I am embarrassed for my city

I just want to let everyone on here know who may have seen on the news the riots that followed the Canucks loss of the Stanley Cup that I am ashamed for my city. This is not who we are. It is terrible, I can't believe the damage the rioters are causing. I hope this does not cloud your judgment of our beautiful city, this was a small group of people who have tarnished the entire group's .

Please accept my apology for this foolish and embarrassing behaviour.

 

I haven't heard anything about it, but then again I just got home from work 30minutes ago...

 

Police cars are being set on fire, The Bay, Coach, The Bank of Montreal and London Drugs have all been broken into and looted. There are unconfirmed reports of fatalities. It's a sad night

 

Police cars are being set on fire, The Bay, Coach, The Bank of Montreal and London Drugs have all been broken into and looted. There are unconfirmed reports of fatalities. It's a sad night

Well that's no good. It stinks when the actions of a few reflect an on an entire place.

 

In my opinion people who loot stores and burn police cars are not 'unhappy fans' --they are criminals that are using the event as an excuse or cover for something that they wanted to do anyway.

The problem is that people in a group seem to be only as smart as the stupidest member. So once it gets going, other drunk fools join in...

 

I live in Columbus, Ohio. I'm used to fools doing this is the past on campus when The Ohio State Buckeyes win... Or lose! I for one wouldn't judge an entire city on the acts of individuals.

 

that sucks, some people take sports too far

I know that sucks, but to lose to a country that counts hockey as their #4 or 5 sport is #BRUTAL =T well kind of, it was like when the New York Giants won the superbowl in 2008, some NYers literally went crazy and just beat up every boston/NE fan, no deaths though

my neighbor is from NE area and we watch the superbowl together every year, and on 2008, I remember body slamming him just because for the last 10 years NY has barely won anything, I just had to get all my anger out =]

I know it sucks that this happened. WE GOT ONE!!! I aint no boston fan, but they got one for the STATES!!!

 

I used to live in CA and we have Oakland and La which have riots every few days so no judgement is passed

 

I live in Columbus, Ohio. I'm used to fools doing this is the past on campus when The Ohio State Buckeyes win... Or lose! I for one wouldn't judge an entire city on the acts of individuals.

what about that lebron lol, I saw those riots!!! I was dying the whole time

 

Hockey is not big in general in the states, but having lived in Boston; the ruins fanfare is strong and has a lot of history. Hockey is big in the northern, cold states here.

 

The Lebron stuff was in Cleveland, Ohio. We don't care about the cavs in Columbus! lol

 

very true, but they won it for the whole USA!!!

Hockey is not big in general in the states, but having lived in Boston; the ruins fanfare is strong and has a lot of history. Hockey is big in the northern, cold states here.

uh huh!!!

The Lebron stuff was in Cleveland, Ohio. We don't care about the cavs in Columbus! lol

 

Bad things always happen when people are drinking to excess.

 

Those of us who know better know that this is not a fair representation of your beautiful city.

 

In my opinion people who loot stores and burn police cars are not 'unhappy fans' --they are criminals that are using the event as an excuse or cover for something that they wanted to do anyway.

The problem is that people in a group seem to be only as smart as the stupidest member. So once it gets going, other drunk fools join in...

x2. Apparently there were facebook posts pre-game about rioting/looting plans.

 

what About That Lebron Lol, I Saw Those Riots!!! I Was Dying The Whole Time

post edited

 

Posts have been edited.
Disrespectful posts will not be tolerated.

Paigee took the time to start this thread.
She and other members deserve nothing but respect for them and their city/country in return.

If it continues, this thread will be closed and warnings will be issued as necessary.

 

Although I appreciate your "apology", it certainly isn't necessary unless you were one of those people out there adding to the senseless chaos. I'm pretty sure you were probably home making googly-eyes at your fish the whole time.

Can you just imagine once these people sober up? Whoa, that's going to be quite an "aha" moment when told exacty what their behavior's been. And to think it's because of a sports game. Gimme a break!

