When Tradition and Taunts Collide: Gay Hockey Fans Criticize Garden

[Mugu]

By KATIE THOMAS

During the final 10 minutes of many Rangers home games, the spotlights focus on Section 407 as Larry Goodman, a longtime season-ticket holder, pumps up the crowd with a goofy dance.

As Goodman’s routine is broadcast on the giant monitors above the ice, a familiar chant picks up momentum. “Ho-mo Lar-ry!” the crowd shouts. “Ho-mo Lar-ry!”

The chant is one example of what several gay hockey fans describe as a toxic atmosphere during Rangers games and that Madison Square Garden, which owns the team, is not doing nearly enough to address their concerns.

Kevin Jennings, a Rangers fan who is gay, said he stopped attending home games for about a month this season because he felt so uncomfortable with the homophobic epithets that are shouted to the players.


Read complete article at:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/21/sports/hockey/21fans.html?em&ex=1206244800&en=5c641ada05d2c0a8&ei=5087%0A#

[joeybee12]

1. I read this yesterday.

The part about people booing when the gay hockey league name goes across the board was unsettling because I think that really proves the point about homophobia...people making comments like Homo Larry are stupid and can--somewhat--be shrugged off, but feeeling the need to boo at seeing the name of a gay hockey league really shows what some people are like.

[Captain Angry]

2. Sports fans can be ugly.

It sucks. When I pay to see a game, I want to see the game. I don't want some drunk idiot behind me calling the refs, the other team and the home team a bunch of names.

You can't get the same experience at home. You can't see the play develop on TV. Live is the only way to go. But you have to be around a bunch of people that don't think at all about what they say. There are always children around, and that doesn't slow these people down at all. Half the time, it's the children's parents using the worst language.

The worst thing is, that the only remedy is to stay at home. Drunk crowds aren't going to get any politer.

This isn't a hockey thing. Or even a pro-sports thing. Listen to the crowd at a college game. Or a recreational league game. The language and behavior is vile way too often.

I've been an NFL and NHL season ticket holder, and am currently a season ticket holder to a minor league hockey team. I've been to hundreds of games, as my bank account can attest. I wish the environment would improve, but all I can do is lead by example. Never chant the ugly stuff, never swear at the refs or the teams. While the ugly people are yelling, I'm usually explaining the penalty to the fans around me that are trying to learn the game.

[La Lioness Priyanka]

3. would you be this mellow if they were yelling racist and not homophobic slurs?

[Captain Angry]

4. I didn't think I was mellow.

I can't stand the kinds of things that people yell at a game.

Any of it. There is plenty of racist stuff thrown about as well. It's all awful.

Telling the 70 year old "usher" that people in the crowd are saying awful things isn't going to fix it. If management is able to do something, awesome. It's been my experience that they do the opposite. The local hockey team I watch has it setup so that when the opposing players are announced that the sheep in the crowd will all yell "sucks!" after their name. It's something I've seen before, and short of not announcing the starting lineups, you can't make it stop. But you don't have to encourage it. Our building encourages it by reading the player's names, pausing and flashing the house lights. It's disappointing.

I just want to see a fun game. Getting in the face of some 270 pound cowboy about their language is the quick way to get stabbed in the parking lot.

[La Lioness Priyanka]

5. sorry i misunderstood your post.

[Beregond2]

6. Epithets

It's just part of the ongoing vulgarization of our society. Look at professional wrestlers. They train children to point at their crotches and yell: "Suck it!" Look at the comedians on TV. They have to bleep out so much profanity, half of what they say is missing. Look at the disgusting T shirts people wear everywhere. Look at music videos. Look at movies, where every other word is "fuck." Heck, look at the posts on this board.

I am actually grateful my mother is going deaf, so she doesn't have to be constantly exposed to all this disrespectful and degrading filth.

[Captain Angry]

7. I'm constantly surprised by the clothing that people feel is acceptable now.

Concert shirts used to be shocking. That was the point.

But the crude statements people are willing to have written across their chest in public, in a restaurant, at school, is something entirely different.

[TML]

8. Not surprising

If you think that's bad, for over twenty years they've sung a song to the tune of Camptown Races that pokes fun at Denis Potvin and Mike Bossy's back injury. Listen to the crowd the next time the Rangers and Islanders hook up and you'll think "Ho-mo Lar-ry" is nothing.

They also once lit an Islanders jersey on fire -while the poor Isles fan was still wearing it! (late 80's, I think)

After Flyers goalie Pelle Lindbergh was killed in a 1984 car accident in his modified Porsche, Rangers fans serenaded Ron Hextall two years later with "Buy a Porsche, Hextall, buy a Porsche!" (Think "here we go Rangers, here we go!")

Classy. :sarcasm:

[TheMightyFavog]

9. What, sports fans from New York City acting like complete asshats?

Say it ain't so! :sarcasm: