This dissertation examines football hooliganism in Britain during the 1980s-1990s as a response to Margaret Thatcher's neoliberal policies. Chapter 1 discusses the socio-historical context, noting that Thatcher's economic changes undermined traditional working-class masculinity by closing industries like mining. This caused alienation among working-class men. The novels by John King and Irvine Welsh depict protagonists struggling with a lack of meaningful work and identity under Thatcherism. Football clubs traditionally provided working-class community but hooliganism arose as a new form of collective, violent expression of disaffection with the changing social and economic landscape.

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SEL3362 – DISSERTATION IN ENGLISH LITERATURE (15/16)
THURSDAY 28TH
APRIL 2016
The Politics of the Terraces: Football Hooliganism in
the Novels of Irvine Welsh and John King as a
Response to Thatcherite Neoliberalism
Word Count: 9,603
Student Number: 120151497
I herebycertifythatthissubmissioniswhollymyownwork,andthat all quotationsfrom
primary or secondary sources have been acknowledged. I have read the section on
Plagiarism in the School Style Guide / my Stage & Degree Manual and understand that
plagiarismandother unacknowledgeddebtswill be penalisedandmay leadto failure in
the whole examination or degree.

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Abstract
This dissertation studies the phenomenon of football hooliganism within the socio-historical
context of neoliberalism under Margaret Thatcher during the 1980s and 1990s, focussing on
articulations of reactionary violence and the role that football firms play in working-class
communities. The entire overhaul of the British economy that took place under
‘Thatcherism’ had particular ramifications for the underclass in Britain, as it was traditional
working-class employment such as mining and steelwork that was diminished during this
period. The history of football is rooted in the working-class and, while violence has always
accompanied the sport to some degree, hooliganism is a construct that arose in tandem
with Thatcher’s Conservatives influence on British society. The increased violence that
characterises hooliganismwas in reaction to a perceived emasculation of working-class men
with regards to class, employment, sexuality and lifestyle. The collective articulation of such
violence through the microcosmic community of a football firm offers some reconciliation
with the traditional working-class masculine ethos that was perceived to be lost under
Thatcher, though this reconciliation is, in places, troubled.

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Introduction
An etymological investigation of the word ‘hooliganism’ finds that the term was first
used as a pejorative colloquialism to describe working-class members of the United States
Coast Guard in 1898. The negative connotations that associated ‘hooliganism’ with rough,
proletarian street gangs were sustained throughout the twentieth-century because, as Gary
Armstrong discerns, hooliganism ‘has always troubled the authorities […] because it reflects
the spirit and wayward energy of the mob.’1 Highlighting the intense contemporary
discrimination that surrounds the phenomenon, Armstrong proceeds to argue that
‘hooliganism’ is ‘an unstable, performative social construct, one entrenched in class
prejudice, and amenable to political manipulation.’2 This project, therefore, seeks to
disregard the established stereotypes of the modern football hooligan and investigate the
complex ontology of the phenomenon in three chapters.
Chapter One outlines the socio-historical conditions of the relevant period, notably
the importance of the tenure of Margaret Thatcher, between 1979 and 1990. Characterised
by austere, neoliberal economics, ‘Thatcherism’ was responsible for the deindustrialization
and privatization of the British economy which, as Nicola Rehling affirms, led ‘traditional
working class formations, communities and identities to be reshaped under late capitalism.’3
The resultant undermining of an orthodox working class masculinity that was entrenched in
industrialised employment, and its concomitant lifestyle, resulted in the alienation and
1 Gary Armstrong, Football Hooligans: Knowing the Score (Oxford: Berg, 1998), p. 6.
2 Armstrong, p. 14.
3 Nicola Rehling,‘‘It’s About Belonging’; Masculinity,Collectivity and Community in British Hooligan Firms’,
Journal of Popular Film and Television, 39:4, 2011, p. 163
<http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/01956051.2011.555252> [accessed 22 March 2016]

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emasculation of men throughout Britain. Liberal democracy, therefore, was perceived to be
a paradoxically repressive socialsystemthat affected the sexuality,lifestyleand class position
of the working-class male.
The purported inequities of this political and economic system gave rise to explosions
of subjective, retaliatory violence which are detailed in Chapter Two. This aggression is
presented as an attempt to counteract the pacifying effects of liberal democracy upon
quotidian male existence through the ‘buzz’ of fighting. The ‘buzz’, in Rehling’s terms, is
‘connected to an assertion of male agency and primal aggression […] which are threatened
by postmodernity and mass culture,’4 interpreting the implementation of violence as an
attempt to reclaim this ‘primal’ and instinctive masculine ethos.
The theme of violence segues into Chapter Three, which focusses on its
implementation within the context of footballing firms and communities. In a post-industrial
landscape in which neo-individualismhas fostered class atomisation, football clubs and firms,
with their historic background of working-class homogeneity, are interpreted, in the words of
John Clarke and his colleagues, to be ‘a collective response on behalf of young working-class
people to the tensions caused by intergenerational conflict in conjunction with their
subordinate class position.’5 Providing more than simply an attractive medium for collective
action, they are also relied upon as a substitution for the working-class communities that are
no longer accessible in the post-Thatcher context.
4 Rehling, p. 165
5 John Clarke, Stuart Hall,Tony Jefferson, Brian Roberts, ‘Subcultures, Cultures and Class’, TheSubcultures
Reader, ed. by Ken Gelder (New York: Routledge, 2005), p. 99.

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The study of the phenomenon of football hooliganism as a response to Thatcherite
neoliberalism is, in this project, read through two novels. Situated in a twentieth-century fin-
de-siècle moment, John King’s The Football Factory [1997] and Irvine Welsh’s Marabou Stork
Nightmares [1995] depict the existential struggle of demographically aligned protagonists in
a working class landscape ravaged by Thatcherite policies. Edinburgh-born Welsh gained
prominence during the 1990s as a preacher of male disaffection in novels that explored the
notion of psychological escape, be it through alcohol and heroin in Trainspotting or, in the
case of Marabou Stork Nightmares, through collectivised violence. King, by comparison,
despite having gained a reputation as an unashamedly popularist novelist, provides a multi-
layered insight into topics of public interest, such as the NHS in White Trash or the alienated
masculinity and concomitant hooliganism in The Football Factory. Through the use of a first
person narrative style, both novels render the hooligan – typically an object of scrutiny and
intense media speculation – into a speaking, active subject, providing an insight into an
ordinarily exclusive subculture.
The futility of the political and socioeconomic conditions that resulted from
Thatcherism can thus be interpreted as a primary cause of football hooliganism. However,
this dissertation interrogates the phenomenon of organised football violence via this
contextual framework, whilst also analysing the extent of the redemptive qualities of football
clubs and firms - as an alternative to working-class communities – through a study of the
methodology of violence.

