15.4.1989 - R.I.P.

We are supposed to be remembering Hillsborough, and it's right and proper that we should. But Hillsborough cannot be seen in isolation - it was the culmination (one might say the inevitable culmination) of a problem which dated from decades earlier. Despite the game depending massively on gate receipts, football supporters had traditionally been treated pretty deplorably by the grounds they visited, packed into standing-only terraces with minimal facilities. And the inevitable happened - if you treat people like animals, sooner or later they will start acting like animals, and that's exactly what they did. So what do you do then - you fence them in! And so to Hillsborough. And depend on it, if it hadn't been Liverpool supporters and Hillsborough, it would have been some other team's supporters at some other ground - it was a tragedy waiting to happen. The terraces may have produced "atmosphere" and there may still be those who mourn their passing, but they were used simply because they were the cheap option and few people were prepared to accept the reality that at the bigger grounds they were inherently dangerous even before fencing was introduced. So yes, remember Hillsborough, but remember it in context.