How hooliganism has contributed to weakening social ties

By Sheikh Muhammad Ali Waiswa

The recent discovery of many bodies at beaches is shocking but the outbreak of hooliganism in the recent years is really threatening. It is shameful.

What we have always known and understood is that sports or politics rectify rather than corrupt behaviour.
 
However, unfortunately those who keep on promoting the situation are not inside the green square; they are outsiders who imprint such bad behaviour on the minds of everyone young and old, each according to his own tendencies and inclinations as if they are enemies.

Hence, we can detect the sources of fanaticism in our discussions in gossiping, tattling and defamation crossing the boundaries of polite criticism and conversation.

Hooliganism is among the forms of fanaticism that exhausts societies, tears apart their unity and violates the rights of others.

We frequently hear, particularly in Uganda, that when a popular sports team wins a game against another one, detest arises among their fans and the odd animosity spreads among friends, as the relations between relatives fade away in an unimaginable or unfathomable manner.

There are even divorce cases between married couples, estranged brothers, disputes raised to legal court and a serious deterioration in the health of some fanatic fans that developed diseases such as high blood pressure, diabetes, irritable bowel syndrome and strokes, which drove many psychologists and sociologists to warn against hooliganism. This is the same to politicians as well.

One who follows the sports scene in Uganda, particularly in football matches and tournaments will find that the detested hooliganism developed to dangerous levels that might threaten the consistency of the society, unity of the family, and sports people relations.

Not to mention that some of the hooligans chant distasteful racist anthems and trade accusations against their opponents questioning their patriotism and sense of belonging. They also practise physical abuse and destroy playgrounds and establishments.

Examples of the reason for promoting hooliganism and making bad situations worse are the lack of awareness of some of those working in the sports media, enticements from few club presidents, the threats from some honorary members and stipends from some old players, challenges from retired linemen, hooliganism from some journalists as well as the lack of awareness of some ill-informed columnists and others who like showing off and attention on the account of the good game in various means of mass media.

Some odd inclinations were used such as stigma with bad names, questioning the prowess of some teams, questioning the integrity of linemen and accusing the officials in regard to their honesty, favouritism and bribery, the matter which provokes the sports society to a great extent making it in constant boiling and look like a ticking bomb, threatening with what may have dire consequences. It is impossible to turn a blind eye to all this as it violates our national principles and political values, communication and social dialogue culture and the sports spirit.

The hooliganism in both our sports and political scenes affect social relations in varied degrees and threatens national unity among fans rooting malice among them. It overlooks the real prospects of honourable sports competition among our teams and politicians.
This urges us to call for an initiative from officials to put solutions to the problems and work hard to promote the awareness, and sports spirits pointing out the gravity of hooliganism among the officials, trainers, players, media people and fans political activists. We need also to convict whoever makes a violation, contaminates honest competitions, raises disputes and trouble putting his own interest before the interest of his homeland.

Upsetting indicator

Something is definitely wrong; when the ugly face of hooliganism appears with such detested momentum leading the honourable sports and political competitions to turn into hassle and quarrels that finally turn to abuses. We are in a dire and urgent need more than ever to discuss the issue with transparency, as this dilemma seems to have been moving increasingly and deeply from the sports and political circles to the social circle and here I will tackle it from these two important aspects.

Hooliganism is not exclusive to one team or its fans nor to a sports society; hooliganism is a global phenomenon that decreases and increases according to many variables not starting with the results nor ending with media people and their compromised tendencies.

In our society, sports — football in particular — have been the only way out for our youth to practise and follow, and its popularity has extended to include children, elderly men and even women in various age groups.

This would not happen in this maximized manner with the extensive accumulative nature if the space for enter¬tainment was not that limited, and if it were not for the extreme scarcity in entertainment venues. People by na¬ture search relentlessly for alternatives, then comes sports to take a measurable space of this vacant status and cover this unmet need and to fill this gap.

"Commitment to dialogue rules and arts among the most significant ways in dealing with fanaticism and accepting everybody's point of view"

Enthusiasm is a very nice thing. However, when enthusiasm turns into ugly hooliganism from which abhor for the opponent team arises and such feeling turns into action and abuse. Then we have to put an end to these unforeseen circumstances, because this is an ominous indication for what things can get to in the future for a public of enthusiastic youth who cannot be controlled when they are incited and congested in such an exagger¬ated manner.

The outbreak of hooliganism in the recent years is really shameful. What we have always known and understood is that sports or politics rectify rather than corrupt behaviours. However, unfortunately those who keep on enticing the situation are not inside the green square; they are outsiders who imprint such bad behaviour on the minds of everyone young and old, each according to his own tendencies and inclining as if they are enemies. Hence, we can detect the sources of fanaticism in our discussions in gossiping, tattling and defa¬mation crossing the boundaries of polite criticism and con¬versation.

In addition, some of the media dis¬putations that we view on sports shows in various channels only make the bad situation worse to increase the sever¬ity of the whole issue to win more fans for the club being supporting and to please superiors. We can see a TV show hosting two sports critics or more and follow it to get some new information but once the conversation begins they turn from knowledgeable critics to merely fans in the fan benches using bad language and insinuations on one an¬other and others as well as questioning their integrity and defame them.

Sticking to dialogue rules and arts

Sticking to dialogue rules and arts is one of the most important means to deal with hoo¬liganism, and it has a positive effect in accepting the views and competition of everyone.

"Tolerance, cultural and political diversity, global di¬vergence and religious and cultural dia¬logue are necessities to halt the growth of fanaticism"

Sports stands for a vital part of the modern social life. Sports became a social phenomenon that takes a large share of written, heard and viewed media as well as electronic media. Moreover, sports is now a prominent social phenomenon same as political and economic phenomena. The significance of training sports people, media people, fans and specialists on dialogue. Dialogue with them is a source for rejecting hooliganism as whenever the speakers stick to the rules and arts of dialogue they would get positive outcomes and get away from hooliganism as well as accepting the views of others, leading to a healthy and proper sports and political community.

I stress the necessity of considering what we teach to young people, specially what is viewed in media or the actions of those working in the sports and political fields, parents or the surrounding environment as all these have a big influence on the individuals behavior and future personality. I call for extensive efforts to monitor and control all behaviors and words directed to youth, to protect them from the negative effects of hooliganism. I consider that socialization comes from the role played by the family, school, friends and media as all social elements play a big role in impacting youth.

The signifi¬cance of implanting the positive motivators for sports and politics as it has great impact on the individual behavior in addition to focusing on positive motivators guiding people towards ideal sports and political behavior as well as putting the well-mannered sports people under the spotlight focusing on their posi¬tive behavior and making them well known which can posi¬tively help others acquire such positive behavior and then picturing hooliganism as a violation to social manners an ethics, besides refraining from biased attitude and its nega¬tive impact on the society and the individuals.


The writer is the Imam of Makerere University Business School (MUBS) and a national population champion and executive board member of the Interreligious Council of Uganda