Sports are a big part of our lives. It starts from when you are a kid kicking little balls around to playing catch with your father during your teenage years until actually playing on a team when you’re an adult.

Most of us play them for leisure but some do it as their job, they get paid a good amount for it.

For instance last year the Superbowl had 111 million viewers…that means 111 million fans of the 32 teams in America or even abroad watched it because it was very important to them and the team their rooting for.

You have cricket with 2.5 billion estimated fans and finally you have the biggest sport in the world. The one that everyone is watching right now. Football. 3.5 billion fans worldwide. Yes, half of the world.

Football is a big part of many lives but at the same time, for many, fan violence has taken the fun out of it, causing mayhem and ultimately division.

According to biggestglobalsports.com, Soccer is the biggest global sport in the world.

You can find kids playing in alleys, on dirt, grass, pavement just about anywhere they find open space. They use anything they find on the ground as goalposts.

Now, with the biggest sport in the world having its biggest tournament the ‘World Cup’ things get more intense and exciting, aren’t you guys all excited?

The World Cup final is watched by an estimated 600 million people. That’s just the final game not the whole tournament.

Because football is very accessible – all you need is a ball to play no expensive equipment, it is played by everyone hence forming a bond between players. You split into two teams and on one side you instantly feel a sense of unity. They have a common goal and this is to beat the opposition. The need to win unites the members of one team, but it inevitably creates a division between this team and the opposing team. In the case of young people playing an informal game of football, this division is often no more than friendly rivalry. At the end of the game, they are all good friends again. Any sense of division would have disappeared.

Sadly, this is not always the case with professional football players. They have a great sense of unity with their team mates, but because professional football is now big business, the sense of division between and the players on the other side is often quite serious. There is a definite sense of division and even, sometimes, of hatred. This carries on to the fans as well.

Fans of rival teams are sometime seen as enemies and this leads to violence in many games.

Let’s bring a few examples:

What’s behind this surge in violence? The problem may not be the nature of sports themselves, but rather the way society treats sports in conjunction with personal factors. A closer look at some factors that may contribute to fan violence:

Alcohol

Alcohol plays a significant role in many fan altercations. At National Football League games in 2011, more than 7,000 fans were ejected for inappropriate or violent behavior. Some fans spend all morning and afternoon tailgating and drinking with friends before watching the event and then celebrating—or grieving—afterward.

Hypermasculine Culture

Sports can be a significant platform for masculine identity, and people who identify with hypermasculine culture may be more likely to attend sports events. Combined with adrenaline, overidentification, and ready access to fans with opposing allegiances, some men may be inclined to be violent when exposed to triggers.

Sociological Factors

Certain people are at a greater risk of engaging in violent behavior. People who have experienced a recent stress such as job loss, the death of a loved one, or a perceived humiliation are already on edge and more likely to react emotionally. Many people attend sporting events to alleviate stress. However, when a favored team loses, a person is heckled, or a person loses a significant bet associated with a game’s outcome, stress may explode into rage.

Group Dynamics

Millions of people attend sporting events every year, and the vast majority never commit a violent act. When 100,000 people pack a stadium, though, the odds are high that a number of them are under the influence of alcohol. Combine this with an emotional, hypermasculine environment and exposure to opposing sentiment, and you’ve created a recipe for fan violence.