You Cant Even Wear An England Shirt Now.... Er Coz.... You Actually Can.

I have had a few of those silly groups you can join, showing up on facebook recently. Nothing new there then, they are ten a penny - everyone knows that. But these recent ones have alarmingly highlighted, via the medium of shouty sentences in badly spelled capitals -that the PC brigade are going to ban people from flying the England flag / Wear England T-shirts during the world cup or for ever. It really depends on different sources what is getting banned and where. Smelling a prime example of flat Earth news I eventually found out via other on line sources who had got the same facebook groups showing up all of a sudden, - a possible source story that can trigger things like this flag flying fiasco. This surprisingly rhetorically tame; given the subject, -short from the Sun on police guidelines to curb drink violence during the World Cup. The upshot of the story is that the police have issued guidelines (not laws) on preventing kick offs off the pitch. Things like glass bottles being replaced with plastics, and; -the key line on which the article is based.

"Among World Cup guidance, it suggests "dress code restrictions - eg no football shirts"

It is hard to say, in the absence of greater context, how far they feel that this suggestion should go. But the critical sentence is this.

"Pubs are not obliged to follow the advice."

There is emphatically no ban on wearing the England shirt.

"but it warns: "Police will not hesitate to use powers under the Licensing Act should we find you are not actively supporting the prevention of crime."

That applies to publicans anyway, so can't be construed as a proxy attempt to enforce it. I highly doubt that any publican will enforce a moratorium on football shirts during matches. It would drive away 90 percent of their clientele, during one of the pub worlds (and my god they need the trade these days!) most busiest seasons. It would be suicide to try it.

As usual with non stories (which it is.) that trigger this kind of thing. (and "Christmas is now Winterval." kinds of stuff.) This flag / t-shirt ban is a world cup staple, when others learn of it secondhand, and haven't read the story in full, get outraged with it, pass it on in a distorted form, where it starts to mutate along with other political correctness tropes and folklore, like a stone gathering moss, so we end up with facebook proclamations from someone who hasn't read the story, but has put 2 and 2 together and got a colour for the answer. Something like this.

"POLICE ARE GOING AROUND PUBS AND CLUBS SAYING THAT WE CANT WEAR OUR ENGLAND TOPS 4 THE FOOTIE & GOTTA TAKE THE FLAGS DOWN AS ITS UPSETTING THE PEOPLE THAT DONT COME FROM HERE! NOW IM NOT RACIST BUT THIS IS TAKING THE PISS! THIS IS OUR COUNTRY AND WE NEED TO MAKE A STAND! WOULD YOU REMOVE YOUR TURBAN & BURKHA BECAUSE IT UPSETS ME?"

The reference to immigrants (or migrants) has been tacked on to the story in several of the messages like this one, despite the Sun article (if indeed that is the source.) mentioning their sensibilities at all. Some of them are pretty unpleasant too, and it is all based on a mythical ban, that was never anything to do with Muslims (that's who the offended party are supposed to be.) at all. It is a classic example of the old phrase "A lie told often enough becomes true by virtue of its pervasiveness." that is ascribed to Lenin, and Dr. Goebels as well as others respectively. Likewise a few PC soundbites become true because the embed themselves in the consciousness by virtue of them being widely spread. And this is what pisses me off so much about the presses role in spreading this kind of stuff. Although the Sun didn't actually implicate Muslims in the story. The constant myths and fabrications about PC, health and safety and immigration do have an affect, and will influence people. So we have a situation where people are berating police for issuing a ban they never made, to publicans who wouldn't enforce it, even if it existed, which it doesn't. - cause its stoopid. All in the attempt to placate non offended sensibilities, that were never thought to need placating at all. The police did little more than issue some leaflets to pubs. That's all.

What a bloomin carry on!

I was downhearted to see that people can be so gullible with this kind of thing. But it was at least positive to see that some Sun comments saw through it, by the virtue of reading the article in the first place.

"Come on people READ the story. Don't just make things up. The police are ADVISING pubs about dress codes. There is NO BAN. And this isn't about race or national identity - they are trying to stop violent incidents. Isn't that a good aim?I don't think it'll make any difference though. "

"I think some of you need to read the story again. Its about advice to pub to implemnt a dress code including no football shirts (football shirts not jut England shirts. Its got nothing to do with immigrants or racism but because of the trouble"

"Come on people! They are not banning England football shirts from pubs!!