BACK TO FOOTSCRAY
Now I will provide reasons why we must ditch Western Bulldogs
and re-introduce Footscray as our name.
(1) The name change (and the 3 other radical moves), were
enacted by 4 people who took control without an election.
Ditching our century old name for something else without
going to the membership for their scrutiny and democratic
decision is surely un-constitutional. If it is not legally
un-constitutional, it is however definitely immoral and
unethical
(2) Why should we accept change? Four blokes assume control
and these four men, not 400 or 40 but four, decide they
know what is good for us. Now just consider this for a moment
– Four people walk into a 100 year old plus institution
and inform all and sundry that they are now running the
show and you will obey our rules. Why should you or I put
our trust in them? Why should you or I be expected to instantly
agree with leaving home for Carlton’s ground and having
our name altered and then continue to keep putting our hands
in our pockets for memberships, players end of season trip
away raffles etc. Did they promise to put $3 million into
the club like Joseph Gutnick did with Melbourne?
(3) Changing your name is a step of monumental proportions.
It is not like selecting a different coat of paint for the
Grandstand seats, or changing the clubs telephone number.
Any organization that is contemplating a name change has
to consult the members of that group to seek their approval
and then vote on it. If they don’t then they are acting
unconstitutionally. You and I am still waiting on a letter
in the mail asking us of our opinion on whether we should
keep Footscray or go with this new name Western Bulldogs.
It has taken a long time to reach us this voting card, October
1996 to May 2004?
(4) I am a Footscray supporter not a western suburbs/ western
region supporter. I attend games to barrack for Footscray
not the Western Suburbs of Melbourne (Despite the fact that
I live in the Western Region as a matter of fact, should
anyone be interested.) Whilst we should be doing everything
to attract supporters from what should be exclusively our
area, changing our name to Western is not the way to successfully
achieve this. Why don’t we call ourselves Australian
Bulldogs as we live in Australia too?
(5) Our name is too similar to another club’s title.
That team is the West Coast. Couple this with the fact that
I believed their name was the silliest and most boring of
all. That was until we became the Western Bulldogs. Thus
the abbreviations between them and us (WCE &WB) are
way to similar. They chose their wine cooler name, which
is so breathtakingly mundane. After 9 years of monopolising
the “Team with the Worst Name award” our un-elected
gang decide that we should give them competition. They usually
defeated us on the field, but we could at least give them
a run for their money in the worst name award.
(6) We were previously when Fitzroy was around alphabetically
number 5.With the demise of Fitzroy and the emergence of
Adelaide and Brisbane we now would be number 6 as Footscray.
As the Western Bulldogs it is not only the ladder position
that places us 16th and therefore last on the list. How
often do you see things presented in reverse alphabetical
order? I can say that I never have. How often do you find
that the last part of a document misses the cut or does
not fit inside the margin? This is especially the case when
printing or photo copying. It would seem that we thrive
in all forms of being last and least.
(7) Why is there such a big deal about representing the
western suburbs? The capital city of the state of Victoria
isn’t the only town to have suburbs on its left hand
side. There are western suburbs in Hobart, Sydney, Brisbane,
London, Glasgow, Belfast, Dublin, Barcelona, Rome, Tokyo,
New York, Warsaw, Prague, Rotterdam, Stockholm, Reykjavik,
Caracas, Baghdad, Teheran and Anchorage, Alaska to name
just a few. What makes the western region of Australia’s
2nd most populous city anything overly special or important?
Is there some unique nearly extinct animal or exotic bird
that is only found in Melbourne’s western suburbs?
Is the Melbourne, Western suburbs, the Western Suburbs of
our universe and overwhelmingly more famous than the above
mentioned ones? Please deliver me from my ignorance I think
we all need to know. Before anyone claims that I am knocking
the western suburbs of Melbourne, please consider that I
have only ever resided in the western suburbs of Melbourne.
I am not here to bag the western suburbs or any suburb in
any area. Did you know that some of my closest friends……………
(8) People’s first thought of Western would be John
Wayne. If I wished to watch the Duke, Lee Marvin or Clint
Eastwood I would go down to the video store and hire The
Alamo, The Magnificent Seven etc.
(9) The unhealthy neurotic over use of the words west and
western is laughable and the lack of originality here is
sickening. As well as the above there is Western Star Butter,
West Point, Western Union Man, Western Highway, Western
Region, West Side Story Western Hospital and even more revolting,
the Western Region Football League, which replaced the Footscray
and District Football League I could go on for another fifty
years about how often the W word is used. How many other
places on the globe are called Footscray though? I can’t
completely qualify this but I believe it to be less than
2. Much more original and unique than mundane tired old
Western. The only west or western I want to know about is
Scott West.
