What is a Scouser?
Funny enough it is terrifically difficult to define.
(Incidentally, you never here the term Wacker instead of Scouser these days, it was once common.)
A similar question about cultural identity has been going the rounds in Scotland for a long time now without anybody drawing up a definitive answer. This site shows just one thread of that debate: -
http://www.scottishweb.net/culture/scotsornot/scotland_ancestors_family.htmBack to what makes a Scouser: -
Is it being born and bred there? âDicky Samsâ only? Going to be an awfully empty ground in these days then!
(Does Bootle count? What about Kirkby, Seaforth, Skelm, The Wirral?)
Where is that line drawn? I defy anyone to answer the question fully. Could lose an awful lot of famous long time served true fans if we choose this option to define Scouse.
Is it being born and bred of Scouse parents? (Whatever that might mean) Where do mixed marriages (Bootle dad Liverpool mum) sit in the equation?
Is it living there for a certain length of time? Merseyside and in particular the dock areas of Liverpool (most of which are in Bootle!) have hundreds of years of history of people arriving and going. Naturally many of these people deliberately or through some quirk of fate stayed on and settled. How long before they became Scousers?
Equally, do you cease to become a Scouser because when things got bad you had enough âget up and goâ to get up and go?
How long after youâve left do you have to hand your âScouserâ card in?
Are the children of these migrants denied their Scouse heritage because of their parentâs sins in âemigratingâ to Southport, London, Birmingham etc etc
Population Churn
Is a technical term to describe how the profile of a place changes. People come people go and some stay put all their lives. At no two given dates are the populations identical.
It is well documented on other posts on this forum that Liverpool truly is a huge melting pot. Whilst there are people from every country in the world represented, much of the stock evolves from celtic roots. Nearly every Scouse family established for three or more generations will have one or more forebears from Scottish, Irish, Welsh or Manx blood. Funny that there are so many fans from those areas, isnât it
When I was a kid the population of Liverpool proper (ie donât count Bootle etc) was over a million, in 2001 it had fallen to less than half that (439,00).
Now it doesnât take a genius to see that there are more Scousers (and their offspring) outside of Liverpool than in it.
http://www.statistics.gov.uk/census2001/pyramids/pages/00by.aspThe Liverpool I grew up in
Had lots of unwashed uncultured Neanderthals BUT had an awfully lot more cultured intelligent, witty warm hearted people.
Returning to Scottish pride, they have a very famous bit about all the firsts and good inventions that came from Scotland:-
http://homepages.tesco.net/~William.Bryson/brag.htmlIt would be easy to match this with the things that Liverpool and its people gave to the world. It would be interesting to do so in another thread.
Although a hard place to live, it had a heart of gold, welcoming the newcomer (Because many of the residents were newcomers not that long ago)
There was an honour and pride in your neighbourhood. Scallys and Urchins would never have been tolerated because of the things they got up to. The only homes that they could boast in were the sort where you wiped your feet on the way out and held your breath if you had to go in the house. Would you let your daughter marry one?
The place was like a huge series of villages, you were known by most of the people for about 8 or 10 streets in every direction. When you went further there would always be someone who knew somebody else who knew you.
Although crime existed, very few people committed crimes against neighbours. Those who did were sorted and had to move away.
Scousers showed humour in the face of adversity;
Determination in the face of hardship
Never-say-die attitudes
Support for the under-dog.
When faced with a problem, they recognised the cause and dealt with it, not attacked the symptoms.
The people generated solutions instead of waiting for someone else to do so.
A proud and cheerful welcoming people
Has it all turned to paranoia and xenophobia ?
The Team that chose me
Nearly fifty years ago, I became aware of a team called Liverpool. It had always been there, I was just too young to have noticed it before.
Dur um der um de dumpty dum de diddly dumpty dumâŚâŚ Sports Report, the smell of a roast dinner getting close to cookedâŚ.. Strange names Gateshead, Accrington Stanley, Hamilton Academicals.
Highs and lows of emotion when the Everton and Liverpool scores came through.
Mostly lows for my Dad; we were having a terrible time. And I never then or in his long life after as I grew up heard him say anything disrespectful about LFC , its managers or its players. He only ever had constructive criticism.
Shortly after, either my Dad or various relatives coming home or calling in after whatever match theyâd been to.
Disaster, Liverpool relegated.
In the face of the onslaught from the blues, my Dad was a rock of defiance; arguing superiority for LFC in the face of fact reason and common-sense. He was obsessed.
