I think you've edited out with ellipses a really important part of my paragraph which in part deals with your query! My anger is primarily aimed towards those Franchise fans who adopted the club when it moved there and those who have adopted it since with knowledge of their 'history' (or lack thereof). I have some (very, very limited) synpathy with young kids gowing up in Milton Keynes who feel perhaps drawn to their local club - but fundamentally, when you choose to support a team you are also choosing to align yourself with their history and values.Kernow Yellow wrote:Very little of what you say contradicts anything I wrote, and I agree with most of your first few paragraphs. No-one (on here at least) is trying to justify the original travesty.Kairdiff Exile wrote:As for the 'fans' who follow the new club, the argument is often made that they're just supporting their local team. [...] they chose to support a Pariah Club and shouldn't be allowed to forget it.
It's the bit I've highlighted that I take issue with. So a teenager who recently started following MK Dons after some community outreach work by the club should be made to feel guilty for doing so? A family newly moved to the area who want to encourage their kids to support their local team should not do so and instead continue paying a Sky subscription so they can call themselves Chelsea or Man City fans instead? Sorry, but I disagree.
To give a (slightly crass and undoubtledly flawed) analogy - it's like choosing to support the BNP and then feeling cross that people treat you as a social pariah. You're legally entitled to support whichever political party you like, but you do so knowing the values they espouse and aware of the fact that some of those may conflict with the views of mainstream society. Fans of Franchise FC cannot claim innocence or ignorance. If they choose to support a Pariah Club, that's their right - but I don't see why we should make it easy on them. *
The point about S*y and armchair fans is an interesting one. Of course I would rather people actively supported a team than slumped in front of a TV, giving money to Rupert Murdoch and further undermining the long-term football of lower-league football in the UK. But I don't think in this case that's the choice - there are plenty of 'proper' clubs within easy striking distance of Milton Keynes (Northampton Town, Brackley Town, Hitchin Town, Aylesbury United, Luton Town, Dunstable Town, to name but a few) who would be delighted to have the support of those individuals. Equally, there's nothing stopping the people of Milton Keynes starting a proper, organic, genuined non-league club again in their town and helping it to work its way up the leagues on merit.
* = For the avoidance of doubt, and to prevent any misunderstanding, I am not likening fans of Franchise FC to BNP supporters, and nor am I saying that the two institutions share any of the same beliefs. I am simply using it by way of a slightly rhetorical and hyperbolic parallel to make a wider point about how society is right to view some groups as unacceptable.