Jeremy Stangroom

You don't know anything about the random Nazi in the street you want to maim. You know nothing about his childhood, education or mental health. You have no idea whether he was brought up in appalling circumstances. Yet despite this you claim the right to maim him. Well fuck you.

Hmm. Sure we've all been to gigs where this sort of bigot turns up. When drunk their true selves show. Not advocating violence normally, nor calling this heroic, but these guys look for trouble. And it's late, can't show much sympathy.

I've been at gigs where these sorts of guys were a feature not a bug! :)

Intriguing. I used to be straight edge in my youth and we didnt tolerate nazi stuff, often ended in violence. As I got older I realised it was a kind of tribalism, and excluding behaviour. Oft3n done to show off to the easily impressed.

Wasn't that just an extension of warring youth cultures - mods & rockers, skins vs. everybody else, etc?

Yes. Lots of it was transient but there was something nasty about certain types of skins/Nazis which wasn't going to fade in time.

Right. In the UK, in the early 1980s, I managed to get beaten by a gang of skins. I'd been on an ANL demo, & ran into this group who were targeting ethnic minority people on Liverpool Street Station (in London). They didn't take kindly to badges & slogans I was naively wearing.

There used to be a really heavy NF presence at NUFC at around that time, my team, and there was a lot of reaction to it. Majority were appalled - quite rightly. The violence was similar - attacks on individuals or small groups. Never hear anything like that any more.