The end of the road

There’s an old wisdom here in Greece, reading “όσα δε φέρνει ο χρόνος, τα φέρνει η ώρα”, meaning that things that didn’t happen for years, can happen in a very short period of time. This is the case with our long (and passionate) affair with FC Sankt Pauli, what brought us here and the conclusion of the story below…

It all kicks off with our joint statement along with 13 other international fanclubs (in case you’re not aware of it, you can find it here, at this point and before we proceed any further, we’d like to thank the author of this post in the Celtic blog, both for the kind words and for verifying that we’re not crazy), responding to the, apparently one-sided statement made by FCSP on the situation in Palestine. Issue is not new, club has been keeping it under the carpet for years but at this point made a statement, which was absolutely correct on condemning Hamas and their brutal acts but didn’t have a single word to say on the suffering of the Palestinian people (didn’t expect them to speak about their rights, a word of sympathy would be enough, even that guy Infantino had one along the way). In the aftermath of the Hamas horrific actions and after their initial statement took place, more than 1030 children have been killed in Gaza. No men, no women, 1030 CHILDREN. As you probably guess, FCSP didn’t have a single word of sympathy for them, this is what you call “selective sensitivity” (even though there is another word for that, we’ll get to that later) and this was exactly the point of our joint statement.

The only question making any real sense to us was the timing of our statement. The answer is that this was probably the only time that people will pay attention. Constant displacement of people, children and journalists executed in the streets by the IDF, bombing of hospitals, entire areas demolished to make way for the illegal settlers and the pogrom parties against the local populations with the army supporting them, an open air prison with inhuman conditions for the population and lots more, all these are happening for years and years and for FCSP was always just Tuesday… What probably happening next is IDF levelling Gaza, more suffering for the population in an illegally occupied territory and all will go “back to normal”. Blood of innocent people was spilled last weekend, some of them weren’t even locals, people from all around the globe were slaughtered in the music event, some friends of ours could be there too, we expected the club, on the occasion of taking a position for once, to consider the blood of the Palestinians too, something that never happened.

Otherwise was just about a shitstorm with various people throwing to us all kinds of disgusting accusations (with first on the list “Antisemite” of course, it’s the only word that some of these people know on the subject), hilarious actually the case of someone who didn’t accuse us as Antisemites but rather as naive (much more polite, thank you), only to find out along the way that the guy hadn’t even read the statement. Of course, we never had a problem handling that, we have spoke openly about Palestine multiple times in the past but there were always only dead Palestinians involved, so nobody really cared declaring a war on us. However, there are two interesting things to extract from all this mess. The first one is how easily the international clubs were converted to a single entity overnight, we read LOTS of stuff like “international clubs are a disgrace for the club”, “we should do something about the international clubs” etc. No one paid attention to the fact that these international fan clubs are a really diverse environment, with people coming for all over the globe, having big cultural differences and, sometimes, the values that FCSP is supposed to represent as a common denominator. Furthermore, there are lots of clubs who didn’t sign this statement, whichever the reasons might have been, still for lots of people out there was just about the “international clubs”. Interesting watching fans of the most global club (not product) on the planet unleashing their wrath towards the international clubs all together, interesting to see how this is going to evolve, pity that we won’t be there to see. The second (and much more significant) is the talk by various sources already from day one about us having done violations described as Antisemitism by the IHRA (International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance), mostly by doing some arbitrary logical leaps (or acrobatics). Let’s have a look at this definition (original can be found by clicking the link above).

To guide IHRA in its work, the following examples may serve as illustrations:
 
Manifestations might include the targeting of the state of Israel, conceived as a Jewish collectivity. However, criticism of Israel similar to that leveled against any other country cannot be regarded as antisemitic. Antisemitism frequently charges Jews with conspiring to harm humanity, and it is often used to blame Jews for “why things go wrong.” It is expressed in speech, writing, visual forms and action, and employs sinister stereotypes and negative character traits.
 