 

I'm a cynic... there's probably quite a few people (the ones who initiated the 'festivities') and planned it out in advance, that'll probably be bragging about their parts in it. Those are the ones that likely planned to go looting regardless of whether 'their' team won or lost. As I said before: those ones are basically criminals using the event for their own gain.

Others may have the sense to feel ashamed of themselves, but plenty of those will put it down to 'I was drunk and everyone else was doing it' style of excuses. Trying to wash off responsibility for their own foolish (or in my mind, idiotic) actions.

I agree with Lynda for the first part though: no need to apologize for other people's actions

 

there is no need to apologize. I however feel I must apologize....I believe my fish may have been a part of that. don't worry they have been punished and will not do it again.

 

And to think it's because of a sports game. Gimme a break!

I don't believe that at all, I believe those people don't even know a thing about hockey, they just wanted to do it for the heck of it, those are not real sports fan

also, a sport is not just a sport, its like is a fish just a fish? no I would not like to think that, part of my life is about sports, when I was a middle school and high school I was actually scouted by universities, but a incident when I was a junior caused me to lose it, I was "taken out" by the opposing player when he was making a play in second base, he basically tore my knee up, I was in a 9month rehab and I lost everything that I have worked for all my life, 9 years of constant baseball gone because of that incident, no more scholarship, I was close to suicidal at one point because of what I could of been, to me, a sports game is not just a sports game, it has a lot meaning, especially when its the finals and your state or country have not won for the last three decades, that's a pretty long time

I take a few games seriously, like anything NY vs Boston/NE... that is the biggest rivalry in ANY U.S. sport, especially baseball, if you have not been in NY and experience a boston red sox vs new york yankees game, than you have not been to a real rivalry game, it is the most hostile environment EVER, boston fans has been beaten for just wearing a red sox jersey, and if you come to NY with any boston gear, be prepared for anything because things do happen, I have experienced this first hand when I went to boston, I was treated like trash over there because I had a NY I.D and license plate, AND I WOULD NOT HESITATE TO DO IT RIGHT BACK WHEN THEY COME TO NY

all in all, a sport is not just a sport, there is more to it if you are a true sports fan

and I am not ashamed of anything NY vs boston/ne related

 

For those who think that this is just an excuse people used to start a riot, I tend to disagree. Minneapolis/St Paul was the site of a similar riot after a big college game. I think it may have even been one that we won.
Basically, these things start when a small number of drunken idiots go out and start smashing things up because they think it'll be fun. Usually, it's an expression of anger at one's favored team losing (people are almost as good as cats at displaced aggression). A growing number of drunken sheeple join in the "fun," until it reaches critical mass (this process usually takes a few seconds to escalate from a couple of guys pitching a garbage can through a window to the entire street throwing stuff) and explodes into a full-scale riot. At that point, it can take hours, or even the entire night, for the police get back into order.

It's just a bad combination of stupid people, alcohol, and excessive pride in a particular team. Certainly, the person or people who threw that first trash can may have gone into it planning to take the opportunity to cause a bit of havoc, but the majority of the people in the riot are doing nothing more than following the herd.

 

No need to apologize.

I think sirdarksol explained it quite well.

 

Thanks for the support guys! Glad this has not been allowed to tarnish your view of our city. And also, I didn't see the posts before they were edited, but this was just meant to remind everyone that this is not what we're all about in Vancouver, so please keep it positive guys!

I agree with all who said it was a small group of people that started it, and I believe that they went downtown to start shenanigans no matter what the outcome of the game was. A lot of pictures I saw had people not even wearing anything Canucks related. Then a lot of people got caught up in the crowd mentality and got carried away. I think a lot of other people were there just to see what was going to happen.

The sad part is that so many people's businesses were ruined (and the damage/loss of goods may not be covered by insurance). One that especially sucked was Black and Lee was completely stripped of all suits and tuxes, and there are many high school graduations happening on Saturday. I hope they can find ways to have suits and tuxes for all those poor guys!

