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Comments
So they came up with their initial 5 point plan, and to be honest that should be achieved fairly quickly.....then I think it was to continue to sit down and go other items, keep the communication lines open
There was talk of people being bought off etc but I don't think that was the case for a second not just as I don't feel the people involved would have taken money but it would have been highly misjudged for the club to offer any financial incentive as the size of own goal it would have produced couldn't be over estimated if the group reps went back to the group and said they offered us money.
I can understand the reflection that caused validity of the march to be questioned on account of the concessions made but not how it came about and feel there is more that will perhaps never be known.
Sadly it was only a day before that hundreds and hundreds of founder member badges went out, there were wood engraved blocks and some poor fella has 20 engraved stone souvenirs that no one will want now, pretty soon having bought the RWHFAG memorabilia will feel like having bought a Betamax video recorder in 1978.
But something has gone on
A nice story: the U23s match was cancelled so they arranged for the unneeded food for the pre-match meal to go to a homeless charity.
http://www.whu606.com/discussion/10511
I am not sure what happened last week to change the landscape but certain members of RWHFAG decided to go all out to ensure this march didn't happen. It went from threats to other groups to trying to cast the march as being hijacked by the political left which was surprisingly bought into by any number of post responders. It was all quite sad to witness happening as groups who were courted and befriended and had happily come under the RWHFAG umbrella were immediately turned against due to the absolute need to ensure the march didn't take place.
I was trying to find any credible evidence that the political left was involved, the best I could find was that someone involved with the group above had at the time or the mayoral elections supported Sadiq Khan instead of Zach Goldsmith. Some were stating they hated Khan yet loved Labour despite the current Labour leadership being far more seated to the left than Sadiq Khan. Nothing was being thought through from the notification of the march being cancelled onwards, luckily I feel a couple of more able people began to reign others in and began to work on damage limitation and supply a consistent narrative once again whilst the behind the scenes conversations ended the march from all sides.
We'll see, but if various factions are threatening violence on each other if the march goes ahead then I think even if it gets the go-ahead from the council, the restrictions will be such (in terms of route and so on) that the organisers might not want to take it forward. I can see, for example, it not being allowed on a match day, or not being allowed anywhere near the stadium/Stratford.
I shall observe with interest ;ok
A possibility was that the group committee recognised that after negotiating with Brady as if holding the power to march or call it off that it became too embarrassing to have told her ok we will call it off and then not be able to because a large part of the group were going to ignore you. Brady would have been wondering why she was negotiating with you and any possibility of an ongoing relationship would have been finished.
Another possibility which I have considered is that someone told the group committee that the march would not be taking place and that if it did they would be held accountable. There are football firms made up of pretty handy guys who know there way around a ruck and there is also a whole different category all together, being an East London club it would not be too difficult to work out who that may be.
My only real reason for thinking this is that the message last week that the march was off was handled so badly that it came across that there could be no discussion, no vote by members, something I am sure would have naturally have been suggested, it was as if that march had to be stopped and I cant think of too many things that would have provoked that much urgency.
The other possibility is that they just didn't know what to do when the club had been so reasonable and acquiesced to so many points that they realised they couldn't retain credibility within dialogue and negotiation if receiving so much and still marching. Their lack of experience in managing such a large group then got exposed through very misjudged communication which snowballed out of control.
As I have said though I am pleased it has been reigned in these last few days and come under control of someone I imagine advising them very well now.
I also think the club responded very well and reasonably and so I agree with not marching although it could possibly have been allowed to happen under a different banner, more of celebration, and still serve as a show of numbers. The big setback was the appalling misjudgement on how the march was cancelled and how the aftermath of that was dealt with. The root of this also stems back to an earlier mismanagement where there were things inflamed as really anti board to possibly create support and enthusiasm that couldn't then be dampened down when needed.
I actually think despite the flared tempers last week caused by reaction upon reaction, which ended up sad and shattering, that the group committee had the best intentions and did a good job. I hope a credible explanation of what happened comes out as it is deserved I feel by a lot of people who invested a lot of hope in the group. Should it do so it may be able to recover but my feeling is it will just be a facebook group now. It was however very nearly something quite special in my view, in the shape of union representation within a football club demonstrating the difference between a normal business and something invested in by people with so much more than just money but their identification and sense of belonging in some cases. It was very nearly brilliant..........
A complete mess.
“Unfortunately it is not simply a case of ‘taking over the existing plan’ because there is no existing plan to speak of,” the Council wrote. “We had one brief meeting last week with [WHRFAG] where a couple of alternative routes were discussed and we were awaiting a detailed route plan and event management plan but have not received anything since.”
Which answers my earlier question.
Threats have been made, threats of physical violence if fans do not do what the ‘Real West Ham fans’ have dictated.