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Chapter 1
The notion of football violence is not a modern construct. In 1314, King Edward II
banned ‘folk’ football – a primitive and uncouth activity which involved rival villages, a pig’s
bladder and any expanse of grass – as he believed that the over exuberance and discord of
spectators was contributing to social instability. This pioneering form of the game, with
arbitrary parameters regarding violence, numeracy of players, and even the use of a ball, was
seen as a threat to the model of authority and civilisation due to the extent of its popularity.
However, even after the refining standardisation of nationwide rules and the formation of
the Football Association (FA) in 1863, the spectre of violence has always shadowed the game.
The fear of the effects of ‘mob mentality’ upon football spectators has, to one degree or
another, been prevalent in the mind of the establishment for over half a millennia. More
recently, the Millwall ‘Den’ was closed three times during the interwar period as a result of
violent crowd disturbance, whilst a police report from 1905 describes the arrest of a 70 year
old Preston woman from a group of drunk and disorderly North End fans following a game
against Blackburn Rovers. However, as Richard Giulianotti articulates, football related
violence preceding the latter half of the 20th century was ‘generated mainly by match-related
causes such as perceived bias from the part of referees, or ‘foul’ play by visiting teams.’6 The
phenomenon of modern ‘football hooliganism’, for Giulianotti, ‘refers not to traditional
outbreaks of disorder, but instead to the social genesis of distinctive fan sub-cultures and
their engagement in regular and collective violence, primarily with rival peers,’7 and arose in
6 Richard Giulianotti, Football:A Sociology of the Global Game (Malden: Blackwell,1999),p. 45.
7 Giulianotti,p.49.

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the late 1970s, with an exponential trajectory which is inextricably linked to the sort of
repressive neo-liberal socioeconomics pioneered by Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan.
Historically, football teams were founded on the premise of proximity and class, equating
large industrial centres to breeding grounds for organised male sport. Manchester United,
statistically the most successful team in English football, adhere to this model through the
context of their humble beginnings as ‘Newton Heath LYR Football Club,’ with both players
and fans compiled from the Carriage and Wagon department of the Lancashire and Yorkshire
Railway. The resulting homogeneity within clubs fostered sentiments of shared identity, and
the strong working class bonds established between both fans and players were a
characteristic of clubs in the twentieth-century until the arrival of Margaret Thatcher’s
government in 1979.
Thatcher’s implementation of conviction policies against the power of trade unions,
the privatisation of industry and the establishment of laissez-faire economics, as fundamental
tenets of liberal democracy, radically transformed the British working class landscape. A
significant ancillary effect of such economics was the elevation of capital into a dominant
position of power over labour through a professionalization of the economy. Although
Thatcher’s decision to invest in emerging markets such as banking services was financially
viable - the output of primary industries such as mining and railway were no longer justifying
their significant expenditure – it was accompanied by detrimental consequences both
domestically and within the workplace. The reduction of these traditional industries triggered
an ontological crisis within the demographic most greatly affected: the young, white, working
class male. Thatcher’s ‘financialization’ of the British economy did not just threaten the
livelihood of Britain’s male lumpenproletariat, who made up nearly a third of the British
population, but their manhood. Physical and manual work was a significant cornerstone in

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the construction of masculine identity at this time, and the policies of Thatcherism, which
closedcoal mines, factories,ship yards and steelmills nationwide, prevented young men from
performing their patrilineal ‘duty’ of labour.
Consequentially, young men were forced into jobs which departed from the physical
exertion that had defined the working-class male experience. King’s protagonist Tom Johnson
bemoans the excruciating banality of his manufacturing job, claiming that ‘stacking boxes five
days solid takes it out of you. Cardboard rubbing against your hands eight hours a day takes
away the feeling. You go into remote control and the brain goes numb.’8 What Tom describes
as ‘the feeling’ is not only referring to the somatic effects of such work, but to the
psychologically diminishing power that it has upon orthodox masculinity. The predominant
focus of male labour shifted from the primary sector, which required the masculine qualities
of strength, machismo and perseverance, into the secondary and tertiary sectors. The work
in these sectors, being monotonously bureaucratic and with less tangible products of labour,
contributed to an internalisation of frustration and inadequacy within a male psyche so
accustomed to being dominant and supportive, as encapsulated by Jennifer Marchbank:
‘Primary sector jobs are characterised as skilled, secure, with decent pay and conditions and
the possibility of advancement through training and promotion […] Secondary sectors are
antithetical.’9 Equally, Roy Strang laments the ontological limitations of being raised in a large
Scottish housing project with no traditional employment opportunities as ‘a wonderful
apprenticeship for the boredom that this kind of semi-life entails,’ (MSN, P. 51) a ‘semi-life’
which is later revealed to as being ‘brought in tae dae the crap jobs that nae other cunt
8 John King, The Football Factory (London: Random House, 1997),p.2. All further references will betaken from
this edition with the page number given followingin parenthesis.
9 Jennifer Marchbank, Introduction to Gender: Social Science Perspectives (Oxford, Routledge, 2014),p. 84.

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wanted tae dae.’ (MSN, p. 80) The apathy of both men with regards to their employment is
demonstrative of the changing landscape for the British working-class.
Significant resentment towards the changing landscape of male employment arises,
in Nichola Rehling’s terms, from ‘fears of societalfeminization and male domestication.’10 This
transitional epoch in British history occurred as, for the first and, to date, only time in modern
British history, neither the Head of State nor the Prime Minister were male, threatening a
symbolic castration of masculinity through a loss of male authority from the top of society.
Furthermore, neoliberalism encouraged women to reject the confines of the domestic space
on the basis on individualism, resulting in unprecedented numbers of women entering the
waged economy in tandem with men. As a result, an enormous amount of pressure was
placed upon the androcentric notion of man as the sole breadwinner. Male youths suddenly
found themselves in asituation in which they perceived that the nation for whom their fathers
had fought a generation earlier – in the ultimate fulfilment of traditional masculinity – had
abandoned them. There is no greater exemplification of this than the fact that, in 1985,
Thatcher’s government decided the threat posed by hooliganism was so great that a ‘war
cabinet’ was established to tackle what famously become known as ‘a law and order issue.’
Roy observes that ‘the only things that seemed to give Dad enjoyment after work were
drinking alcohol and listening to Churchill’s wartime speeches. Pools of tears would well up
behind his thick lenses as he was moved by his idol’s stirring rhetoric.’ (MSN, p. 29) His father’s
nostalgic enjoyment of these two quintessentially masculine associations indicates a desire
for the reclamation of traditional codes of male behaviour which are no longer economically
accessible post-Thatcher.
10 Rehling, p. 163.