Contemporary examples of antisemitism in public life, the media, schools, the workplace, and in the religious sphere could, taking into account the overall context, include, but are not limited to:

• Calling for, aiding, or justifying the killing or harming of Jews in the name of a radical ideology or an extremist view of religion.
• Making mendacious, dehumanizing, demonizing, or stereotypical allegations about Jews as such or the power of Jews as collective — such as, especially but not exclusively, the myth about a world Jewish conspiracy or of Jews controlling the media, economy, government or other societal institutions.
• Accusing Jews as a people of being responsible for real or imagined wrongdoing committed by a single Jewish person or group, or even for acts committed by non-Jews.
• Denying the fact, scope, mechanisms (e.g. gas chambers) or intentionality of the genocide of the Jewish people at the hands of National Socialist Germany and its supporters and accomplices during World War II (the Holocaust).
• Accusing the Jews as a people, or Israel as a state, of inventing or exaggerating the Holocaust.
• Accusing Jewish citizens of being more loyal to Israel, or to the alleged priorities of Jews worldwide, than to the interests of their own nations.
• Denying the Jewish people their right to self-determination, e.g., by claiming that the existence of a State of Israel is a racist endeavor.
• Applying double standards by requiring of it a behavior not expected or demanded of any other democratic nation.
• Using the symbols and images associated with classic antisemitism (e.g., claims of Jews killing Jesus or blood libel) to characterize Israel or Israelis.
• Drawing comparisons of contemporary Israeli policy to that of the Nazis.
• Holding Jews collectively responsible for actions of the state of Israel.

Antisemitic acts are criminal when they are so defined by law (for example, denial of the Holocaust or distribution of antisemitic materials in some countries).
 
Criminal acts are antisemitic when the targets of attacks, whether they are people or property – such as buildings, schools, places of worship and cemeteries – are selected because they are, or are perceived to be, Jewish or linked to Jews.
 
Antisemitic discrimination is the denial to Jews of opportunities or services available to others and is illegal in many countries.

As you can see, it’s quite straightforward. Pay attention to the 2nd sentence (in bold) at the beginning because this is exactly what we did and what we are doing all these years. Legitimate criticism to the state of Israel, criticism supported by various resolutions of the UN (Israel doesn’t give a damn about them, why should they?), the report of Amnesty International and various initiatives within Israel (normally it should be considered obvious but, under the current circumstances, we need to state that all this is against fascism down there and not the people, every single person being against Netanyahu and all this madness is considered a friend of ours, solidarity!), problem is that UN and Amnesty international do not appear to be in the list of the qualified organizations when it comes to the Brown White bubble. This is simply ridiculous and it’s dismissed as the joke it is. Unfortunately, there’s a bigger joke already out, which was the critical game changer for us…

This is the statement of the FCSR, link to the page can be found here. The first two sentences are actually absolutely correct, looks like a good way to start the statement, it gets spicy when it refers to certain fan clubs who have crossed the line with their statements, calling them to review their position. Of course, there is only one statement and this is ours. This is really embarrassing, even a 7 year old can easily identify the explicit condemnation of Hamas, in a text that also concludes by asking for peaceful coexistence between Palestine and Israel. It’s getting even funny at some point, as the Scum Admin immediately added an extra appendix in our blog version of the statement, in an attempt to “clarify” the issue once and for all – it was looking somehow absurd afterwards, the appendix was practically repeating in a slightly different formulation what exactly was mentioned in the statement. We’re actually really satisfied with that part of the statement, during the conversation, a few clubs expressed their need for an absolute condemnation of Hamas, without “ifs and buts”. We agreed of course and we’re actually the ones who proposed the final form of this paragraph.

The article below is written by Gideon Levy, one of the most distinguished Israeli journalists, written for Haaretz. It’s not the original, it’s a republication, as the original is subscribed content, you can still access it here. Make sure that you read this before you go any further.