It was much easier to be a blue, but even then I was an obstinate bar steward. I didnât realise it then, but I was hooked. I began to listen to the radio and although we werenât mentioned much, when we were I listened. The old Scouse love of defending the under-dog had kicked in. The never-say-die determination had kicked in.
I didnât know that then; but what the hell I was only 5 .
It appeared then that kids didnât generally get to go to the match (In the way of boozing, you couldnât take women into many pubs in those days let alone kids)
So I listened and watched and waited, and waited, and waited.
Life is full of strange circles within circles. At the time all this was happening, my wife was going to football matches with her dad, who was chairman of a lovely little club and sometimes the manager would return home with them for an evening meal. Like all the kids of the time, every adult earned the honorary title of Uncle or Aunty. How I envy her when she recalls âUncle Billâ manager of Workington Town.
What I would have given SHANKLY!.
That Everton was THE team was indisputable. They were in what we now know as the Premier League. They were always there or thereabouts in Championship or Cup shakeouts. Liverpool languished in the old Second division seemingly stuck forever doomed to come third and fail to reach the promise that they always flattered to deceive with.
Dad got very excited about this man who meant nothing to me then SHANKLY. I understood heâd been a very good player and although he had managed a few clubs, he had no real track record but the thing that people got excited about was his sheer positiveness and enthusiasm.
January 21st 1961 (Thank you God; thank you Mr Pead for the date) a long war of attrition won my dad takes me to my first match, age 10 ½ . Infield Road end, Paddock side, top corner.
Slater
Byrne Moran
Milne White Leishman
Lewis Hunt Hickson Harrower Morrisey
No subs, No diving, No poncing about with niggling digs and tugs. 90 minutes flat out football, no quarter given or taken. Bookings rare, sending-off almost unheard of!
Proper football, proper formationâŚ. But I digress
Opponents Ipswich Town 33401 in attendance (I was that 1).
On the way to the match we stop in one of my Dads pubs. He sits down to a game of cards with his mates and Iâm stood in the corner with a pint of shandy made with real ale! Big man! I looked around and saw a load of Bobbies enter the pub. Full uniform , truncheons handcuffs- the lot.
No escape for me! I could see the headlines âUnder-aged drinker age 10â
The lead bobby was well on the way to being 7ft tall and a sergeant.
Hi son, he said to me.
Move over Vic he said to my Dad and demanded to be dealt in. PHEW!
The match was a cracker, one of their players was injured and hobbled around a bit, then took off like a scalded cat in pursuit of the ball and bang 1-0 down. Then we laid siege and eventually my first football hero scored the equaliser. Kevin Lewis. He could run around with that ball glued to his foot for half an hour beat everyone and miss the open goal. He was so close to being a football legend!
The match ended 1-1
I went to a couple more matches that season but the only thing I remember is that my Dadâs hero Billy Liddell played his last game earlier in the season, and although Iâm told that I did see him in a reserve match, I donât remember.
But Boy was I bitten by this LFC thing, with the Shankly revolution and the glory years to come
We failed again, 3rd in Div 2, but this was fun.
I used to look back on the glorious past and wonder what it must have been like in the good old days , cup finals championships. It couldnât return could it? Could it? You bet it could.
We were so far behind Everton in the derby match tables that it was schoolboy fantasy that we could ever catch them up. Weâd have to dominate derbies for years, almost forever. Couldnât happen could it. Could it? You bet I enjoyed every single minute, but first we had to get back to the top division.
The rest is history. Loads of people will say that they used to go to Anfield. Well let me tell you the average attendance was 33,000 , a few thousand would be away supporters so say 28,000 was the true average. More than half of them will now be dead (we are talking 43 years ago here), so draw your own conclusions.
All Scouse crowd. You are taking the Piss.
There were Irish, Scots, Welsh and the London based supporters even that long ago (Hey havenât we been here before?).
Not as many as now, but then there were more Scousers in Liverpool then.
Shortly after we got back up the attendances rose to an average 40,000 and someone wrote Shankly could put out a team of 11 pigs with Liverpool shirts on and 40,000 would turn out and cheer them on.
And in those days, every match was a delight of skilful attacking fluid football wasnât it. The hell it was, I swear Shanks put the 11 pigs out a fair few times!
True Liverpool fans stuck through it good days and bad. They learnt their history. They saw history made.
They envied the blues, they stuck through the ridicule, they bought Shanklyâs philosophy âdo your talking on the pitchâ, and they overtook everyone
We learnt to sing.
No we learnt a creed- a way of thinking- a way of life.
Youâll Never Walk Alone is not a song. It is the essence of a True Scouser (No matter where heâs / sheâs born bred or billeted)