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Tom exhibits a similar pessimism in relation to this new reality of contemporary
masculinity, asking ‘why torture yourself with visions of female beauty and the joys of sex
when hours of mindless warehouse tedium was the best you could hope for from the rest of
the day.’ (FF, p. 39) These sentiments are actualised during one of Tom’s many episodes of
alcoholic escapism, in which the barmaid serving him ‘looks at the glass she’s filling or over at
the wall the whole time, as though I don’t exist.’ (FF, p. 6) His response of staring ‘at her tits
so she knows I’m alive’ (FF, p. 6) is an attempt to re-sexualise himself in retaliation to
repressive forces of neoliberalism upon conventional masculinity. Rehling writes that, in this
dialogue, ‘the tedium of such work represses male virility and agency, hence the flabby,
undisciplined male body.’11 This critique is embodied by Sid, one of the Chelsea
‘Headhunters’, who ‘whilst leaning his back against the cold metal of the lorry’s wall, hitched
faded jeans over a sweltering beer gut and imagined playing centre-forward in the cup final.’
(FF, p. 33) His poor physical condition, coupled with his ‘daydreams’ (FF, p. 33) of being a
professional footballer, indicates a dissatisfaction with contemporary male lifestyle which, as
Johnson highlights, is shared by demographically aligned men nationwide: ‘the big bastard
who’s one hundred per cent beer monster, gut spilling over the front of his jeans […] you
know the one, he’s fucking famous and you meet him up and down the country.’ (FF, p. 15)
Both men also highlight the emasculating nature of not just the jobs themselves, but
the lifestyle to which they are inextricably linked. Roy acknowledges that his home may be ‘a
concentration camp for the poor, but I’ve always defined the place as less characterised by
poverty than by boredom,’ (MSN, p. 19) indicating that financial difficulty is preferable to
aimless boredom of his quotidian existence. Similarly, Tom describes a midweek visit of
11 Rehling, p. 163

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Rochdale in the cup as one of many ‘boring home games’ (FF, p. 7) but admits that you ‘turn
up because what else are you going to do?’ (FF, p. 7) These sentiments of ambivalence shown
towards contemporary male employment and the frustration at its departure from orthodox
labour are testament to the listlessness of British masculinity during this period, to the extent
that Roy proposes that it would be preferable to ‘pull the fuckin plug.’12
The effects of free-market economics upon the traditional British class system were
unmistakable; in 1979, the year Thatcher came to power, the post-tax income of the top 10%
was five times that of the bottom 10%; by 1997, the year that saw the end of a twenty year
Conservative premiership, it had doubled to ten times as much. These post-Thatcherite
novels, therefore, depict the resentment that arose amongst men who felt utterly
disconnected to a government that had spent the previous two decades deconstructing
traditional masculinity. Johnson sneers that he ‘should shut the old brain down and learn to
obey becausethe Eton wankers in charge know best, just do as you’re told, follow the orders.’
(FF, p. 19) Roy, meanwhile, when describing his forays away from his Edinburgh housing
scheme which resembled a ‘concentration camp for the poor,’ (MSN, p. 19) provides an
insight into the constraints of class as he reminisces that ‘people in the big hooses, hooses
that were the same sizeas our block, where sixtyfamilies lived; when they sawme they would
just go away and phone the polis … aw I wanted tae dae was tae watch birds.’ (MSN, p. 26) In
a society in which money has become the primary indicator of masculine performance, those
members of the working class feel both emasculated by class polarization and bitter towards
the middle classes for being deemed superior in this social context. In stereotyping the two
doctors in charge of keeping him alive during his coma as ‘Middle-class English Cunt One […]
12 IrvineWelsh,Marabou Stork Nightmares, (London, Jonathan Cape, 1995) p. 51.All further references will be
taken from this edition with the page number followingin parenthesis.

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and Two,’ (MSN, p. 57) and blaming the ‘disapproving threats of my middle-class teachers’
for ‘lower[ing] my self-esteemeven further,’ (MSN, p. 36) Roy highlights the gulf in class that
is fostered by neoliberalism.
However, the most significantindictment of the post-Thatcher landscapewith regards to class
polarization is the liberation that both men enjoy when detached from it. Roy’s claimthat the
aforementioned threats of his ‘middle class teachers calling me a warped evil and nasty little
creature […] [left him] wanting to be invisible’ (MSN, p. 36) is juxtaposed with the
‘empowerment’ (MSN, p. 87) that he experiences following his families emigration to South
Africa. He finds that his ‘interests […] were positively encouraged […] Once I got over this
culture shock, I found myself relishing the acquisition of knowledge’, even stating that he
‘had, for the first time, ambition of a sort.’ (MSN, p. 77) Likewise, his expatriate uncle Gordon
tells himthat he’s ‘a Jubilee boy, Roy, apenniless Scotsman from Granton. There I was nothing
[…] here, I count.’ (MSN, p. 84) A similar thought process is displayed by Tom when
considering his experience living abroad; he ‘had an Englishman’s distrust of politics and
intellectualism, but his life was ground in a hatred of wealth and privilege. Outside England,
however, he could relax.’ (FF, p. 134) Both novels, therefore, attribute blame for the state of
contemporary masculinity upon the socio-economic conditions in which they are set.
The subversion of young working-class men from a position of producer to consumer
further evidences the socio-economic overhaul during this period which was to the detriment
of conventional masculinity. Having grown up throughout the transitional age of Thatcher,
Roy’s father exhibits an internalisation of the neoliberal principles of individualism and
consumerism. Roy remembers that ‘we were the first family in the district to have all the key
consumer goods as they came onto the market […] For some reason, Dad though they made

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us […] a cut above the other families in the scheme.’ (MSN, p. 27) Furthermore, in berating
Roy for ‘hanging out with they bloody casuals’ instead of ‘doin that joab in computers now n
aw,’ he reveals an internalisation of Thatcherite economic policies, underlined further
through his description of such work as ‘a thing ay the future.’ (MSN, p. 143) Tom Johnson
unconsciously embraces the bourgeoning commodity culture as he suggests that‘Spurs losing
vital seconds with indecision as the scouts go back and make their report’ would be remedied
if the ‘tight cunts [tried] investing in a couple of mobile phones.’ (FF, p. 28) Furthermore, he
highlights his belief in the police, the greatest physical agent of the state, as carrying out their
job with bias in relation to class. This is expressed through a ‘row’ at Tottenham, in which he
states that ‘I want to laugh becausethis is Tottenham. A fucking shit hole and the old billdon’t
put cameras down poor people’s streets. They’re only interested in protecting […] the rich
cunts in Hampstead and Kensington.’ (FF, p. 30) Similarly, Roy sussing ‘oot quickly that the
polis werenae bothered too much aboot crimes against the person as long as you never
bothered posh cunts or shoppers,’ (MSN, p. 137) highlights a societal prioritisation of capital
and consumerism above morality and justice. Welsh elaborates on the harmful effects of a
consumer society upon the construction of Roy’s sexuality, which is erroneously shaped from
his experiences with pornography. His first sexual encounter narrates that he ‘stood close to
her then moved onto her, and started rubbing up against her till I came, talking like they did
in the wankmags […] slut . . . slut . . . dirty fuckin slag.’(MSN, p. 62) His sexualityis thus proven
to be constructed artificiallyas opposed to empirically, resulting in his ignorant and unhealthy
stance. Furthermore, in admitting that he ‘never liked the pictures of women’s fannies […]
where the genitals were exposed in too much detail. They were like raw, open wounds, totally
at odds with the smiling, inviting faces of the models,’ (MSN, p. 111) Roy exhibits a repulsion

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for genuine, organic sexuality, instead embracing the artificial and manufactured product of
a consumerist society.
The multifaceted effects of Thatcherism upon British society are apparent, from its
catalysing of the fragmentation of traditional and organic communities, to its progressive
privatization of everyday existence. However, the unifying motif that links all these issues is
the fraught relationship between the community and the self. As David Cannadine argues,
Thatcher’s attack on the trade unions, as well as her stress upon the market, the public and
the individual, achieved ‘the shiftfrom the traditional preoccupation with people as collective
producers to the alternative notion of people as individual consumers.’13 It is this shift that
can be interpreted as being responsible for the phenomenon of football hooliganismwhich is
explored further in Chapter Two.
13 David Cannadine, The Rise and Fall of Class in Britain (New York: Columbia University Press,1999),p. 12.