(PS: before using the link below, we started with a Greek translation of it from a Greek site, by the time we reviewed the text the page was down… )

Israel can’t imprison two million Gazans without paying a cruel price

Having any of us written this, we would be accused by now of extreme antisemitism, religious fundamentalism, possible Nazism, tax evasion and who knows what else. Of course we’re not Gideon Levy, we are just FCSP international fan clubs, expressing an unpopular to the local bubble opinion, being an apparently easy target within the bubble. So here are some vast fields of glory for FCSR, could you please comment on the article above? They probably won’t, what this guy writes, what the left opposition says, what even some Jewish Orthodox organizations say are all indifferent to them, there’s another word for that too…

It’s easy to understand that the FSCR statement is easy out of place, simply because there’s apparently nothing to criticize (interesting the fact that there are no particular mentions in there). Can’t be, not sure if any professors of literature in the FCSR but most of them are clever people and certainly know how to read, what’s it then? It’s simply about “keep your mouth shut” on the issue and this is the utter disappointment here. The absolute inability of these people to have a discussion out of their comfort zone. We are all fellow Sankt Pauli fans, for every single thing dividing us, there are ten more uniting us, we should be all able to sit down and talk together in good will, put our perceptions and opinions on the test and try all together to make something better out of this and, in the worst case scenario, find a way to respect each others beliefs in sensitive issues if unable to reach a solution in between. The FCSR statement is the death of that illusion and the decisive factor in our decision.

What do we have overall? a) An one-sided condemnation by the club with it’s indifference towards the plight of the Palestinian people reaching levels of inhumanity, b) a shitstorm from the majority of the local base, dealing basically with trying to prove we’re Antisemites and ignoring both everything that happens in Palestine along with all different opinions (even if Netanyahu himself was telling them what Gideon Levy says above, still they wouldn’t believe him) and c) a statement by the FCSR putting the tombstone to any possibility of a healthy dialog. All these suggest that we’re standing against our club. A club having a, peculiar but still real, problem of racism and bigotry (approaching the end, time to put the missing words in place). Racism expressed via the inability to handle Palestinians as human beings and openly endorsing an apartheid regime and bigotry via their choice to absolutely ignore any evidence not supporting their case. The bigger problem is that the latter makes them unable to acknowledge and deal with the issue, for them everything is fine, so this doesn’t leave any real space for optimism.

We have really good news for all of them. No sir, we won’t comply. We won’t stick around here silent, not daring to speak every time a bomb destroys a school with everyone inside in Gaza, in order not to “cross the lines”. We won’t stick around watching elements of the FCSP scene who have the audacity to call themselves antifascist/antiracist, while exercising in parallel their Arab hate, celebrating as “justice” the eventual extermination of an entire nation inside their very own stolen land by a fascist regime. People belonging to this category had one thing right though, at least as expressed in the social media, “you don’t belong here”. They are absolutely right, we don’t, not anymore. For us antifascism and antiracism are not a la carte perceptions, you either are or not, without “ifs and buts”, racism towards Palestine and endorsing Netanyahu is not compatible. We arrived in the Brown White cosmos via the value path (we never really cared about the football), the same way we’ll use on our way out, we don’t identify with all these, we’re out, simple as that.

South End Scum is disbanded with immediate effect, we ask the FCSR to remove us from the fan club registry, we’ll never deal with the club again, we wish all the best to the international fan clubs still affiliated with it. We’re not going to engage in any further dialog with anyone, on the one hand this time has come and gone thanks to FCSR which made the hardest decision of our life really easy – on the other hand, dead people (thankfully not our case)/organizations do not care about feedback and reactions. We’re leaving, joining King Eric and the rest of the world. Those of you happy with this, feel free to leave this piece too, there’s nothing more for you in the rest of it.

PHOTO | “It is time to end Israel's impunity and to insist on the same standards of equality, justice and respect for international law that we demand of other states.”

Eric Cantona. pic.twitter.com/hGVImYYYok

— Antifa_Ultras (@ultras_antifaa) October 14, 2023

Alright, the easy part is gone, now to the hard one…

We were always a spontaneous bunch in terms of making decisions. This one was a fast one too, after being briefed, everybody agreed that no step back should be taken, there was actually a suggestion to go nowhere and put up a fight with the club but it was dismissed for one reason: this would only create more conflict, further embarrassment around and it would be overall unworthy of our love all these years towards the club. There was also the thought about waiting for things to cool down a little and take it from there but it’s unfortunately not possible, a lots of beliefs (fortunately not all of them) died these days. Even if/when things eventually cool down, it will never be the same again for us. All these years all we collected was respect, hospitality and appreciation, we’d like to keep and cherish these 15 years as they were, previous days have clearly indicated that this era is over, trust is broken, faith is lost… Only decent way left was the way to the exit and this was eventually agreed, a fast decision as usual but the very first (and last) that we allowed some time before implementing it. Reason? This was the most significant decision ever received by us and we wanted to take some time to review it and allow some time in case anything changes, at least that’s what we told each other. The FCSR statement made sure that there are no additional options, in truth we wanted to take some time and reminisce before leaving, there are too much being left behind…

