A Letter to Patricof

[ZYanksRule]

Hmm. I don't think I swear to be cool or hip. It just feels good sometimes. It's how I think a lot of reasonable, law-abiding people talk quite a lot of the time. It feels genuine.

You know, unlike "Make some New York noise".

I get that people might be offended by it. And I guess that has to be balanced against the desire of people to chant the unmodified version (and any number of other desires from other stakeholders).

But how?

It's not even about being offended. Hell, I curse all the time. It's just ... come on. We should be more original than that.

You know what that chant says to me? "We can't think of a good two-syllable word that fits here, so let's just go the easy way and say this." Try harder.

And again I come back to the family friendly part. It's not about being offensive, it's about setting a good example for the thousands of kids in attendance at every match.

 

[Gotham Gator]

As a guy who brings kids to the match all the time, I don’t get too worked up about the language, but certainly prefer the PG version. It’s nice if your kids can sing along. It’s also nice not to have to answer questions about why it’s okay for the supporters and not okay for them.

 

[Christopher Jee]

It's not even about being offended. Hell, I curse all the time. It's just ... come on. We should be more original than that.

You know what that chant says to me? "We can't think of a good two-syllable word that fits here, so let's just go the easy way and say this." Try harder.

And again I come back to the family friendly part. It's not about being offensive, it's about setting a good example for the thousands of kids in attendance at every match.

People don't generally act in a certain way knowing that it's bad. So the "bad example" thing isn't necessarily likely to sway them. I'm not ashamed of swearing at a football match. I'm sorry but that's just the truth about how I feel and I'm happy that the children who sit around me have parents who feel the same way.

I don't have kids so maybe I'm missing the neurochemistry to completely understand where you're coming from.

I don't think I'd mind my kids swearing though. I'd try to teach them the importance of context, but it would be about pragmatism, not the inherent and arbitrary immorality of certain words.

 

[SoupInNYC]

It's not even about being offended. Hell, I curse all the time. It's just ... come on. We should be more original than that.

You know what that chant says to me? "We can't think of a good two-syllable word that fits here, so let's just go the easy way and say this." Try harder.

And again I come back to the family friendly part. It's not about being offensive, it's about setting a good example for the thousands of kids in attendance at every match.

People don't generally act in a certain way knowing that it's bad. So the "bad example" thing isn't necessarily likely to sway them. I'm not ashamed of swearing at a football match. I'm sorry but that's just the truth about how I feel and I'm happy that the children who sit around me have parents who feel the same way.

I don't have kids so maybe I'm missing the neurochemistry to completely understand where you're coming from.

I don't think I'd mind my kids swearing though. I'd try to teach them the importance of context, but it would be about pragmatism, not the inherent and arbitrary immorality of certain words.

I'm against completely unnecessary swearing and being original, but I don't think Make Some Fucking Noise is all that bad and I join in on it as well.

What I really don't like is the "Fuck the [insert team name here]". That is completely unoriginal and unnecessary and it really isn't any kind of jab at the other team at all. I don't see how people view that as "sticking it to the other guys" when we're basically copying something that 6th graders sling at each other.

 

[hatt91]

I'm against completely unnecessary swearing and being original, but I don't think Make Some Fucking Noise is all that bad and I join in on it as well.

What I really don't like is the "Fuck the [insert team name here]". That is completely unoriginal and unnecessary and it really isn't any kind of jab at the other team at all. I don't see how people view that as "sticking it to the other guys" when we're basically copying something that 6th graders sling at each other.

Completely agree. I don’t think swearing is bad, it’s part of life. It’s part of the English language, and in fact all languages. There are cases where swearing add emotion and passion to the message being conveyed. ‘Make some fucking noise’ here’s a perfect example of that. Is it useless without the swear word? Of course not, but it loses some of the teeth.