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Chapter Two
Building upon the research findings established in the previous chapter, this chapter
investigates how Thatcherite policies were responsible for a redrawing of society which
included the emergence of women in the workplace and, as I argue throughout, how this
phenomenon impacted upon traditional working-class employment and lifestyle. This
neoliberal revolution contributed to a diminishing of traditional masculinity with relation to
sexuality, class and employment and, as such, young men developed the need for a medium
through which to articulate a growing frustration at what they perceived to be the usurping
of their importance within daily life. Eric Dunning, Patrick Murphy and John M. Williams’s
observation that ‘violence […] is one of the few sources of excitement available to these ‘un-
incorporated males’, who are denied the education and occupational gratification offered to
males of the middle classes’14 highlights the indiscriminate availability of violence, regardless
of socio-economic standing. Indeed, with many other traditional signifiers of masculine
identity eroded by liberal democracy, violence, as they configure it, becomes an attractive
tool for an entire demographic who are ‘white, Anglo-Saxon, working-class heterosexuals who
are fed up of being told they were shit.’ (FF, p. 116) The myriad frustration experienced by
this new, displaced demographic began to crystalise, and find articulation via, around the
beautiful game: football. As Chapter Three will outline, the subculture surrounding the sport
14 Eric Dunning, Patrick Murphy,John M. Williams, ‘Ordered Segmentation and the Socio-Genesis of Football
Violence: A Critiqueof Marsh’s ‘Ritualized Aggression’Hypothesis and the Outlineof a Sociological
Alternative.’ in The Sociological Study of Sport: Configurational and Interpretive Studies, ed. by A. Tomlinson.
(Eastbourne: LeisureStudies Association,1981),p.39.

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became central to the forging of new communities in the post-Thatcher era as football
hooligans employed violence in order to re-establish a concrete masculine identity.
The implementation of violence as an attempt to reclaim male virility and sexuality
was prevalent during and after the Thatcherite period, exemplified through the fact that
increasing rates of male impotence correlated with an augmentation in the crimes that have
traditionally been cited as indicators of this sort of dissatisfaction, primarily assault and
domestic abuse charges. Tom’s difficulty in adjusting to contemporary ideas surrounding
consent and gender equality is highlighted through his chauvinistic boasting that he ‘could
see the curve of her tits through a tight t-shirt that she shouldn’t be wearing if she wants to
keep them to herself.’ (FF, p. 48) The thinly veiled nature of the violence espoused here is
indicative of a series of interactions that play out within the novel in which women are
perpetually depicted as sexual objects; yet, his behaviour represents a stubborn protest
against the sort of changing cultural attitudes that have already begun to transform domestic
cultural life.
Roy’s sexual assault of one of his female classmates as a young adolescent,
meanwhile, is justified by him as a search for ‘a bit of respect […] [as his] fuckin entitlement
as a man,’ (MSN, p. 179) whilst Tom claims that ‘you can’t change human nature. Men are
always going to kick fuck out of each other then go off and shaft some bird. That’s life.’ (FF, p.
2) His violent androcentricity can be explained through Judith Butler’s phenomenological
theorising of ‘gender performativity,’15 in which she argues that masculinity must perpetually
reinforce itself through the use of ‘discursive practises.’16 Butler’s philosophy suggests that,
15 Judith Butler, Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity (New York: Routledge, 1990),p. 40.
16 Butler, p. 41.

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far from being ingrained in ‘human nature’ as Tomsuggests, aggressive misogyny and ‘phallic
posturing’17 are in fact posited as a defensive reaction to a male inability to adhere to
masculine expectation during this period. However, in their desperation to regain this
‘entitlement’, both Roy and Tom inadvertently useviolence not as ameans of restoring sexual
dominance, but as a substitute. The relationship between sexand violence is establishedfrom
the very opening lineof the narrative when Tomremarks, ‘if you seesomething run you chase.
Pure instinct.’ (FF, p. 1) Tom, here, outlines his belief in the points of intersection between
sex and violence, arguing that with ‘violence and sex, there’s sometimes little difference […]
It’s all about boosting the ego,’ (FF, p. 185) a boost necessitated by such effacing of
masculinity. A young and confused Roy makes a comparable link between sex and violence
during a fight on his estate, in which ‘he stood […] feeling the side of my face where his hand
had made contact throb in a strange harmony with my balls.’ (MSN, p. 101) The enactment
of violence is transformed into a psychological device employed to counter the reduction of
male sexual potency and dominance that was catalysed by Thatcherite policies.
Violence, as depicted in both novels, is used by the working-class as a means to
recapture a sense of masculinity that, under a repressive political system, was perceived to
have been lost in the sphere of both the domestic and the professional. Rehling highlights its
significance, arguing that ‘violence provides the buzz and homosocial ties that their
consumer-driven lifestyles and jobs in the service industry cannot offer’18 or, as Gerry Finn
understands it, as a way of ‘seeking the “flow” or “peak” experiences that allow an intense,
collective emotionality that is rarely accessed in everyday life.’19 Tom bemoans his banal job,
17 Butler, p. 42.
18 Rehling, p. 169.
19 Gerry Finn, ‘Football Violence: A Societal Psychological Perspective’in Football, Violence, and Social Identity,
ed. by Richard Giulianotti,Norman Bonney and Mike Hepworth (London: Routledge, 1994), p. 94.

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saying that ‘it pisses me off when the warehouse interferes with Chelsea […] I do my duty and
want to leavewhen there’s agame on.’ (FF, p. 41) His interpretation of his job and the football
– or football violence - as being antithetical engenders his belief that the respective
experiences are diametrically opposed, which serves to accentuate the importance of
violence in order to ‘balance things out.’ (FF, p. 96) In the build up to a fight between the firms
of Chelsea and Tottenham, Tom underpins the liberating power of violence when declaring
that ‘you can feel the tension and I’m buzzing. Been looking forward to this all week. Washes
away all the boredom of slaving over hot cardboard boxes.’ (FF, p. 28) However, violence is
depicted as possessing a more profound significance than as a means to simply alleviate the
boredom of quotidian working life. As Giulianotti has noted, ‘sociologists have tended to
underestimate the psycho-social pleasures of football violence,’20 a belief reflected in Tom’s
recounting of the fight itself: ‘We’re running down the street and there’s that noise that
comes from somewhere deep down inside you when you steam in. No words, just a roar like
we’re back in the fucking jungle or something.’ (FF, p. 28) His portrayal of such violence as
having an innate and organic quality is mirrored in Roy’s experience, who, in describing the
‘eyes of the cunt I was hitting […] filling up with fear’ as ‘the best feeling on earth.’ (MSN, p.
123) These ‘psycho-social’ pleasures embody Giulianotti’s argument that ‘the innate and
intense momentary beauty of hooliganism is revealed only to those who stride somatically
into the very eye of the storm, the hooligans themselves,’21 whilst also presenting the act as
tribal and organic.
Moreover, the notion of violence is perceived to be an essential component of the
masculine experience. Gary Armstrong, in his study of football hooliganism, argues that ‘the
20 Giulianotti, p.52.
21 Giulianotti, p.53.