We all fell in deep love with this club, for some of us became the absolute priority, it’s not simply about parting ways with a football club, is about redefining and rearranging our lives in general. Knowing what we know now, we wouldn’t probably get involved in the first place but looking back at these 13 years (for a few of us there are a few more, having started with our pals from the Athens Club), it worth every fuckin’ second of the journey. Anyone thinking that we’re leaving with feelings of hate towards the club couldn’t be more mistaken. Looks a little like a life relationship with a partner that you were supposed to spend your life with ending unexpectedly, some people never really get completely over it, they carry on with their lives, even opening new chapters but still there’s a corner with feelings of love and affection deep inside that will always be there. And let us tell you something, we may have reasons to feel “betrayed” but have absolutely no reason to hate this club. As said in another occasion above, for every single thing that goes wrong there are a lot more going right, this still applies today, there are just some differences that are simply too wide to be bridged. We really hope that FCSP will find its way at some point, even though there’s no way back for us (you live and die only once), it would serve at least as a kind of vindication, telling us that, yes, we did well dealing with it in the first place…

Looking back to what we did in these past 12-13 years as a fan club, we could summarize them as mostly being lazy bastards, doing some really good deeds from time to time, not remotely comparable of course to the (huge) things that clubs like Glasgow have done but still quite alright. If there’s one thing that we could say that we did well, it was contributing our part to the development of the international scene and we mostly did that by being consistent, going through this, soon to fall into oblivion, blog, you can see the entire FCSP history of the past 12 years unfolding, we didn’t miss a single official match. Of course, in the light of the recent developments, helping the development of the international FCSP scene is something that nobody knows whether was eventually a good thing or not, either perspective (ours or the clubs’) you look at it, nevertheless it was something that we really enjoyed doing. Another thing that we really enjoyed doing was dealing with the amateur departments of the club, we always believed (and still do) that, with the constant growing commercialization of the FC in the past years, amateur departments become more and more important as the cradle of our values. We tried to deal with as many of them as we could, covering activities that no one else in Germany cared to, a pity leaving this in the middle, was probably our most serious contribution in the recent years. Our glorious rock’n’roll moments, even though aligned to the FCSP context, are considered simply entertaining and not useful, hence out of scope.

Looking now back to our times in Hamburg throughout these years? Experiences gathered cannot fit in here, an endless joyride from the start of the very first until the end of the very last trip over there. We saw things, did things, made friends (all around Europe and not only), heard stories, got to know the world from a different perspective and, some of us, even became better people. It’s a really long way looking back, some of us grew up with this club, some others grew old, it’s overall a huge load of memories to keep and cherish, tattoos may can be erased (they won’t) but such things simply can’t, the thing that L.A.K. talk about in “Mehr Als Fußball”, you know…

Time to go, let’s close with a few thanks. Thanks, first of all, to all these people/places (both Hamburg and all around the globe) we met/hanged out throughout these years for making this the unforgettable 15 years experience described above. Some of these people became true friends, passing even the hard latest test, these are relationships that do not end here, we’ll just change the agenda in our conversations, after all we have more things than FCSP uniting us. A big “thank you” is going to our Fanladen (as far as we are concerned, certain people in there may have hostile feelings towards us at the moment but we don’t care, fair is fair), for doing always the best thing possible, not only for us but for every international fan club, appreciating always the fact that we come from far away. Unless you have experiences from bigger international clubs, who suck your bone in cash and treat you like a B class customer, you can’t really appreciate the work that these guys did for us all these years. Thanks also to the Blind Football department just for being there, Millernton for being the brightest beacon of light, not only among this madness but all along, the good people of Jolly which served as our home in Hamburg all these years and, last but not least, thanks to…FC Sankt Pauli, we feel that we really owe it after all these magnificent years, thanks club, be well.

It was emotional, we’re out of here, let’s hit it up for one last time.