(10) If changing the name from Footscray was to attract
a wider audience then why stick with boring old Western?
Why leave it there? How about the Melbourne Bulldogs, Victorian
Bulldogs, Eastern State Bulldogs, Eastern Daylight Saving
Time Bulldogs, Australian Bulldogs, Australasian Bulldogs,
Oceania Bulldogs, Southern Hemisphere, South of the Equator
Bulldogs, Earth Bulldogs, Solar System Bulldogs, Milky Way
Bulldogs, Universal Bulldogs, Commonwealth Bulldogs, Former
part of the British Empire Bulldogs, Australia- United States
of America Alliance Bulldogs, ANZUS Treaty Bulldogs etc.
If soccer commentator Les Murray could choose he would possibly
select the "World Bulldogs".
(11) Bulldogs is our clubs nickname. I have no problem with
that. Yet that is all it should be. Nicknames are names
given to people or places for humorous, derisory, endearment
or ironical reasons. They are not meant to take over in
a legal sense. They should not receive equal billing to
your real name. No person has ever had their nickname on
their Birth Certificate, nor will it appear on your Marriage
Certificate. Captain Blood will not be found anywhere on
Jack Dyer’s Death Certificate. When the great Bruce
Doull becomes late as well as great there will be no mention
of Flying Doormat on his last certificate.
(12) Are the residents of Footscray not entitled to feel
slighted that the suburb that they live in is not considered
good enough to represent the football club that it always
has done so in the past? What message does this give out
to people living in Footscray? Their suburb is unworthy
of continuing a long tradition of having a football team
in the biggest competition in Australia? The club will still
train there but it is beneath their dignity to be called
the name of that suburb. Now there is one good idea why
we are not playing our home games in Footscray anymore.
It would have been very interesting hearing the explanation
given to Footscray citizens by the Western Bulldogs executives
that- ‘We will still use the Footscray ground, for
home matches, but we, (the football club) don’t and
won’t use the Footscray name anymore ‘Because
it is for third rate losers lacking success. So shove your
name, just let us have the ground.’ There is one unfortunate
scenario avoided for the Western Bulldogs administration.
(13) Consider the feelings of people who were born in Footscray
or at some point lived in Footscray. Are we underprivileged,
third rate and lacking success as well as the present residents?
Should my sister, numerous other relatives and friends and
myself who were born in Footscray endeavour to have all
mentions of the F word erased from birth and baptismal documents?
(14) Any person could quite justifiably arrive at the conclusion
we have either or both of these problems. (1) an inferiority
complex or (2) some form of self loathing, which has necessitated
the need to change our name. Why would anyone want to support
a team that hates itself or is embarrassed by it’s
history or both
(15) Why is such a stigma attached to the nine letter, word
that concludes in Y and commences with F? Footscray is easy
to say, spell and pronounce. It is also an actual place.
Grab a street directory and try and find West Coast Eagles
or Port Power in them let alone Western Bulldogs. However
you will encounter little trouble locating Footscray should
you pick up a Melbourne street directory.
(16) I don’t like having to use this negative logic,
but I find that this reason does have to be raised. I in
no way wish to start bagging suburbs for stereotypes either
real or imagined. However if Footscray the suburb is deemed
undesirable then why have Collingwood, Richmond and St Kilda
not changed their names as well? There are equal or worse
word associations and stereotypes with those three suburbs
than what there is or was with Footscray
Maybe I shouldn’t complain about what our title
is. We are living in Australia and what is so unique about
Australia and Australians is our outstanding ability in
giving out the most boring, mundane, ‘State The Bleeding
Obvious’ names. The name of the stadium where the
2000 Sydney Olympics was held is Stadium Australia. If they
had not named it Stadium Australia it would be ‘The
Olympic Stadium’ The Australian Open tennis tournament
is played in Melbourne. What is its name? It is Melbourne
Park. What about the names of pubs and hotels? They are
mostly the Railway, Prince of Wales, Grand, Royal, Station
or Commercial etc. Get the picture? Maybe introducing Western
Bulldogs was merely making a statement about reinforcing
our Australian love of inane names. Now some bloke wants
to copyright the intellectually challenged
Aussie, Aussie, Aussie, oi oi oi
I cringe every time I hear this Shakespeare rivalling
stuff. What does the rest of the world think when they hear
Australians at Wimbledon, Lords, Flushing Meadow etc yelling
this out aloud. The only thing worse was some of our supporters
chanting the similar -
Doggie Doggie Doggie, oi oi oi
So maybe there’s the link and why we are Western
Bulldogs. We are true Australians aren’t we? Patriotism
is the last refuge of the stupid. (Scoundrel is too hard
to spell) However I won’t settle for this so please
click on the category about why Western Bulldogs has failed
7 years after it was controversially enforced.