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devastated economy […] and this post-industrial milieu […] means that men […] will always
seek out some classifiable ‘higher purpose’ to fight and die for.’22 Armstrong’s assessment of
working-class male apathy giving rise to violence resonates with Tom’s elevation of football
violence as possessing the potential to define a proponent’s entire life: ‘it’s about knowing
you’ve done something that will last the rest of your life.’ (FF, pg 102) He labels the ‘rush [as]
so good that you love it more than anything […] they say it’s adrenalin and that may be true,
but all I know is that nothing compares, not drugs, sex, money, nothing.’ (FF, p. 102)
Furthermore, he assures himself that ‘when he’s an old geezer pissed off a couple of pints […]
at least I’ll have lived while I had the strength’ (FF, p. 103) whilst bestowing pity upon
‘conformers […] whose bitter voices echo through the concrete, locked in council cells with
only the telly for company, taking their hatred out on West London.’ (FF, p. 224) His fixation
upon sensually experiencing his world is a reflection of the numbing effects of neoliberal
economics upon conventional masculinity.
The perpetration of violence as a deliberate response to repressive neoliberalism is
exemplified through the fact that, as a child, Roy’s is unable to appreciate its significance.
Indoctrinated into it by his father, who would ‘force us [Roy and his brother] to fight until one
or both of us broke down in tears of misery, pain and frustration,’ (MSN, p. 29) his
preadolescence prevents him from comprehending the masochistic endurance of pain, as a
means of reclaiming a ‘mythical, original, authentic masculinity.’23 In one particular fight, Roy
recalls ‘opening up his brother’s eye with a tearing twist of the glove’ (MSN, p. 30) and feeling
‘a jolt of fear […] I wanted to stop; it was the blood, splashing out onto his face.’ (MSN, p. 30)
His position of reluctance and distress regarding aggression is juxtaposed with what he
22 Armstrong, p. 317.
23 Rehling, p. 169.

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perceives to be an inexplicable fearlessness during his first meet with the mob. Perplexed, he
admits, ‘I wasn’t scared at all. I didn’t know why; it seemed as though I’d been surrounded by
latent and manifest violence allmy life.’(MSN, p. 134) It is only retrospectively that he realises
the significance of his environment upon the changing of his attitude: ‘This was different
though. A new situation. It’s only now that I realise that behaviour always has contexts and
precedents.’ (MSN, p. 134)
Roy’s comments regarding the importance of ‘contexts and precedents’ can be
understood through the interpretations of Slavoj Žižek. Žižek differentiates between
‘subjective violence […] [which is] tangible violence performed by a clearly identifiable
agent,’24 and ‘objective violence’ which, as ‘the counterpart to an all-too-visible subjective
violence […] may be invisible, but must be taken into account if one is to make sense of what
otherwise seems to be ‘irrational’ explosions of subjective violence.’25 In the context of late
twentieth-century Britain, objective violence can be construed as the systemic, invisible
violence of neoliberal capitalism. Stuart Hall, in highlighting the disproportionate media
attention that was given to football violence during Thatcher’s premiership, comments that
‘we see the violence of the street brawl or the pub fight, but not the violence implicit in
poverty, unemployment and class exploitation.’26 In doing so, Hallprovides an explanation for
football violence as being not simply ‘an irrational explosion of subjective violence’, but as
calculated resistance to a perceived attempt to deinstitutionalise masculinity. Welsh
indirectly addresses Hall’s diagnostic account of football violence in Glue, a hooligan novel
populated by characters in Marabou Stork Nightmares. His protagonist, Duncan Ewart, posits
24 Slavoj Žižek,Violence: Six Sideways Reflections (New York: Picador,2008),p. 1.
25 Žižek, p. 2.
26 Stuart Hall, ‘The Treatment of ‘Football Hooligans’in the Press’,Football Hooliganism, The Wider Context,
ed. by Roger Ingham, Stuart Hall,John Clarke,Peter Marsh and Jim Donovan (London, Inter-Action Imprint,
1978),p. 94.

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in relation to the media obsession with football casuals that ‘they’ve aw been demonised oot
ay all proportion tae take people’s minds off what this Government’s been daein for years,
the real hooliganism. Hooliganism tae the health service, hooliganism tae education.’27
Ewart’s polemical commentary proposes that the incrimination of hooligans is an
epiphenomenon of the government’s attempt to sustainsocialorder atwhatever cost,as Tom
notices, ‘they let the fucking queers and sadists batter each other, but when it comes to a bit
of football violence they get on their platforms and start preaching.’ (FF, p. 152)
Frustration, therefore, at being vilifiedby a societywith which they are so disaffected,
offers some explanation of the violence which, as the most potent physical manifestation of
the state,28 is targeted towards the police. Both novels canvass the fraught relationship
between the police and the working-class, with Roy claiming that one of his first memories
was his father ‘drumming into us’ that we should ‘never tell those cunts anything.’ (MSN, p.
26) The draconian, and often equally violent, tactics of law enforcement deployed to control
hooliganism under Thatcher can be understood through a fear of what Armstrong labels as
an ‘unscripted participation,’29 or working class collectivity, as shall be addressed in Chapter
Three. For example, when arrested for his proximity to a fight with Manchester City fans,Tom
is called ‘fucking scum’ (FF, p. 44) and accused of being one of ‘you lot destroying this country
and giving the rest of us a bad name’ (FF, p. 44) as he is manhandled into the back of a police
van. A direct association is established here between the hooligans and the police with the
‘Headhunters roving their eyes over the Holte End for the Villa mob’ (FF, p. 202) functioning
as uncannily similar to ‘the van of coppers [moving] slowly, eyeballing everyone under the
27 IrvineWelsh,Glue (London: Jonathan Cape, 2001) p. 167.
28 In his book ‘Ideology and Ideological StateApparatus’,from The Norton Anthology of Theory and Criticism
(1970),Louis Althusser labels the policeas the most significantinstitution of the RepressiveState Apparatus
(RSAs).
29 Gary Armstrong, ‘Football Hooligans:Theory and Evidence’, Sociological Review 39 (1991).

