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Adam Goodes kicks goals for Australia's race industry : Comments
By John Slater, published 4/8/2015The Adam Goodes saga says little about the state of race relations in Australia.
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People do funny things when they are in crowds, even 'crowds' of fifty or so. The lovely old ladies from the mission used to really let their hair down when it came to abusing the other teams: as someone from a very sheltered background, I learnt some wonderfully new terms of abuse which, I'm sure, those aunties would disavow ever afterwards.
In a crowd of forty or fifty thousand (about the same number as that of Indigenous university graduates), it's understandable if people sort of submerge themselves in the mass, each person being as one with their fellow-supporters, liberated to cast various aspersions on the manhood, etc. of enemy players.
Canetti and other writers have studied crowds and their surrender of individuality on such occasions. And let's face it, it's enormously enjoyable to swear your head off in a big crowd, cursing every enemy player up and down to your heart's content for a couple of hours. Wit may be in short supply but is highly prized by one's fellow-supporters: solidarity is all. Violence is never far below the surface. Hence the paper cups rather than cans and bottles.
Perhaps there is something primal about being part of a mob. It must have been enormously exciting to be part of a football crowd fifty years ago, cheering on the blokes belting the piss out of each other behind - and even in - the crowd. Mere words wouldn't have cut it.
Just saying :)
Joe