I am glad for all of the people that went downtown today to help clean up the mess. I would have gone but I had no one to go with!

 

well I for one, not a hockey/sports fan .. think the teams that earn such enormous money from sports should contribute to the cost of repairs whenever this type of stuff happens. I don't think this should have to come from the tax payer's pocket.

People don't think about the trickle effect of this stuff. Insurance goes up because of this type of garbage. The cities have to recoup the cost of the repairs. The business have to recoup the cost of repairs. It all ends up effecting the people who had nothing to do with the event.

If the cities can't keep this type of thing from happening .. I think they'd be smart to stop allowing these events without ensuring the teams have money allocated for the repairs. Watch how fast these sports teams would not want to play if they were partly responsible for the bills.

 

well I for one, not a hockey/sports fan .. think the teams that earn such enormous money from sports should contribute to the cost of repairs whenever this type of stuff happens. I don't think this should have to come from the tax payer's pocket.

People don't think about the trickle effect of this stuff. Insurance goes up because of this type of garbage. The cities have to recoup the cost of the repairs. The business have to recoup the cost of repairs. It all ends up effecting the people who had nothing to do with the event.

If the cities can't keep this type of thing from happening .. I think they'd be smart to stop allowing these events without ensuring the teams have money allocated for the repairs. Watch how fast these sports teams would not want to play if they were partly responsible for the bills.

Though a novel idea I HAVE to disagree. You can't make a professional sports team owner pay for idiots actions.

 

all in all, a sport is not just a sport, there is more to it if you are a true sports fan

If this had happened after the Pillsbury Bake-Off, I would've said "and to think it's because of a recipe gone wrong...."

Sports matter to some people, and that's fine. But are sports so important that lives can be lost and property destroyed? I lettered in sports in school, but I never lost my mind when we lost a game. This topic reminded me of fathers who have shot other fathers at their children's games, referees who have been killed, fans being trampled in stadiums, etc. You can't tell me that the perps in these cases were not real sports fans.....

 

I am a Canadian who lives in the States... I told ANYONE who would listen .. THIS IS NOT CANADA.. this is not who we are!! I was deeply ashamed of anyone who took part in the riots. What a black eye for Vancouver and Canada in general. What were they thinking? Families with children were trying to make it out safely , I also believe there would of been a riot win or lose .. I believe it was planned ahead of time and as was stated above then mob mentality took over. I hope any one who can be identified should be prosicuted fully... what a sad day for my beautiful country. I am deeply ashamed.

 

well I for one, not a hockey/sports fan .. think the teams that earn such enormous money from sports should contribute to the cost of repairs whenever this type of stuff happens. I don't think this should have to come from the tax payer's pocket.

People don't think about the trickle effect of this stuff. Insurance goes up because of this type of garbage. The cities have to recoup the cost of the repairs. The business have to recoup the cost of repairs. It all ends up effecting the people who had nothing to do with the event.

If the cities can't keep this type of thing from happening .. I think they'd be smart to stop allowing these events without ensuring the teams have money allocated for the repairs. Watch how fast these sports teams would not want to play if they were partly responsible for the bills.

And watch the city's total tax revenue and spin-off economy drop as well. No more tax from team sales (quick google suggests average attendance of 17000k@62$ for 41 games means they are bringing in almost 5 million a year on regular season tickets alone. Add in alcohol sales, income tax for the players, admin, maintenance crew, tax on merchandise...). No more people from out of town coming in for canucks games spending on travel, accomedations, food, shopping since they are here anyways.

 

Though a novel idea I HAVE to disagree. You can't make a professional sports team owner pay for idiots actions.

Well .. it's certainly not their responsibility to pay for an idiot's actions BUT ... if they were made liable and started threatening not to play in certain cities because they didn't want to be financially liable .. maybe, just maybe the rioters would understand the threat and stop this nonsense.