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ageof forty’. (FF, pg 7)However, Marabou Stork Nightmares and TheFootball Factory indicate
a darker extension of Hall’s philosophy, portraying a subversion of the idea of hooligans as
aggressors and the police as protectors. Upon arriving at Tottenham for an away match, Tom
observes that;
‘The old bill are tooled-up and looking for aggro … They’ve all got their numbers
covered so there’s no chance of identification and you know that any complaint
you make against police brutality comes to nothing. They love football fans
because they can do what they want. They’re the shit of creation, lower than
niggers, Pakis, yids, because at least they don’t hide behind a uniform.’ (FF, p. 31)
This description of police attitude and behaviour is evocative of many of the concerns
that were expressed by Thatcher with regard to hooligans. From the beginning of the 1989-
90 football league season, the government insisted upon the issuing of photographic-ID
membership cards to any supporter wishing to attend a football match, an initiative that was
enforced in all 92 clubs in the Football League. However, as articulated in this extract, such
explicit attempts to cull ‘mob mentality’ and expose hooligans were delegitimised through
the hypocritical anonymity of their enforcers. Tom’s claim that ‘we just want to be left alone’
(FF, p. 22) and that’ we’re only interested in the other team’s mob and we don’t care about
anyone else’ (FF, p. 152) contravenes the stereotype of hooligans as mindless thugs. Peter
Marsh coheres with this depiction when arguing that ‘football violence was rarely injurious or
mindless but rather ritualized aggression,regulated by tacit rules, enabling a theatrical display
of ‘manly’ prowess and the acquisition of peer recognition and identity.’30 In his rhetoric, Tom
questions ‘why […] anyone would any fuck about with civilians? You just make yourself look
30 Peter Marsh,The Rules of Disorder (London: Routledge, 1978),p. 88.

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like a cunt if you start having a go at old men and kids’ (FF, p. 44) and, in the process,
demonstrates how hooliganism is geared towards an agenda greater than unbridled and
indiscriminate violence. The ‘tacit rules’ to which Marsh refers are evidenced through a
collective desire to ensure that football remains ‘nothing too serious […] a running punch-up
and a few bruises’ (FF, p. 199) as, contrary to the media sensationalism surrounding it, ‘rows’
were never intended to cause serious injury or death. Accordingly, when ‘a couple of blades
come out, sparks of silver fear flashing in the early afternoon sunlight,’ (FF, p. 29) the
communal response is to ‘pull back, mob everyone together and do the offender,’ (FF, p. 29)
while Roy admits that he ‘felt a bit bad about using a blade, no because ah had any
reservations aboot improving his features through plastic surgery, but because bladework
was sneaky […] we were intae toe-to-toe stuff in our crew.’ (MSN, p. 172) The ‘old bill’, by
comparison, ‘steam in, not even sizing up the situation as they pick on a young lad nearby,
cracking his head with their truncheons,’ (FF, p. 30) demonstrating less discipline and
rationality that the supposed thugs they combat. Subsequently, the role of the police in
tackling hooliganism is presented as counterproductive, as ‘the old bill are so fucking thick
that they just whip everything up’ (FF, p. 32) and ‘they stitchthemselves up in the end because
they turn everyone against them.’ (FF, p. 185) Giulianotti has highlighted the ineptitudes of
police regarding hooligan management through his beliefthat ‘there is no prestige (but plenty
of ridicule and disdain) to be gained from attacking illegitimate targets, such as ordinary
supporters.’31 They play, if anything, an antagonistic role, uniting football fans through
negative cohesion againstthem, as Tom identifies: ‘I hate the bastards worse than Tottenham
and West Ham combined. Fucking scum the lot of them, hiding behind uniforms, licking the
31 Giulianotti,p.51.

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paymaster’s arse […] they only avoid the kicking they deserve because of those fucking
cameras and those fucking uniforms.’ (FF, p. 62) Indeed, the blurring of the line between
enforcement and brutality was so great that in the hooligan film Cass, the eponymous
protagonist brands the police as ‘the biggest groups of uniformed hooligans this country has
ever seen,’32 anotion which has been reinforced by the recent conclusions of the Hillsborough
enquiries: The Taylor enquiry ruled on the 26th April 2016 that senior police officials had
unified in collective silence despite knowing that they had committed fault. The violence
exhibited by football hooligans, therefore, is legitimised as a natural and humane defence
mechanism against the repressive violence inherent in the system.
32 Cass, dir.by Jon S. Baird (Logic Pictures,2008).

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Chapter 3
Chapters One and Two have outlined the disruptive effects of Thatcher’s neoliberal
revolution upon the traditional working class psyche,and the counterattack of the disaffected
demographic through various implementations of violence. Although the use of violence as
an articulation of frustration offered a temporary catharsis to the relatively swift
emasculation of the working-class, it failed to provide sufficient reconciliation with the
conventional working-class experience that had been lost under Thatcherite policies. As
articulated in Chapter One, the origins of football clubs as functioning proletarian organisms
presented an attractive framework through which working-class men could re-inscribe
masculinity during and following Thatcher’s tenure. However, despite the centrality of
football to this phenomenon, the actual game itself is purported to be insignificant: ‘you go
up, have a punch up if you’re lucky, maybe see the game, then get out.’ (FF, pg. 6) John Clarke
has stated clearly that hooliganism is ‘not about football, nothing to do with it. It’s about
tribes,’33 and this sentiment is reflected in Roy’s first experience with the firm being
characterised ‘by the swedgin […] I don’t remember anything about the match, except wee
Mickey Weir running up and down the wing, trying vainly to play fitba.’ (MSN, p. 134) Football
communities, therefore, are perceived to offer a means of escape from what Zygmunt
Bauman has termed the ‘liquid modernity’ of Britain’s society post-Thatcher. Describedas the
growing conviction that ‘change is the only permanence, and that the only certainty is
uncertainty,’34 Bauman’s philosophy argues that the postmodern society populated by Tom
33 John Clarke, ‘The Skinheads and the Magical Recovery of Community’, Resistance through Rituals: Youth
Subcultures in Post-War Britain. Ed by Stuart Hall and Tony Jefferson (London: Routledge, 2004), p. 202.
34 Zygmunt Bauman, Life in Fragments: Essays in Postmodern Morality (Oxford: Blackwell,1995),p. 82.

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and Roy is characterised by ‘nomadism […] and feelings of uncertainty with regards to places,
jobs, spouses, values, and sometimes more, such as political or sexual orientation.’35 These
sentiments of insecurity, canvassed and analysed in Chapters One and Two, are, in these two
novels, combatted through the participation of young men to footballing communities, to
varying degrees of success.
For disenfranchised young males, football communities and ‘firms’ provide a modern
equivalent of the paradigm of traditional masculinity that was significantly blurred under
Thatcher. Roy initially expresses disdain for the sport, proclaiming that ‘there was no way ah
wis gaun tae any fuckin fitba’ (MSN, p. 101) as it ‘seemed a drag to me […] I identified with
my own lack of ability.’ (MSN, p. 117) However, he develops an attraction to football as he
realises that it is a contemporary method through which alliances and hierarchies can be
legitimately established between men. During one of Roy’s early experiences away at
Motherwell, he narrates that ‘Dexy, Willie and myself were eager lieutenants, laughing
sycophantically at any jocular top boy who played to the gallery, but remaining stern,
impassive and deferential when a psycho held court.’ (MSN, p. 113) The ‘eager’ response that
is given at being concretely aware of his seniority and standing within this neo-tribal
environment is contrastable with the listlessnessofhis existenceprior to the casuals,inwhich
he ‘was a dreamer […] because I never really fitted in anywhere.’ (MSN, p. 35) Likewise, Tom
romantic’s depiction of the actions of the hooligans in nautical terms, with ‘Harris sitting at
the front, ship’s captain, in charge of a select few who knew what they were doing’ (FF, p.
120) demonstrates his belief inand relianceupon an hierarchical and organisationalstructure.
35 Bauman, pg. 8.

