerland (and Europe in general), sports clubs are not just “the” team that you see playing on sunday evenings on TV, but multiple teams of different ages in different levels, sometimes in different sports and even different places; and it’s those clubs that you go to as a kid when you want to play football as a hobby, because they have the coaches and sports camps and so on.
Sport teams in Europe have in general a much more “organic” history then in the US. They did not start as businesses so many became associated with political affiliations/religion/ethnic groups either explicitly from the beginning (like clubs founded by unions) or with time because of the area that they were based/ the supporters they attracted.
To take American football, the NFL is centrally managed and has only one license for Chicago. That is a very large city/urban area with just one team meaning is very unlikely that it can become associated with any political affiliation. It would also be bad for business. No other team can be created there and play in the NFL. If Chicago would be in Europe, it might have a lot more professional teams, some of which might end up having some association with politics or ethnic groups. Imagine having a team founded by meat packing workers in South Side of Chicago in the early 1900 and one founded by members of the rowing team of a small collage in a rich area. The clubs would probably end up having a very different type of supporters and all the associations that come from that.
Football in Norway is not very politicized. I’d say every football club in Norway has plenty of supporters on either side of the political spectrum. Even if you’re with the singing supporters/ultras(those who typically display political affiliation) there won’t be songs or displays about political alignment. Typically people support whatever their closest team is and not based on politics. Any supporter’s group will generally welcome anyone as long as you’re not an extermist.
The “ultras” of the club Vålerenga used to be associated with right wing support, which definitely was the case at one point. They used to have issues with racism, but this was some years back and the club has cleared up most of that now.
Socioeconomic status has been a more important distinction in a few football clubs here than political affiliation. The Oslo-rivalry between Lyn and Vålerenga, that barely exists anymore since Lyn’s bankrupcy was more of a socioeconomic rivalry than one based on politics. Lyn came from the city’s richer upper class west end. With the working class Vålerenga from the east of the city.
Yeah, there often are distinctions within a same team too. In Paris for example you have fan groups which are right wing and fan groups which are left wing.
They often cooperate but they sometimes fight it out quite violently over politics too.
Montpellier for exemple is known as very left wing / basically skinhead hunters while other clubs like Lyon where I live have a right wing reputation.
One thing to understand is that football in Europe is far from just a sport, it is also a cultural phenomenon.
Football stadiums historically were refuges and meeting places for various subcultures such as punks, mods, skinheads (both the fascist and antifascist kinds) etc… as at the time it was a very cheap and very working class pastime.
Depending on the places some subcultures often took precedence until they ran other subcultures out of the stadium. In some places the left wing antifa people may have kicked the fascists out, in some others the opposite happened and in some others they found a middle ground where they occupy different areas of the stadium.
Many (most in France actually) fan groups are also specifically apolitical meaning you will have people from all ideologies and members are expected to not bring any politic in the group.
I used to be a member of an apolitical group and I was personally very much on the left but I knew some people were right wing or whatever. It was okey to talk politics but more often than not we didn’t go too deep as we knew we would never agree.
Of course it does not mean that all fans of Lyon for example are right wing or even that all the fan groups are or that every person in the stadium has to deal with that. It’s mainly a struggle between fan groups that does not concern average supporters and most people just come to the stadium to enjoy some family time with their kids especially nowadays after decades of police repression of fan groups.
In Poland it’s less about individual affiliations, more like ultras/dedicated fans of all the big football/soccer clubs being heavily rightwing. Clubs that benefited from government patronage during the communist era (Legia Warsaw – military club, Wisła Krakow – militia/police club) will sometimes get accused of being communists but this is just used as a slur and not based on actual beliefs (Legia fans in particular are rather (in)famous for their politically incorrect banners).
You’ve mentioned it already but I’ll explain in more detail. Glasgow and the surrounding areas received a lot of immigrants from Ireland after the Great Famine and other events that led to mass emigration from Ireland in the 19th century and even beyond. These people were largely discriminated against due to the usual hatred of individual Irish people in Britain combined with a more anti-Catholic theology that was found in the very ‘low church’ Christianity of Scotland (Presbyterianism).
This led to Celtic being founded as a charitable endeavour for these immigrants and they then attracted a fan base from that community. Rangers weren’t inherently linked to Unionism since their inception but instantly became increasing associated with a very right-wing form of Unionism and Protestant social conservativism throughout the 20th century.
These aren’t total rules that apply to everyone though you’ll meet Rangers and Celtic fans that don’t really like these associations and only really care about the football and some that go against the stereotype (Protestant Celtic fans and Catholic Rangers fans of pro-indy Rangers fans and pro-Union Celtic supporters).
Some guys get proper invested in it though and can be some of the most unpleasant and insane people that you’ll ever meet.
What is important to understand is what a sports club is here. It’s a voluntary organization that is run and owned by its members. Every little village has one. And all the clubs in the country (probably thousands) play in the same league system. Lower leagues for amateur clubs, higher leagues for semi professionals, and the highest leagues for professional players. Each year, the best teams in each league get to go one league up, and the worst teams go one league down. This also means that no club or no city has a “safe spot” in the highest league, and often multiple ones from the same city are in.
Even most of the major teams are at their core membership based organizations, owned by all the club members. I think in Germany there is even a rule to enforce that.
And since the members of the club, usually many of the fans, own the whole thing, there is a lot of identity formed around it, and often, they are identified with different parts of society. Often a bourgeois club vs a working class club, or a more right wing vs a more left wing one. Especially when there are multiple major clubs in one city.
I am from Barcelona, and there, FC Barcelona/Barça, is mostly associated with Independentism/Catalanism (although it’s got followers from all the world, including unionists), and it has the Catalan flag on the coat of arms. It’s biggest rival, Real Madrid, is from the capital, so they are a bit like polar opposites: the central capital which has the king’s crown on their coat of arms vs the regional capital of an independentist territory with its flag on the coat of arms. So, Barça is VERY politicized by some fans, although not everyone, as it is a major football club with fans all over the world.