The Bitter End of British Nationalism
Among The Thugs, Bill Buford, Vintage Departures, 1993.
Before embarking on any discussion relating to the world's most popular sport, it is necessary first to remind the North American reader that, first, it isn't Baseball or Basketball, but in fact Football. But not what North Americans call football. It's what they call "soccer". Possibly North America's least popular game. In any case, everywhere else in the world, "football" is a game in which gangs of rugged athletic men beat the crap out of eachother trying to get a small white-and-black spheroid into an enclosed area, thereby scoring a point, though you could probably attend an entire season of Saturday afternoon games in the United Kingdom without seeing more than five or six actual goals.
Fortunately, it isn't necessary to understand or like football in order to enjoy "Among The Thugs".
This book is really about the causes, effects, and mechanisms of crowd violence. It appeals more to the morbid psychologist in all of us, the armchair criminologist that wants to get deeply into the brain of the more violent, drunken elements of our society.
The book touches only slightly on the societal causes of British football thuggery. Inasmuch as it does, it is the author's premise that British youth is another "Lost Generation" of people with no legitimate heros or goals to aspire to, merely the inheritors of the hubris and trappings of a fallen empire, who then vent their aimlessness and frustration on Europe, innocent non-football fans, and especially eachother.
More effort is spent on the graphic effects of crowd violence. The book has the expected healthy dose of graphic beatings, stabbings, knifings, tramplings, and, for the more verbal among us, plenty of amusing vernacular, though it is obvious that the American-born author has dumbed down the local slang to cater to the language of his audience. Probably the best, or worst (depends on your tastes) depiction of violence in the book involves a football supporter actually sucking the eyeball out of the socket of a policeman. If this book is ever made into a movie, it'll be directed by David Cronenberg.
Possibly the most fascinating element of this volume is the glimmers of truth and insight that the author draws about the workings of crowd violence. Much time is spent analyzing the moment that a crowd decides to turn to violence, the required stimuli, and the pleasure that members of the crowd derive from the experience. Much of this flies in the face of the views taken by law enforcement as evidenced by their general treatment of crowd violence. The author makes the challenging assertion that crowds don't require any sort of "ringleader" to incite them to violence; rather, there is a group-mind experience that goes through several stages of commitment and excitement, until finally a member of the crowd volunteers an act of violence, and the crowd as a whole follows, or does not follow - as a minded thing. Most of us probably don't want to test this theory personally.
I was disturbed by the lack of any moral awareness of the author as he narrated the book. The research that the author engaged in was mostly hands-on; the author in fact involved himself in the supporter organizations and became friends with many football supporters whom he tacitly admits are the most willing to commit violence and mayhem as a means of Saturday-afternoon entertainment. More than once, I found myself thinking of Gonzo Journalist Hunter S. Thompson's book, "Hell's Angels", in which the author also involves himself as much as possible with his subject, leaving the reader to wonder by the end of the book whether the quest for an objective and real insight into the subject hasn't tainted and changed the author to such a degree as to defeat the desired objectivity. You feel as if there must be a sort of Heisenberg's principle of authorship at work - that to get too close to the subject matter will by nature distort your narrative. The supremacy of sensationalism as a value over journalistic accuracy would be too simple an explanation, and the book contains too many useful and thoughtful insights about it's subject to be written off to simple sensationalism. The eye-for-an-eye people will be pleased to note that the author's direct participation in much of the dangerous mob behaviour was not without it's cost; in fact the author claims to have been beaten badly by the police when he is apprehended with the rest of a mob at the World Cup. One certainly wouldn't wish this price on anyone, but it surely can't be said that this author was entirely insulated from the business end of the violence he writes about.
"Among The Thugs" is a good read, especially for those interested in the darker side of collective thinking. Don't look for any moral conclusions or clean resolution, however; as with so much other non-fiction, real life doesn't work that way.
Thomas K. Burkholder, October 21, 1998.