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For Welsh and King, the shared bonds that exist not just within, but across, footballing
communities provide an alleviation from the problematic categorisation of an entire nation
as ‘British’. In considering his justification for football conflict, Tom argues that:
‘it’s easy working out where football fans come from. It’s not even the style.
There’s something more. Scousers looks like scousers. Geordies are geordies […]
the faces look like they belong to a different race. The hate must go back to tribal
times.’ (FF, p. 184)
The significant differences outlined by Tom between British regions with regards to
class and lifestyle reinforce Benedict Anderson’s idea of the nation as an ‘imagined
community.’ As Anderson articulates, a ‘nation is imagined because the members of even the
smallest nation will never know most of their fellow-members, meet them, or even hear of
them, yet in the minds of each lives the image of their communion.’36 Disenfranchised young
men, however, reject this universal classification on the grounds of the integral dissimilarity
between regional communities. As Rehling highlights, the term ‘British’ is ‘indubitably an
unstable signifierthat covers over numerous internal divisions,such as the entrenched north-
south divide, and is thus in constant need of reconsolidation,’37 a reconsolidation that is
achieved through the homogeneity that is established through football hooliganism. Tom
labels Britain as ‘a primitive nation full of primitive people. Different tribes from different
parts of the country’ (FF, p. 82) and states that ‘northerners hate us and we return the
compliment […] it’s like two countries in one.’ (FF, p. 123) However, by acknowledging that
36 Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of Nationalism (London:
Verso, 1991), p. 6-7.
37 Rehling, p. 171.

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‘when you get to a football ground we’re all the same really,’ (FF, p. 123) Tom provides an
insight into the potential that collective male violence has to coalesce men in different
working class groups. Equally, despite the intense spatial rivalry that exists between Chelsea
and Millwall, Tom admits that they’re ‘sound’ (FF, p. 5) and that ‘there’s grudging respect for
Millwall,’ (FF, p. 5) respect which is grounded in Millwall’s proficiency at ‘doing the business.’
(FF, p. 14) The systemof violence, while it does initially create antagonism among men, does
at least define them as ‘men’, in contrast with those who are effaced by this system. It is,
therefore, depicted as having the ability to replicate the homosocial bonds that existed prior
to Thatcher’s overhaul of the British economy, and transcend the petty and superficial
hostility of regional conflict.
The cultural and class atomisation that occurred under Thatcher is presented as being
remediable when tackled through the medium of footballing communities. Tom’s pragmatic
embracing of consumerism follows the example of his firm, who ‘dress sensibly […] and blend
into the background’ leaving the ‘army fatigues and funny haircuts for punks and sillies,’ (FF,
p. 22) Roy expounds asimilar rejection of the ‘flamboyancy of football culture,’38 as described
by Richard Haynes, proclaiming that ‘we had nae colours: we wir here tae dae the real
business. No for the fitba, the bigotry, the posturing, the pageantry.’ (MSN, p. 171) This novel
desire for anonymity within hooligan subcultures is enabled through an immersion within
society, investigated by Giulianotti who discerns that:
‘the neo-hooligan ‘habitus’ demands that the individual possesses economic and
cultural capital […] Consumption of goods also requires a sub-cultural savoir-
38 Richard Haynes, The Football Imagination: the Rise of Football Fanzine Culture (Aldershot: Ashgate
Publishing,1995),p. 43.

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faire; hooligans exercise a distinctive taste in the buying and consuming of
particular menswear.’39
Roy’s ethos is presented in keeping with Giulianotti’s definition, as he admits to the
reader that ‘the thing was that I was spending a lot of dough as well, mainly on clathes. Nearly
every penny I had went on new gear.’ (MSN, p. 136) His internalisation and adoption of the
neoliberal notions of individualism and consumerism that were initially to his detriment can
be interpreted as a necessary defence mechanism, but one that is only acceptable for men
within the social boundaries of a football firm. This is because, in Rehling’s terms, ‘displays of
collective violence […] defend against such rabid consumerism and narcissism being
feminizing.’40
Furthermore, ideas of consumerism and individualism have led football communities
to be departed as an improvement from the working-class communities that came before
them. While the issue of sexism remains, labelled ‘the unspoken term’41 by Adam Dawson
and Beatrice Campbell, analysis of the demography of modern football firms suggests the
incorporation of individuals from a wider range of class. Rehling has argued that: ‘while the
majority of hooligans are from working-class backgrounds, with intense emotional
investments in working class culture, they are not the archetypal, uneducated, low-income,
or unemployed working-class ‘yobs’ of the middle class imagination.’42 Roy identifies himself
accordingly, announcing that ‘we were big news because we were different; stylish, into the
violence just for itself, and actually in possession of decent IQ’s.’ (MSN, p. 137) The strength
39 Giulianotti,p.51.
40 Rehling, p. 168. My italics.
41 Beatrice Campbell,Adam Dawson, ‘Indecent Exposures,Men, Masculinity and Violence’, Hooligan Wars: The
Causes and Effects of Hooligan Violence, ed. by Mark Perryman (London: Mainstream,2002), p. 63.
42 Rehling, p. 170

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of affiliations within clubs are also depicted as having the ability to surpass racial divisions.
Despite the explicit racismentrenched in the ‘Headhunters’ socialinteraction and their liberal
use of the word ‘nigger,’ they are receptive to anyone, as long as they aren’t a ‘part-timer.’
(FF, p. 22) One individual, who Tom names ‘Black Paul’, is not able to escape ethnic
categorisation, but is described as ‘A Chelsea nigger first and foremost. Does the business for
Chelsea and that’s what counts.’ (FF, p. 22) The cohesive potential of footballing firms and
communities is thus shown to transcend various divisive prejudices in British society.
Football communities have been conveyed within these novels as providing a secure
environment for cathartic, masculine release that is perceived to have been restricted by
Thatcherite policies. As Armstrong has observed, ‘football enables the release of emotions
that men rarely manifest in their everyday life, with supporters hugging, kissing and declaring
their love for each other.’43 For Roy, who recalls that he ‘laughed with a liberating hysteria at
any banal joke or observation about the swedgin,’ (MSN, p. 135) the environment produced
within footballing communities is conducive to legitimate, unbridled behaviour without the
fear of judgement. Despite their apparent redemptive qualities, these novels provide an
ambivalent portrayal of football communities as a means to correct the atomisation and
isolation of neo-liberal economics.
The manner in which aggressive male sexuality, both between men and towards
women, is constructed within these social structures is fraught when considered in the
context of footballing communities as reconciliatory bodies. Prior to his engagement with the
‘CapitalCityService’, the moniker of Hibernian FC’s firm, Roy embodies the sexual‘nomadism’
and confusion outlined by Bauman. During an incident in his final school year, a primal Roy
43 Armstrong, p. 124.

