June 7, 2021 - 10:58am
“That some fans are booing players taking the knee shows just how far football still has to go in tackling racism.” That is the type of high-minded narrative beginning to take hold following the hostile reaction displayed by many supporters when England’s players took the knee before recent matches against Austria and Romania.
In truth, things are not quite so clear-cut. While it is certainly the case that a schism has emerged on the issue, it would be wrong to portray it as one between a few hardcore bigots and everyone else.
On the one hand we see the game’s authorities and big-name stars who, in supporting knee-taking, appear driven by a desire to flaunt their progressive credentials (as well, no doubt, as an acute fear of causing offence by being seen to display anything less than full-throated support) and, on the other, thousands of ordinary fans — and not just those emitting boos — who are, let us be frank, growing increasingly frustrated at what, for them, has become a protracted moral lecture.
These fans have a point. Any campaign seeking to garner mass appeal must, by definition, try to take people with it. On this, the Black Lives Matter movement — which, let us not forget, is synonymous with the whole knee-taking phenomenon — has singularly failed. And not, as is sometimes implied, on account of dissenters themselves being inherently racist; but because the general tactics have, from the outset, been ill-judged and divisive.
When people see local statues being defaced or torn down without any sort of debate, they get angry. When they hear their country inaccurately depicted as a cesspit of racism, it rankles. And when they are bombarded with the same political message wherever they look, whether it’s in their local supermarket, when using public services, in their workplace, on their favourite TV shows, splashed on the products they buy, or rammed home relentlessly at sporting and other public events, their patience begins to wear thin.
These objectors aren’t, for the most part, opposing the message. In fact, the number of people in today’s Britain who believe that black lives don’t matter is, thankfully, ever diminishing. What they object to is the method of delivery. So pervasive is the propaganda in their everyday lives that, in the end, they must be forgiven for concluding that they are personally its target, that it is they who are considered the problem — bigots, all of them, in need of “re-education”.
The knee-takers and their cheerleaders would do well to take a lead from the Kick It Out movement, which, thanks to its subtle and intelligent campaigning over many years, has contributed enormously in helping to press home the message that racism has no place in football or wider society. Kick It Out took people with it, such that, in nearly 40 years of attending football matches, I have never heard a bad word uttered about the organisation. It united rather than alienated. By contrast, Black Lives Matter has set things back.
The spectacle of cosseted millionaire footballers repeatedly signalling their virtue in front of hard-pressed fans who simply want to enjoy the match was always going to grate. Most football fans — indeed, most Britons — stand against racism, and they know in their hearts that their country is one of the most tolerant on the planet. Battering them incessantly with a message which implies otherwise has served to create a deep tension which shows no sign of abating. Why is anyone surprised?
Paul Embery is a firefighter, trade union activist, pro-Brexit campaigner and ‘Blue Labour’ thinker
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SubscribeThey are not bigots, they are heroes. They are quite rightly revolted by the spectacle of craven submission to a new orthodoxy that is being rammed down people’s throats – comply or die style – by a toxic combination of virtue-signalling airheads and the sinister devils who are behind this whole thing.
Of course they boo it. Any normal person would.
The public booing of a simple anti-racism gesture is a shameful, hurtful act. If you don’t get the meaning of the gesture, you really are part of the problem.
The sentence formula “If you [do/think] X, then you are part of the problem” is one of the most divisive and unhelpful arguments out there today. It might seem like a quick way of discrediting the other side, but it really just exacerbates the damage caused by whatever debate you are having. It also betrays a level of intellectual laziness, as it is used to exculpate the person saying it from actually synthesising and defending an argument.
So agree with your comment. What about reasoned debate to win someone over? To say that anyone who disagrees with you is the enemy is so unhelpful.
File also with that old favourite, “I’ll just leave this here . . . ”
It’s the logical outcome of a sheltered generation with poorly developed (if at all) debating skills. WRT to the cricket shenanigans, I received a lecture the other day from a young student about racism; their argument was “perhaps you should educate yourself about Basil d’Oliveira…” etc. plus a link to d’Oliveira’s wikipedia entry. I politely pointed out I was alive at the time, well aware thank you & indeed saw d’Oliveira play, none of which has any traction compared to a youngster “discovering” a wikipedia entry of course
Also a generation that has grown up (or grown accustomed to) thinking that it’s somehow possible and a good idea to communicate complex political arguments in a 120 character tweet or a meme. The meme-ification of society, if you like.
