Over the past few years, football fans have been treated increasingly as naughty children and issued with a list of rules governing every aspect of their behaviour: don’t stand up, don’t drink outside the ground, don’t swear, don’t sing that song, don’t wear that t-shirt, don’t unfurl that banner, don’t say that, and so on. Viewed with contempt by the political classes and those who run football, supporters are seen as potentially racist, homophobic, sectarian and boorish louts who need to be controlled at every turn.

In the past year or so, however, there has been a particular focus on the policing of what fans say and sing. The Scottish government has introduced a law making the uttering of sectarian songs and words a criminal offence. Supporters of Tottenham Hotspur have been prosecuted for using the words ‘Yid’ and ‘Yiddo’, despite the fact that these are terms applied in a positive way to themselves and their team. In April, three Gillingham fans were arrested on suspicion of a ‘racially aggravated public-order offence’ after reportedly calling Rotherham manager Steve Evans a ‘fat Scottish w***er’. Liverpool FC has released a list of words that will lead to supporters being banned if they use them.

For many, this is a serious issue of free speech, yet civil-liberties groups have been largely conspicuous by their silence when it comes to defending fans. Words that were once regarded as merely coarse are now seen as unacceptable and even worthy of prosecution as new codes of conduct and polite speech etiquettes are imposed from above. Others argue that words that players or other supporters find offensive should be regulated. Football, they say, should be played in an inclusive and non-threatening atmosphere so that families can enjoy the game, too. 

Is terrace singing and shouting a free-speech issue or simply a matter of enforcing proper behaviour? Does real tolerance mean that we should defend the right of football fans to sing and to say what they want, even if some find it offensive? Does such policing of football – a rare arena in which people can let off steam outside the normal rules of behaviour - have consequences for wider society?

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