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‘felt a dryness in ma mooth as my eyes feasted oan the Dressed By His Ma Cunt’s worried,
rabbit-like expression […] [he] roared, pointing at him, and bundled him into the cubicle at
knifepoint […] I forced the Dressed By His Ma Cunt to wank me off.’ (MSN, p. 109) Roy
experiences his own sexuality as confusing to him as, in his thirst for the power and respect
that has been withheld by liberal democracy, he contravenes his own belief that ‘he ‘hated
poofs. Hated the thought ay what those sick cunts did tae each other, pitting their cocks up
each other’s dirty arseholes. I would castrate all poofs.’ (FF, p. 82) However, his subsequent
admission to the ‘casuals’ and their subculture, far from enlightening him, instead provides
an environment that facilitates his ignorance and aggression. Building on Rehling’s comment
that ‘male intimacy in intensely homosocial situations inevitably gives rise to the question of
homoerotic desire,’44 Eve Sedgwick has argued that the two are synonymous, and highlighted
the contradictory predicament of homosocial ties as ‘at once the most compulsory and the
most prohibited of socialbonds.’45 Football communities, instead of unpacking these complex
paradoxes within male sexual interaction, simply provide a milieu in which they can be
dismissed. This is evidenced in Roy’s monologue to the reader, in which he continuously but,
significantly, inwardly degrades women, calling them ‘fat hoors.’ (MSN, p. 140) Within the
hyper masculine atmosphere of the firm, his increased confidence allows him to externalise
his misogyny, joking with acomrade that a pastconquest had ‘a fanny likethe Mersey Tunnel.’
(MSN, p. 139) While Tobias Doring has referenced Freud’s notion in arguing that ‘men often
joke with each about women in a sexually aggressive manner in order to consolidate their
44 Rehling, p. 169.
45 Eve Kosofsky Sedgwick, Between Men: English Literature and Male Homosocial Desire (New York: Columbia
University Press,1985) p. 20.

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homosocial bonds,’46 the environment produced within footballing communities is still
depicted as being explicitly misogynistic and intolerant.
The misogyny fostered in these communities becomes increasinglyproblematic when
women are not just denigrated as part of a common male humour, but commodified
physically. Butler has argued that women are irrelevant as individuals, instead serving as part
of a ‘repressed and disparaged [male] sexuality which is about the bonds of men, but which
takes place through the heterosexual exchange of women.’47 For Roy, a willingness or
passiveness to being objectified is conditional for women in these communities, who have
‘goat tae realise that if they hing aroond wi top boys, they huv tae dae the biz.’ (MSN, p, 179)
His attitude is shockingly manifested in the brutal gang rape of Kirsty, an acquaintance of the
firm who is disparaged for her lack of indiscriminate promiscuity. The act is carried out upon
a restrained and semi-conscious Kirsty ‘while watching George McKlusky smash home a
beauty against Dunfermaline on the telly on full volume.’ (MSN, p. 190) By depersonalising
and defeminising her in this situation, Welsh cultivates the homoerotic impression that the
hooligans are fornicating not with her, but with each other, demonstrated as ‘Dempsey and
Lexo were up her cunt and arse at the same time, their balls pushed together. – Ah kin feel
yir cock, Lexo, Demps gasped.’ (MSN, p. 190) As a woman, Kirsty’s presence is purely to allow
the hooligans to deny the homosexuality of the act, while her commodification indicates a
paradoxical internalisation of the consumerist culture that the hooligans seek to combat.
Conclusion
46 Tobias Doring, ‘Freud about Laughter, Laughter about Freud’, A History of English Laughter: Laughter from
Beowulf to Beckett and Beyond, ed. by Manfred Pfister (Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2002), p. 129.
47 Butler, p. 55.

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For men, who are seen as ‘the real victims of the late capitalism and postmodernity’48
that characterised Thatcher’s Britain, the tribal nature of hooliganism satisfies what Bauman
has described as ‘an overwhelming ‘need of belonging,’ a need to identify ourselves not just
an individual human beings, but as members of a larger entity.’49 As this dissertation has
indicated, hooligan groups and football firms do provide a site for the articulation of post-
millennial male agency, while the associated violence can be justified by Žižek’s belief that
‘authentic community is only possible in conditions of permanent threat.’50
However, the obsession that exists within these communities of re-experiencing the
elusive and enigmatic ‘buzz’ is ultimately unsatisfying, as it does not provide a holistic
reconciliation with traditional masculinity. Despite relishing in the sex and violence that
‘riding with the cashies’ (MSN, p. 110) provides him, Roy admits that ‘after [the violence], I
often felt sorry, never to the particular person I’d abused, but in general. I never knew why.’
(MSN, p. 109) Moreover, Roy’s exposure to the individualism of neoliberal society and the
collectivism of his firm leaves him in a position of confusion, as a man who Roy appreciates
as accomplishing all of the requirements for ‘successful’, or traditional, masculinity, Derek
Holt, who is an ‘ordinary guy; married with two kids, liked a pint at lunchtime, good at his job,
… intae fitba …’ (p. 114) is seen as a ‘caveman.’ (p. 115) Through their attempt to close ‘the
implied gap between the individual male subject and the unattainable phallic ideal,’51 men
48 Rehling, p. 173.
49 Bauman, p. 275.
50 Žižek, p. 23.
51 Rehling, p. 173.

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are placed within animpossible double-bind: pressured to live up to this idealisedmasculinity,
yet symbolically castrated by the social logic of neoliberalism.
Despite the fact that nearly two decades have passed since the publishing of these
two novels, the sentiments of Roy continue to echo with relevance. The landslide victory of
New Labour in 1997 saw Tony Blair set his reformist agenda upon the culture of football
hooliganismin the UK. Under New Labour, football underwent aradical revolution akin to the
sort that neoliberal economics instigated in the early 1980s. Blair’s policy of introducing
inflated revenue streams survives contemporarily, evident in the staggering wealth of today’s
English Premier League. The injection of such significant capital has resulted in the
‘bourgeoisification’52 of the game, a further displacement of the individuals within this
demographic, and a departure from Tom’s assertion that ‘football, more than any other area
of society […] has accepted the shifted make-up of England’s working class population.’ (FF,
p. 235) For young, disenfranchised, working-class men, the ‘hurt just seems to go round and
round,’ (MSN, p. 263) as they continue to ‘run away because a schemie, a fucking nobody,
shouldnae have these feelings because there’s naywhair for them tae go, naewhair for them
to be expressed and if you open up every cunt will tear you apart’ (MSN, p. 254). For both
men, football is depicted as offering them a chance, however slim, of reconciliation. Tom
closes his narrative by assuring the reader that ‘football is just a focus, a way of channelling
things. If there was no football we’d find something else.’ (FF, p. 210) Whether or not a new
vehicle through which young, working-class men can disseminate their existential
dissatisfaction remains to be seen.
Bibliography
52 Giulianotti,p.21

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- Anderson, Benedict, Imagined Communities: Reflections on the Origin and Spread of
Nationalism (London: Verso, 1991)
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