The memefication of the me-me generation !
That “educate yourself” expression is guaranteed to make me furious.
I think YOU are part of the problem! Why don’t you engage with the argument?
But is abundantly clear that what the woke set want to do is to virtue signal, condemn supposedly unenlightened white people, and issue performative and disingenuous proclamations of ‘being hurt’. They actually have an an extreme and divisive ideology – look it up – full of general left wing platitudes and have zilch interest in improving conditions for people of all races in this country. ‘Gesture’ is indeed the right word, it should just be preceded by ’empty’.
Got you talking about it though, hasn’t it.
But I do get get meaning of the gesture as do most reasonable fans. It is a signal by a tiny privileged few to the many ordinary folk that they despise their ideas, their way of life and their culture. BLM is a explicit Marxist organisation which captured the faux outrage of last year and turbocharged it to their own ends. The overthrow of free markets the family and traditional institutions. Do your homework. it is explicit in its intentions. Many ordinary folk inducing multi racial fans I know, have no taste for this philosophy and are smart enough to see right through it.
I think you mean “including” rather than “inducing”. Good comment in any case.
I might have agreed with you (note might) but I definitely will not agree with any organisation or individual who considers skin colour the only method of deciding that lives matter. Remember the BLM attitude to those who said All Lives Matter!
Or to that valiant little “White Lives Matter” aeroplane.
Zac – I don’t doubt that some of the kneelers feel that their disparagement of the flag and politicization of a sporting event is “standing up to evil.”
I though, see it is craven virtue signalling, and making alliance with an anti-Semitic, Marxist and anti-Western movement, that has the added flaw of staggering hypocracy.
I live in Chicago. On an average week here, more blacks are killed in this one city, than are killed by police in our entire country in an entire year. Many of those shot are children. Virtually all of them are killed by other blacks. And BLM has exactly ….NOTHING … to say about it.
Well said, tell it as it truly is, not what these thugs try to portray it.
Don’t care about your non-existent problem. Leave me alone.
They are also booing at the (inherently racist) wokeism that is rampant in the West. The fact that this article doesn’t mention it, doesn’t mean it is not at the heart of the matter. #wokeryfakery
Yep Jiggery Wokery…
The huge majority of fans are not racists, bigots, fascists, or any other negative label you seek to apply without any evidence whatsoever. They are ordinary decent fair minded people, who know hypocrisy and self interest when they see it. BLM, which could gave been a force for good and to improve understanding, are clearly seen now as the racists and selfish revolutionaries they are. Time indeed for good and decent folk to stand up straight
It’s an insult to every person to have this constantly forced upon us, EVERY person has a right to their own opinion whether other people like it or not. If a person is racist, right or wrong, it’s their choice. I think a lot of people are so angry at being labelled racist because they’re not going along with the ‘the mob’ that it is having an adverse effect. The BLM movement will keep pushing on and causing ill feelings because, somewhere, some people are raking in sh*t loads of money because of it. The people who were willing to “get the message” have got it. Those that don’t never will, give us a break.
If you don’t get how toxic and abhorrent “antiracism” is by looking at its current track record, then you are the problem.
Some idiot commenting on another post complained that Unherd is dominated by lefties. I rather think not. Well said, we’re not all against you for expressing a bit of common decency. I do agree that BLM in general and knee-taking in particular have been mindless and divisive, but to boo those who don’t see things that way is hardly heroic and very unpleasant.
We are just all sick of the Wokerati trying to teach their grandparents to suck eggs.
I’d say the article does a pretty good job explaining why the people booing are not bigots
You’re the one who doesn’t get the meaning of the gesture.
YOU and your ilk are the problem with your simplistic acceptance of a subservient gesture.
-85 downvotes, well done, that must be a record. If you don’t understand why you are part of the problem.
Not sure even I’ve managed 85! Well done Zac. It was a Good comment, too.
Mark, you do get lots of downvotes, but some of us are interested in what you have to say! Even when I disagree (as I usually do, as with your commendation of Zac’s wilful misunderstanding of the significance of the kneeling gesture), it’s always good to hear a contrary voice – UnHerd is in danger of becoming an echo chamber, rather defeating its purpose.
