Back in November I wrote a blog here in response to Peter Herbert (of the Black Lawyer's Association) calling for ban on Spurs' supporters chanting the word "Yid". While many of us had thought the issue had been done to death and gone away, it seems that the Football Association (FA) has decided to raise it's head over the parapet and has claimed that it is planning to prosecute anyone using the term in football grounds.
Apart from being misguided, one would also imagine that the FA had other, more important taks with which to occupy it's time: the England national team, for example; tearing young Englishmen and women away from their games consoles to play football; and to spend time making it clear to Sepp Blather the wrongness of FIFA's decision to hold the World Cup in Qatar, and how removing it to Winter would be disruptive to where the real power is in football (where the big players play, becuase that is what the money goes to).
However, I digress. So let me repeat what I stated in November (with some marginal editorial changes). Firstly, I would refer Peter Herbert, David Baddiel, the FA and others with an axe to grind to John Efron's learned article on the usage of the term Yids by Spurs supporters. It illustrates clearly the history of its usage, its social implications, and how it has become ingrained into the character of Spurs' supporters, so that any attempts to ban it (a clear infringement of freedom of speech) would be futile. From a more personal perspective, let me state once again quite simply the following: •I am a person of the Jewish faith, a member of the 12 tribes of Israel.
•I abhor totally and unequivocally any form of racism or anti-Semitism.
•If a gentile calls me a Yid then I am very likely to be offended (at the very least), as this is a term which has a long history of being abusive when applied to Jews, and has often been followed by physical oppression and violence.
•The use of the term by Spurs supporters began in the late 1970s as a response to anti-Semitic abuse from opposing fans, who (perhaps mistakenly) believe Spurs to be a Jewish football club. •It has since been claimed as a badge of honour by Spurs fans, for whom many (especially the younger fans) it has become synonymous with supporting Spurs. Such younger fans typically have no knowledge of its origins as an anti-Semitic epithet. The same may also be increasingly said of younger fans of opposing teams.
•It's use in the Jewish community has been ongoing for centuries, mainly in the communities of Eastern Europe and their descendants who made their way to the UK (in particular). It is used in such communities in much the same way as Englishmen may refer to each other as "mate", "pal" or "buddy".
Messrs Herbert and Baddiel, and the FA: if you are truly serious about removing racism and anti-Semitism from football then you should start by dealing with the large sections of clubs such as Chelsea which constantly barrack Spurs on the basis of our alleged Jewish connections. When they stop calling us "dirty Yids" and making gas chamber sounds, when they stop singing "Spurs are on their way to Auschwitz" I will happily then campaign for my fellow Spurs fans to stop applying the term Yids to ourselves. It would be helpful, of course, if the Jewish supporters at other clubs, especially Chelsea and Arsenal where they are also a significant minority, did something to prevent or dissuade their fellow supporters from their anitsemitic chanting. I am delighted that Spurs themselves have seen fit to give this so-called FA initiative the short shrift it deserves. I intend to answer the proposed club questionnaire to season ticket holders using all of the above, and would ask fellow Yids to do the same.
Ivan "DrHotspur" Cohen
Glad to be a Yid in every sense of the word.