For anyone who's saying "this is not Canada" ... heck yes it is. THIS happens on a regular basis whenever we host a final game. I remember riotious behaviour like this back in 1983?? (some where early 80's) in Edmonton .. and we won that game. Stores were looted, windows broken, cars damaged. I sat in a 9th floor apartment and watched from safety. It was as devastating and stupid then as it is now.

It has happened several other times in various other cities and always over a final game and it happens whether we win or lose so all the excuses about being angry we lost are garbage.

If it's happening so often the police are preparing for it in advance, it's in the news before it happens .. oh HECK YA it's us.

I'm not embarrassed over this behaviour I'm downright angry over it. These stupid people effect us as a nation and effect me as a tax payer. The cities gain gobs of money in revenue over something like this, so do the teams playing .. the only people who really suffer are the middle class tax payers.

If they expect this to happen why can't they figure out a way to stop it BEFORE it happens???

 

And watch the city's total tax revenue and spin-off economy drop as well.

Exactly .. but also exactly why some people MIGHT just stop this behaviour before it happens in the future.

 

Stopping a mob before it happens is a difficult thing.
Having the riot police out in force before the riot happens can actually trigger a more violent riot.

What it comes down to is that there is responsibility on the part of everyone involved in the sport to create a culture which doesn't accept that sort of garbage. If they wanted to, the people organizing a given event could seriously impact such things.

I can think of two concerts which give an example of this. The first was a Nine Inch Nails concert from the 90's. All the hyped up music gets everyone worked up and by the end of the concert everyone surges out of the stadium, jumping around, running around town, etc... Except that the last song was a slow, introspective song; "Hurt." Everyone filed out of the stadium relatively quietly.

The second was even more impressive. When the Republican National Convention was in town, Rage Against the Machine played a concert. Of course, most of the people at the concert were upset about the RNC being in town, and there had been clashes between police and demonstrators before the concert. The band made an announcement toward the end of the show, saying that they didn't want people acting out, that the Republicans were waiting for an excuse to call the group of concert-goers a mob and use it against them, so act respectfully.
It worked very well. As far as I know, there were no clashes between concert-goers and police, which is surprising, considering the fact that there were riot police with twitchy baton arms out there.

 

Such a tragedy! The decent folks of Vancouver, and especially the store owners, have my sympathies.

As to the sports teams having to pay for possible riot cleanup, in this case the city of Vancouver itself must bear quite a bit of responsibility. The city invited any and all who wanted to come downtown to "fan zones" to watch the hockey game on giant TV screens the city had set up. No restrictions on attendance, consequently tens of thousands of people downtown--and very inadequate crowd-control prep.ops:

Now almost 50 stores are boarded up and/or trashed, including big dept stores. But I do agree with those who say some of the trashing was pre-planned and a lot was "following the herd" mentality.

I'm not sure you can blame it all on "drunken idiots" though; quite likely some intelligent people did some of the planning, to get some things they wanted. I'm sure nobody foresaw the amount of damage that would be done.

 

I'm not sure you can blame it all on "drunken idiots" though; quite likely some intelligent people did some of the planning, to get some things they wanted. I'm sure nobody foresaw the amount of damage that would be done.

I really don't think so. Looting isn't like "normal" theft. It's not something that people plan. It's crime of opportunity, just like when an unlocked bike is stolen from the sidewalk. Someone smashes a window because, face it, it's really cool to see plate-glass shatter (no, I don't smash store windows, but I've had the opportunity to break glass when the owner didn't want it anymore). Someone else sees the broken window and the shiny-new electronics behind it, climbs through, grabs something, and leaves. The first couple of people who do it are the same kind of people who would steal the bike from the sidewalk.
After that, people see that these others are getting away with it and herd mentality takes over. Basically, if other people are getting away with it and getting free stuff, why shouldn't I?
People don't generally say "let's start a riot so I can get a new high-def TV." There are more sure-fire ways to steal a TV.

 

In my opinion people who loot stores and burn police cars are not 'unhappy fans' --they are criminals that are using the event as an excuse or cover for something that they wanted to do anyway.