They’re booing the racism of BLM, not it’s self-professed “anti-racism”. BLM is racist to the bone and should be proscribed as a terrorist organisation.
Cancel them!
I love your point by point takedown of the argument in the article. Masterful.
Stick to your Twitter echo chamber, rubbish you spout is offensive.
The booing is because the people have seen behind the curtain, there is no Wizard of Oz, it has been outed, but the virtue-signallers just won’t take the hint.
In the past if you didn’t like the act-glasgow empire was famous-the audience used to boo & chuck tomatoes & stuff at the stage. They are the paying public. The footballers are there to entertain them not tell everyone their views.
Good point… cowardice become virtue.
Brentford ( Most Multi national team in Championship) Wifred Zaha rejected BLM Soon…..All it does is annoy fans,Southgate is a failing Clown …
Having been an American for the last 81 years, I can tell you that there has never been a time in this country when any sort of protest or pushback by Black people has been supported by more than a minority of White people — usually a rather small one — unless and until it becomes fashionable and goes over bigtime. It used to be worse. It is beginning to dawn on even the densest of Americans that the country really won’t work at all well if divided into mutually hostile castes and tribes. Surrounded by their kind, though, the jocks utter bovine noises in _their_ form of protest, but I think in l’esprit d’escalier. The sun is setting on their day.
I’ve been going to the game for 40+ years, and I haven’t seen a single piece of racism from a crowd for the last 30. (And believe me, I saw plenty before). Football in the UK is a beacon of acceptance that we should be proud of. No doubt you’ve still got the odd bigot somewhere or other but this ‘broad brush’ approach of lecturing/moralising to the ENTIRE crowd inside the stadium, endlessly, is an insult to the people who pay to turn up each week.
Remember football crowds are folk theatre. A place to enjoy pure & bracing freedom of speech where you can go and bellow out your rudeness at the ref / the players / the opposition fans. As anyone who’s ever chanted “Jimmy Hill you’re a w*nker” at the press box will agree. The discomfort of the establishment / mealy mouthed commentators each time this happens, will only drive the boo-ing even more.
And whenever there has been the odd bigot, the crowd tend to get the bigot ejected or tell them to go do one. The average football fan from what I’ve seen has no patience for bigotry. Much like the average Brit. It’s a privilege to be British and to live in a country that is by and large so tolerant and accepting.
I’ve been attending lower league football for over 40 years as well and agree with the above comments. Racists get short shrift at football matches which comes as a surprise to people who don’t attend football matches when you tell them this. But then they have the media telling them otherwise.
Quite right. Each time I hear a commentator on TV cringingly apologise for “any offensive language you might have heard” a tiny part of me dies inside.
How about a new song “who’s the w&nker in the studio”
Most of the Abuse is from AFRICA & Middle East Twitter wont tell you,but Paul Joseph Watson showed examples in his weekly blog,last Week…boo hoo….
I don’t suppose the players are aware that some of the BLM leaders now own more mansions than they do.
Nice point, Fraser!
Exactly, as I said, above, some people are raking in millions because of this movement so will carry on stoking the fire.
So it is a gesture of unity then.
see my above point Youtube Paul J.Watson ”why you should boo taking the knee”..Excellent debunk of Woke moral ”superiority ”
Some on the traditional left have argued for some time that identity politics are the tool of the neoliberalism – one evidence being their popularity among the well off and corporate sectors. The latter in particular do not embrace these causes because the believe they will result in a real challenge to economic injustice.
Fraser Bailey= Cliff Clavin with a bad attitude.
Please explain….
Worth repeating over and over, but the UK is one of the most accommodating and inclusive societies ever created by humanity.
The accusation that the country is rank with racism and xenophobia doesn’t hold true, and to agree with Paul’s comments, when people are told something that is patently untrue is actually reality they begin to rebel. 2+2 doesn’t equal 5 no matter how many times organisations like BLM like to claim it does. People understand the laws of reality and the truth in front of their eyes, and become frustrated when their objections are thrown back at them with a cursory explanation of ‘white privilege’ or ‘being blind to institutional racism’.
Never once do we see a breakdown from BLM et al. about what the all encompassing ‘BAME’ actually means. We never see, for example, the difference between African and Afro-Carribean diasporas in educational attainment, neither do we see that cross referenced against white working class attainment which has been slipping for decades. We never get told the difference between the health and educational outcomes and trends of Bangladeshi diasporas vis their Pakistani neighbours since the 1970s either, or how Asian Ugandans migrants tend to outperform almost every other group in society on certain metrics.
