Customer Reviews

Among the Thugs

5 star:		(25)
4 star:		(31)
3 star:		(13)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(8)

 

 

Bill Buford, a naive American adrift in England, tackles a very dicey subject: Mob violence by English football fans. He starts out innocently enough, trying to find the allure, cause, nature, basis, and form of England's notorious football hooligans, but soon has difficulty separating himself from his subject matter.

As he relates his journey into the world of the yobs, we get a vivid picture of the people and the events, but no real glimpse into what is behind the football mob violence -- even after Buford spends most of the second half of the book trying to work it out. The only real insight were provided is that the mob becomes greater than the sum of its parts, and that there is a line where a person within the mob ceases to be an individual, and becomes a compnent of a greater organism.

However, questions such as why sporting crowds in the US, Canada, or other countries never reach the level of violence or mob mentality as seen in England are never addressed, nor are questions of why this sort of violent behavior seems to be limited to a very large degree to football (soccer) crowds. Of course, that subject is beyond the scope of any one book.

Still, the snapshot into the seedy world of NF members, jingoistic supporters, drunks and felons provided by Buford is entertaining, in a voyeuristic sort of way. Besides, unless you are intimately familiar with crowds at English, or any European, football matches, Buford's book is best if taken as a sort of superficial sociological travelogue, offering a glimpse into a strange land, complete with foreign customs, traditions, uniforms and etiquette.

Reading 'Thugs' won't provide too much enlightentment on sports violence or the psychology of mobs, but it will entertain. And with the coming Euro2000 tournament, reading this may prove timely, as well.

When my friend recommended this book, I was skeptical. I didn't believe an American journalist could successfully infiltrate a gang of European football hooligans. I was introduced to the notoriety of hooligans when I attended a match in Turkey. There I witnessed 200 soldiers armed with assault rifles and riot gear, lined up behind the goalie. This severity made me believe what I'd heard about fans ending up trampled, stabbed, beaten, and killed in the aftermath of a match.

Starting with a few lukewarm leads, Bill Buford, a true journalist, is relentless. He transports the reader to England, Germany, and Italy as he tries to understand what fuels hooligans. You experience the helplessness of being caught in a body-crushing crowd, being ambushed by the brutal mobs after the match, and riding the fan-crammed trains. His characterizations are so vivid, you can almost smell the charged atmosphere in the streets and in the stadiums.

This book is about violence. The descriptions are fierce and don't let up. The history behind the European football fury is discussed. Even if you aren't a fan of football (better known to Americans as soccer), this book is an excellent read on the sociology of mob mentality. You become aware of what propels crowd violence and its devastating effects on the victim, whose only blunder might be unfortunate proximity and timing.

The old saying of "don't judge a book by its cover" does not apply here. I saw this book, its cover and title, read the back and bought it. It did not dissapoint.

If anybody is looking for insight into soccer hooliganism, then this is the book for you. Buford, an American ex-pat, infiltrates the Manchester United hooligans. At first he attempts to share their perspective in his book, but as the story unravels, he becomes one of the hooligans. This gives readers a first hand account of their lives.

The scenes are ultra violent. This book is truly a modern day Clockwork Orange and the Man U fans are so crazy and violent that they make the Raider Nation look like a Girl Scout Troop.

GREAT BOOK!!

I really enjoyed this book and tore through it in three days. It really does capture how the working class of Britain has degenerated even as its standard of living has reached levels of comfort that would seem unimaginable a few decades back. There is something about the game of football that tends to drive working class males crazy in almost every country, from Argentina to China. The author does however lose steam in the middle of the book when he attempts to psychoanlayzie crowd behavior. Overall very good read

This is the definitive book on hooligans. The writing is intelligent, and Bill Buford often breaks down the society he's studying with an amusing and deprecating wit. On the back of the book it says that _Among the Thugs_ is never condescending, which is the diametric opposite of the truth. The thing that makes this book amusing is its ability to portray the sheer insanity of hooliganism as the circus freak show that it is. Other writers treat this subject with a been-there-done-that sort of nonchalance. Bill Buford, on the other hand, sees the phenomenon through the lens of a mild mannered American who is justifiably shocked and horrified by what he is witnessing. For the American reader, this is the ideal standpoint because it is important to emphasize just how utterly ridiculous, alien, and unfathomable hooligan behaviour is to a civiized American. I highly recommend this book as a fast, entertaining, action- packed, and often hilarious read.

