the limping messenger

A Dutch MP has proposed to change the law to make it possible to make whole sale mass arrests…of what she classified in Dutch as “meeloophooligans”. This category should enter a special law on football now in the making.

Now us Dutch do concatenate many words into one, so ‘meeloophooligan’ does split up in mee/with loop/walk and the now international word hooligan, though a decade or more ago in Dutch the word used was more descriptive: ‘voetbalvandalen’.

For a short article commenting on this attack on principles of law and civil rights I made a graphic and today I felt compelled to look at the graphic again, taking away the superimposed text: “mass leisure / mass arrest”. I am now still pondering on how to translate the new Dutch word ‘meeloophooligan into English and if that term does justice to the social phenomenon of football hooligans.

HOOLIGAN HANGER

would that work?, or would ‘hooligan hanger-on’ be better? The social classification ‘meeloophooligan’ itself is also in need of some scrutiny. Authorities always want to find out who is ‘the leader’ of a group of followers. There is a fundamental denial in law enforcement on the group dynamics of hooligans. In my observations the leader role can be taken on by anyone according to circumstances, a few seconds or minutes only. It is that ‘equal chance of short-lived fame’  during a brawl that must be the most attractive element of the mass leisure sport known under the name of: hooliganism.