No, it’s easier to just claim everything is institutional and invoke sins of the father for all the world’s ills.
“Never once do we see a breakdown from BLM et al. about what the all encompassing ‘BAME’ actually means.”
Actually we do, courtesy of the estimable Tony Sewell and his colleagues, promptly denigrated [sic] by Sasha Johnson as a “house n3gro who should be hanged”.
She is a waste of space. As is the Gopal woman in Cambridge. Not to mention her boss, Toope.
So let’s get this straight. The FA have adopted the same slogan as a far left political group, ‘BLM’ and have adopted one of their most prominent symbolic gestures, taking the knee before a sporting game; but we’re suppose to believe that any similarities are pure coincidence?
Football Association, Stopped Poppies on Players shirts,near Memorial day near November 11…Stopped Robbie Fowler supporting liverpool dockers strike in 1996 with a fine…Turns a blind eye to 6 of its team greed forming a super league,Arsenal,Chelsea,Spurs,Manchester utd,Manchester city,Liverpool ..Sick Society &possibly my last comments on Unherd Goodbye Folks ..Stay Safe
Yes. I think booing is a childish thing to do generally, but I absolutely understand why these fans are expressing discontent at the protracted, sanctimonious moral lecture of BLM now being forced on them at the football field – for exactly the reasons outlined here. Chapeau for being explicit.
black lives matter is a self-evident truth. Black Lives Matter is a radical political movement with a destructive agenda
Critical Racist, uh I mean Race, Theory judges people by the color of their skin, not the content of their character. CRT says that white skinned people are born racist and remain that way forever, no matter what they do. That’s racist by definition.
The people who push CRT are racists. It’s time to stop being polite and label CRT supporters the racists that they really are.
Exceedingly well said.
Critical Theory (critical race theory) comes from ‘The Frankfurt School’ in 1930s Germany, from a group of academic and intellectual Marxists planning how to destroy Capitalism in the West, and now are seeded throughout the education, entertainment, and MSM/Social Media. Google them, and the 11 points, and maybe the Bilderberg , Davos, G-7, G-20, and all the other ones out to destroy the world as we know it.
Realistically, I suspect this would be as psychologically successful as the CRT advocates trying to win people over by calling them racists.
Many people who accept this approach just don’t understand that it’s race essentialism. It needs to be revealed for what it is, but a blanket claim that everyone who has followed these movements is a personal racist would be a bad move.
I will be very interested to see if they continue with this cheap bit of theatre next year in Qatar.
Given the treatment of the guest workers who have quickly built the venues over the last few years, one wonders whether black lives only matter in Western countries.
Hope so. Qatar has behaved terribly.
Whoever thought that black lives don’t matter? No one in Britain would ever have thought that. The movement was moulded in the US around the meme that white cops were deliberately killing innocent blacks. Given the figures of black on clack crime it seems that many blacks in the US believe that black lives don’t matter. . There were race riots in Britain in the 1950 s, but they were never predicated on the belief that black lives did matter.
There you go – trying to treat BLM like it merely had flaws in its logic, rather than it is a Marxist ploy to sow divisions between all the groups in society, to harm harm society its self, as a step to destroying Capitalism and bringing in Soros’s New World Order.. .
Is that what Soros is up to nowadays? How time flies. It seems only yesterday he was using the run on sterling to make over a billion in a few hours. I wonder if the damage he helped cause ever causes him sleepless nights. Ah, but then you would need to have a conscience in order for it to be troubled.
BLM. I really must do some proper research on that lot sooner rather than later. Are we sure they are really Marxists, and not other people who have dressed like Marxists?
It’s just that Marxism is so yesterday, somehow, and even a little bit village fete. Our enemies are numerous, and those who wish to destroy the West will use any tactic to advance their aims.
My guess is that were one to suppress one’s gag reflex and lift the stone all the way, one would find creepy crawlies of an entirely different brand underneath it.
For those of us who care about getting rid of racism it’s depressing that the left never seems to learn anything. Their basic attitude is that everyone in this country needs to be eternally lectured because we are all terrible people. Any resistance to this is seen as proof that further lecturing is needed (beatings will continue until morale improves). This alienates more people than it persuades and so racism actually increases. As a result of this the left then prescribes more lecturing.