I, like Mr. Buford, lived as a priveleged American in London during the heydey of bootboys and hooligans in the early and mid 70's. I was a teenager and a wannabe-hooligan, too young (early teens) to be a real hooligan. I travelled extensively on the "football specials" to away games, among them a 1973 FA Cup semifinal at Hillsborough (scene of the 1996 disaster that ended standing on the terraces forever), and the danger of violence was expected and palpable. I recall a lovely spring day in Southampton where hooligans in motorcycle helmets roamed the streets smashing milk bottles on heads in a completely random fashion. Unlike some readers, I found his descriptions dead-on accurate. The discussion of crowd theory and when things change right before they "go off" was fascinating, as well as absolutely true. The part of the book I found odd was the change of opinion from wanting to study his topic to throwing up his hands and deciding there was nothing to study. What's the conclusion, or are there none? I am happy to report that those days are, for the most part, over. Having recently returned from England, the ticket pricing, and all-seater stadiums, have eliminated the hooligan mobs at football matches. the reason the hooligans rampage in continental Europe is because that's all that is left (there are still terraces in much of Europe). Domestically, many of the football venues described by Mr. Buford have been torn down or rebuilt as all-seater stadia.

I thought this book would simply be a blow-by-blow recitation of the crimes and violence perpetrated by Britain's soccer "hooligans." I was very pleasantly surprised that it turned out to be much, much more. Mr. Buford gives a very nice discussion of the crowd mentality and explains from a first-hand perspective how quickly a large event can turn violent. He also does a nice job of explaining how the social environment in Britain led to the conditions that allowed large number of disaffected young men with few other outlets for their frustrations than Saturday games and riots.

Among the Thugs is highly entertaining: it's Michael Herr meets Bill Bryson--a hybrid that has produced a documentary of the British hooligan phenomenon that is at once gripping, frightening, appalling, sickening, very funny, and, maybe, BS!

What really bothers me about this book is the recurrent disconnect between over-the-top acts of violence and the consequences thereof. Buford's graphic description of homicidal aggression is never seen with a meaningful (i.e. consistent with human nature) aftermath. For example, supporters (the rabid hooligan-fans) visiting Turin, Italy, trash the city, leaving anyone in their wake beaten to a pulp, perhaps murdered; and then the next day, for all intents and purposes, the Italian perspective is portrayed as a sort of grumbling resentment as opposed to, say, murderous rage. In the most unbelievable episode, a supporter blunders into a party (comprised of police officers, no less), and assaults one of the guests in such a manner as to surpass your most deranged, paranoid and sadistic fantasies. In the next scene, the supporter rejoins his wife at home, albeit with a great quantity of blood on his shirt (la-di-freakin'-da). I mean, how did he get out of there and then elude capture (believe me, this guy would be hunted down as if he were public enemy number one)?

But in spite of some wide credibility gaps, Buford chillingly describes mob and crowd dynamics, the creepy fascistic underpinnings of this scene, and the working class vacuum that is filled by this malignant sense of purpose. I'm just not sure if I can believe it all.

Dick Singer, Dallas

I couldn't stop reading this. We went to a friends house and I sat and read this book in the corner (easily one of the most impolite things I have ever done, but there was no way in hell I was stopping reading). I lived in London in the late eighties, working between Highbury & Islington tube station and Arsenal's ground and can remember the shops and pubs closing early on Wednesdays if there was a game. I can also remember the warnings not to work late, etc. I never understood why until I read this book. These people were (are?) the cruelest, nastiest people alive, and Bill Buford deserves endless credit for the quality of this book.

One last thought, we often hear that it was the average person that served as the guards in concentration camps, etc., well after reading this book I think it is the thugs who are described here, not the average Joe - so I feel better about the rest of humanity.

It was Bill Shankly, ex Liverpool manager, who said "Football is'nt a matter of life and death, it's more important than that". This book goes someway to capture the passion and importance of Football in English culture, and the extreme lengths that some so called supporters go to feel that they belong. As a true English Football supporter, I felt somewhat annoyed that readers of the book from other countries would feel that all English Football supporters behave in this manner, this is NOT true. But this book does accurately portray the minority who caused and still cause the atrocities described. The book works on two levels, to shock with horrific stories of brutal violence, and at a much deeper level to explain crowd behaviour and how this can be manipulated. Overall this is a valiant attempt by an American to explain English Football violence, which to my suprise was successfull.