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by DorsetExile
I feel what I think must be Percy’s frustration at being told (on another thread) that something he knows perfectly well is objectively the case is merely his own subjective opinion; that his opinion is neither true nor false, and that his attempt ‘to make a definitive argument’ to prove what he knows to be true, can’t possibly work. So, let’s test the idea that Percy can’t prove that Newport County and Newport County AFC are two different clubs, by reminding ourselves of a few simple truths.
The first truth is that although football clubs are ‘social constructs’ (they wouldn’t exist without human beings bringing them into existence) they are nevertheless objectively existing social constructs. Try telling someone that it is purely a matter of individual, subjective opinion that Manchester United exists; that saying MU does exist is neither true nor false. And we all know that it is objectively true that football clubs can be distinguished from one another. Try telling someone that it is neither true nor false, but is merely a matter of individual subjective opinion, that Man Utd and Man City are different clubs. In addition, we all know that football clubs are brought into existence, and cease to exist, by means of legally binding agreements between people. Percy knows what the objective nature of the agreement to bring Newport AFC into existence was, because he was there. Percy tells us that the intention of the people who gave birth to Newport AFC was to replace the defunct Newport County with a different club, and that is what objectively came to pass. As I understand it (I wasn’t there) the people involved had to make the new club a different one from the old club because if they had declared it to be the same it would have inherited the old club’s debts. Admittedly it was a collectively subjective decision to bring a completely new club into existence, but it is an objective, historical, legally endorsed, fact that that is exactly what happened.
It is true, of course, that many of us, including me, like to think of Newport County AFC and Newport County as the same club. In my less analytical moments, I will continue to think that way and will continue to tell anybody who will listen that the Great Len Weare holds the appearance record for the club. But, as we all find out eventually, what we would prefer to be the case and what is the case are very often completely different from one another. As Percy points out, the fact that were Jerry Sherman to have got his way there would have been TWO clubs is the clincher. This means that it is not a matter of subjective opinion that the two clubs were and are different from one another; on the contrary, it is a matter of logical necessity that they are different, since two separate entities cannot have a single identity. And it makes no difference that Sherman did not get his way; the fact that it would have been logically possible for him to have got his way is all that is required to prove Percy’s case.