Maybe one day they will learn that calling everyone a bunch of thick racists isn’t very popular but I don’t hold out much hope.
I have stopped commenting on this to friends because anything other than full support for everything that BLM stand for is considered racist
I suggest you get some new friends…
That’s why they are getting away with it, we have freedom of speech and if other people don’t like what you say then I say that’s their problem.
So why stop? That would just make me more provocative. If you cannot mess with the heads of self loathing anti-patriots are missing out. I would say it is time to get a MAGA hat to wear when you go out to the pub with them.
(and maybe a ‘Q sent me’ T-shirt)
This article doesn’t mention wokeism and critical race theory which is at the core of BLM. Even some people commenting in the trashy Daily Mail are making this point and are saying enough is enough with this racist wokery fakery.
Wocus Pocus…… Woko Haram…..the Alphabet people etc. etc.
Isn’t it about time we all took the knee in honour of our wonderfully diverse and tolerant country and all its done for racial equality and fairness. Maybe drop the other knee for the huge contribution the caucasian majority has made in science, medicine, industry, literature and technology?
Shouting at people for being bigots is not going to further your interests particularly. Stonewall have made the same mistake.
As Private Jones (Dads Army) said “They don’t like it up em”.
A case of the plebs, probably, for the most part, white and male basically saying, “CHECK YOUR PRIVILEGE”.
Wearing white (Is that a loaded term ?) has it’s issues. If you sling mud, don’t be surprised if some slashes back.
The 1966 Quarter Final White football Strip IS My favourite England strip, no adverts,rainbows etc…i wear White similar rugby shirt was all white until 1992
I must say I do like Paul Embery.
Embery I follow on Twitter he is One of few Sane Voices on Moderate Left…
Footballers kneeling is a revolting spectacle and the idea that it has nothing to do with BLM is clearly preposterous. For millions of people since last summer, kneeling is associated with hatred of Britain, its institutions and history. Paying customers should be allowed to voice their disapproval and I would boo my lungs out.
Furthermore, the insistence that disapproval of kneeling somehow implies racism is making the problem worse by entrenching the divide. People are now objecting in increasingly stronger terms to having these accusations thrown at them. The situation is being made worse by Southgate. In football no good ever comes from criticising or disparaging fans.
This is the 1549 Western Rebellion (Rebellyans an Lyver Pejadow Kebmyn) [And various others around the country] repackaged for modern times. The powers on high – THE CONDESCENDING YOU NEED CIVILISING BRIGADE – want to force on the people, just as then, something the people don’t hold with. Nearly 500 years ago it was the prayer book now it is the hegemonic athiest orthodoxies of CRT, White Privelge, with its attendant need for us to feel shame for our customs, history, and traditions.
They’re going to come at us by calling us racists, bigots, and every pejorative, but we will not yield without a struggle.
I truly feel most have had enough, there will be repercussions.
None of the token commentators pause to wonder why they’re on the tv in the first place.
The question is did Austrian and Romanian players take the knee, when their national anthems were played?
Since “taking the knee” seems to have become a sign of opposition to one’s own racist country, why are these players participating in a sport on behalf of said racist country? The English players should have refused to play and handed the victory to their more worthy opposition, who played for a country which they can respect. The fact that the English players continue to represent a racist country, signifies that their inflated salaries mean more than any ideal, be that patriotism, or anti racism. Today’s entitled SJW’s will virtue signal as long as the effort is minimal.
The what??
KNELT. Or KNEELED, even. Same as we don’t normally say “take the ar$e” instead of ‘sit’, or “take the sole” for ‘stand’, & so forth.
The expression “take a knee” is quite common in the sport vernacular of the US.
I don’t boo. I just don’t watch anymore.
The only racist/homophobic action that goes on at football matches occurs when Mexico plays. The fans are fond of homophobic chants. Last night’s crushing win of the US over Mexico was stopped for 5 minutes due to Mexican fan behavior. Whenever Mexico plays in the US stadia, fans are mostly Mexican.
