Footy Fans Against Mass Murder call on all supporters to...
TACKLE GLOBAL POVERTY AND BOOT OUT THE WEF!
END THE CORPORATE CONTROL OF SPORT!
JOIN THE S11 PROTESTS!
SHOW YOUR COLOURS SEPTEMBER 11-13 AT CROWN CASINO!
THE SEASON IS OVER, BUT THE STRUGGLE CONTINUES!
Numbered amongst the multi billionaires and faceless technocrats attending
the WEF will be many of the people who have also come to control Australian
Rules Football. Clowns and sleazebags like McGuire, Jackson, Gutnick and
Elliot. People whose true interest in football stems not from a love of the
game itself, but from a hunger for the power and prestige that comes from
controlling its future.
The term "globalisation" is just a cover for a process that increases
corporate control over our daily lives. The detrimental effects of such
control can be seen as much in what has happened to football in
recent years as anywhere else. Over the past decade we have seen the
smaller leagues and teams bankrupted, relocated or forcibly merged as part
of what we are told is an inevitable evolution towards the "modern" game.
Long loved grounds such as Waverly and those belonging to North Melbourne
and Collingwood have been phased out in favour of monuments to advertisers
like the disastrous Colonial Stadium.
With club managements increasingly reliant on the patronage of big business
we have seen stadiums and players renamed on a short and long term basis
after sponsors. Collingwood management indicated this year that they would
not even be adverse to renaming whole teams. Advertising at grounds is ever
present, whether on scoreboards, jumpers, the turf, fan banners, the ball,
trainers, little league players, tickets, water bottles, etc. Wherever you
may look whilst at a game you cannot escape it.
So where do the fans and members fit into all of this? Only as passive
sheep to be sold merchandising and herded into whichever expensive, crap
ground the AFL decides is good to make a buck off. Did we at any stage
request that our beloved teams and grounds be destroyed? That entrance
costs and food and drinks at games become ever more expensive? That our new
ground should be more like a TV studio that a footy field? That news about
AFL financial double dealing and arguments over TV rights take equal place
in the sports pages with that about the actual games and players? That club
boards vote themselves ever higher salaries? That the 2000 season be
rescheduled to suit the needs of the Olympics and Channel 7? Has the game
really improved as a result of all this?
Supporters have not taken all of this lying down, but resistance has
largely been passive. The response of the AFL and club managements to
declining memberships and game attendances has been predictable- ignore the
views of the fans and instead scramble for a bigger share of television
royalities and the corporate dollar. The problem for management is that at
some point the majority of fans will finally give up and just switch off
altogether.
However all is not yet lost. The rare exceptions in which supporters and
players have really voiced their anger have seen managements make
concessions or back down. This was seen earlier this year when Colonial
Stadium was forced to allow general admission to empty seating originally
allocated for corporate sponsors and in the Fremantle Dockers opting to
retain training at South Fremantle Oval after 1000s demonstrated against a
proposed move in 1999.
In the spirit of such protest and in the knowledge that corporate control
of our lives, be it over football or the workplace, does no one any good we
call on all concerned footy fans to join the S11 protests around the
country. Wear your team colours and let your best barracking voice be heard!
For more info and a history of troublemaking within footy check out our
website at www.geocities.com/footyfans2000
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