The problem is that people in a group seem to be only as smart as the stupidest member. So once it gets going, other drunk fools join in...

Agreed.

Vancouver is a lovely city. The actions of opportunistic idiot criminals do not influence my opinion.

 

If they wanted to, the people organizing a given event could seriously impact such things.

Love your two concert examples. Excellent. Maybe you could talk to the Stanley Cup organizers and give them some advice on this subject!

 

Sports matter to some people, and that's fine. But are sports so important that lives can be lost and property destroyed? I lettered in sports in school, but I never lost my mind when we lost a game. This topic reminded me of fathers who have shot other fathers at their children's games, referees who have been killed, fans being trampled in stadiums, etc. You can't tell me that the perps in these cases were not real sports fans.....

its different once you get to the national, professional and world level, you have countries that you represent, especially when that sport is your national sport, lets take for example soccer in a world level, people stop everything just to root for their team, lets take the Olympics and michael phelps, he represented the WHOLE U.S.A when he went to the summer Olympics and won all those gold medals, what happened to him when he got caught smoking pot? he embarrassed the whole U.S.A and paid the consequences, when you represent your country, its more than just a sport

people have been killed for failing, especially when their country have counted on that specific person or group to come home successful, if it is your NATIONAL sport, you better take it seriously because people do retaliate, the latest thing I can remember was Lebron James, he was born and raised in cleveland, ohio and they counted everything on him, they treated him like a "king", and when he decided to move somewhere else where there was more talent, people retaliated very dangerously, his family was even close to being harmed, his house I believe was vandalized, he was basically exiled from that state, sports is a serious thing when all that country has is that sport

what happened in vancouver was a embarrassment, those people that did it should be jailed, but if you ask me if its anything new? no its not, if you pay attention to sports, riots in europe are much more dangerous compared than what they north americans call a riot

sorry this is just how I feel

 

I am fairly confident that the vast majority of those involved in the riots were not at the game and probably many of them are not even sports fans, just people out looking for a fight.

I am English and we have a horrible history of football (soccer) violence, many of the 'firms' never even went to games/cared about the outcomes, they just wanted a fight. For something to be this organised it is most likely that they would have done this no matter what the result was.

Do not worry about your reputation, events like this do not really effect it in the long run.

I still want to visit!!!!

 

its different once you get to the national, professional and world level, you have countries that you represent, especially when that sport is your national sport, lets take for example soccer in a world level, people stop everything just to root for their team, lets take the Olympics and michael phelps, he represented the WHOLE U.S.A when he went to the summer Olympics and won all those gold medals, what happened to him when he got caught smoking pot? he embarrassed the whole U.S.A and paid the consequences, when you represent your country, its more than just a sport

people have been killed for failing, especially when their country have counted on that specific person or group to come home successful, if it is your NATIONAL sport, you better take it seriously because people do retaliate, the latest thing I can remember was Lebron James, he was born and raised in cleveland, ohio and they counted everything on him, they treated him like a "king", and when he decided to move somewhere else where there was more talent, people retaliated very dangerously, his family was even close to being harmed, his house I believe was vandalized, he was basically exiled from that state, sports is a serious thing when all that country has is that sport

what happened in vancouver was a embarrassment, those people that did it should be jailed, but if you ask me if its anything new? no its not, if you pay attention to sports, riots in europe are much more dangerous compared than what they north americans call a riot

sorry this is just how I feel

Yes, it can be very stressful for the people playing the sports, that is a lot of pressure. However I can't remember seeing one of these riots that break out being started by a player.

So to the people mobbing the streets, it is just a sport. Even if they are really big fans, that's all they are. The next day their lives will be the same as always, the team they like winning or losing will have no real effect on them, except determaning if the after game drinks are a celebration, or to forget their disappointment. I like a few sports, and I always root for my favorite teams, but if they lose a big game, hey there is always next year. My paycheck stays the same, only trash talking rights are won or lost.