Fan Violence

Sports fans must have certain rules and regulations against them in order to maintain violence outbreaks during games. For the past decade, fan violence has gotten more and more out of control. There should be certain limits for fans so that violence can be prevented during games.

The route of fan behavior comes from many different things, all of which can escalate into very serious situations during games. That’s when it can get very dangerous for the fans and even for the players. There are lots of different examples of fan violence in sports. For instance, a Kansas City Royal’s fan attacked an umpire named Las Diaz (“Fan”). On April 30, 1993, a tennis fan named Gunter Parche, who was a fan of another player; stabbed Monica Seles. He was a fan of another tennis player (“Fan”). Cleveland Brown fans threw thousands of beer bottles, cups and debris onto the field after a penalty call was taken back from the Browns (“Fans throw”). Players, coaches, and referees had to sprint out of the football stadium. On January 25, 1995, Manchester United striker Eric Cantona, assaulted a fan during a game against Crystal Palace after a fan said a racial slur toward him (“Fan”). On August 29, 2004 an Irish priest, Neil Horan, burst out of the crowd to race the leader of a 5000 meter race in the 2004 Summer Olympics (“Fan”). On September 13, 2004, Texas Ranger pitcher Frank Francisco threw a chair at a fan during a game after the fan spoke inappropriate language to him (“Fan”). On November 19, 2004, a brawl broke out between the fans of the Detroit Pistons and the players (“Fan”). There are many different causes of misbehavior from fans. Of course not all fans do it, but there are many that do. Alcohol is usually the root to the fans menacing behavior during sports games. William Ligue Jr., who was fan at one of the games, admitted he drank before beating someone up (“Alcohol”). The fans were described as uncontrollable beasts. Winning is supposed to cause you to drink for celebration (“Alcohol”). And then losing is supposed to cause you to cry in your alcohol (“Alcohol”). The alcohol industry markets hugely on risk-taking fans (“Alcohol”). Maybe that is why fans are causing such problems at games. Fans are more inclined to be binge drinkers rather than non-fans. Studies found 53% of sports fans binge-drink 5 or more drinks in a short period of time as opposed to 41% of male non-fans and 37% of female non-fans (“Alcohol”). Even a judge puts his words into about alcohol and fans. “It comes down to two things, alcohol and anonymity,” says Judge Seamus McCaffery (“Inside”). One fan said, “If you come to the game sober, you’ll have only a good time, but if you come with a buzz, you will have a great time (“Inside”).” What that fan said was a very bad statement. Binge-drinking fans have to realize that it makes the environment unsafe for people to enjoy the game. There should be certain rules and limits for drinking policy at sports games because it can get way to out of hand. It puts younger spectators in dangers.

There are also other reasons why fans resort to violence during sports games. They may do it because of actions that are done to players or to their teams. For example, fans rioted on the streets after football player Maurice Richard was suspended (“Fan”). Fans rioted streets after the Denver Broncos Football Team won the Super bowl (“Fan”). Fans may also resort to violence to express loyalty to a team, by releasing frustration with a team’s performance, or in order to intimidate other opposing fans. It is often alcohol-related (“Fan”).

There are so many types of different things that fans do when it come to violence in sports. Fans get caught and fined for doing very ignorant things. Fans have been fined for disorderly conduct, and have been caught for trespassing and public urination (“Inside”). One fan named Chris Patrick was almost beaten up to death just for wearing a jersey of a different team at a Philadelphia football game (“Inside”). Fans harassed him and taunted him making him feel un-welcomed. They also threw a bottle at the back of his girlfriend’s head (“Inside”).

Fan behavior has gotten so out of control that it even has gone throughout college. College fans have been so out of control these days and many critics believe it is from the way Pro-fans act. Phenomenon of fans became standard practice at dozens of college campuses across the land (“Home”). Highly energetic student fans become another undesired norm of college basketball and football (“Home”). The “Fan participation” experiments that people get involved with include launched objects into the arena, inappropriate swears and jokes about wives and mothers, any other timely or tropical disparagement that could enrage, distract or cause harm upon the big bad opponents