Footballers should take their virtual signalling to places where BL are most at risk – the inner cities with significant BAME populations
I call them black lives Marxists, they have nothing to do with racism in the UK and even in USA. One can say that the blacks who are living in the UK were more than fairly treated (look at the direction of the little boats if you don’t believe me) and BLM has made things a lot worse, because of its Marxist agenda, it is not just statues it is the State which they wanted to pull down on June 7 2020 and to replace it with a Marxist nightmare. This was announced by Enoch Powell a long time ago and is nothing more than a go at the proletariat dictatorship. Floyd had nothing to do with England!
The black armies in London showed up a bit but in USA they took over places where more blacks than ever before have been murdered in those areas. One can safely say that the blacks of the UK or USA are not in little boats trying to get in to Africa or Jamaica it is the other way round, thinking of leaving the UK? They may be Marxists but they are not stupid, so a lot of this gesturing is not race motivated it is just political, it is also counter-productive and it is unfounded (events in another jurisdiction), nobody is stopping anybody from getting in to a little boat and heading for Africa. To tell who are the lucky black people all what we need to do is look at the directions of the little boats, their destination are where the lucky ones live.
Finally, Marxism: this has been the scourge of mankind and has caused millions of dead in biblical genocides, these need to happen because of the way in which Marx prepared Marxism gearing his followers up to be violent and not to accept defeat, not take no for an answer nor accept changes for any reason which would water down the doctrine (at the time it was people like the Mensheviks who would want to do this in the Russian interpretation of Marx). So Marx created an open loop system which from the moment it is launched it is out of control and if it finds a wall it will crash it, so sooner or later there is some “cultural revolution” or a “great leap forward” somewhere and you have your genocide and inevitable failure of the doctrine but sadly new Marxists turn up all the time and say that Marxism (Communism) was never tried!
Marxism in order to destabilize the states use envy arguments such as the zero sum ones. So England has fanatics who don’t believe in merit and want jobs just because they should be represented in X% everywhere because they are X% of the population, not because they are qualified nor the best to do the jobs. Sadly in the Police, BBC etc a lot of pro Marxist organizations want to do just that, ignore merit and racially segregate the jobs to force black people competent or not in to their vacancies letting down their societies for which they have no real care. It is more important to get somebody like our anti-Terror cop pro BLM Marxist who says they were right to be angry! This he said around June 7 2020!!) he is the assistant commissioner. The commissioner is even worse she is a female commissioner with a Teflon skirt to which nothing sticks who after what happened in 2005 it is debatable if she should still be in uniform at all. Wokes have created in the MET a 1-2 woke dream team. Ideal team for to deal with what happened on June 7 2020 as we all saw! Their police just like the players just love to kneel to the black lives Marxists.
What happened on June 7 2020 “seemed to be” because of something which happened in another jurisdiction, the other side of the world (a small time crook using forged currency being arrested and killed) So London was thrashed – This makes no sense! Nothing to do with London! It wasn’t race it was an attack on our State: our flag on the Cenotaph our monuments! Our heroes were also deprecated! Our heroes were the ones who gave these terrorists their freedom and sadly allowed the freedom of wokes to be incompetent and anti-English and to undermine our state by not wanting to fill vacancies according to merit.
So the footballers are kneeling like the police to the black lives Marxist god and many of us don’t like it and there are many reasons for us to hate this. These people in certain circumstances represent or are the image of our nation and what they do is disgusting.
The fans should not watch nor pay for this, that is the message the millionaires will listen to, they may not have brains to understand how demeaning they are but they do have pockets.
As an American, it’s very strange to see Europeans using a term and an action from American football, a game that most Europeans don’t follow or understand. “Taking the knee” means deliberately “downing” the ball instead of playing it. It’s typically used in the last minute or so of a game, when the team that has possession of the ball is in the lead. They are obligated to play until the clock runs out, so the quarterback “takes the knee” with the ball rather than initiating a play, to guard against the other team getting the ball back through an interception or fumble. The trend was started by an American quarterback (Kaepernick), whom, I suppose, was trying to symbolize “I’m not playing the system’s game.” Europeans are adopting a symbolic gesture without even understanding what it means.
Time to calm down about all of the woke nuttiness. This, too, shall pass, as Peter Franklin wrote here a few weeks ago (5/19/21). And it will pass more quickly if everyone ignores the wokeness of it all, as one would ignore a two-year-old’s tantrum.
Although, such articles really are amazing clickbait.
I don’t think we should ignore it. I think they need to be told NO.
We did ignore it.
It hasn’t passed.
Isolated from live crowd feedback for a year, the sporting establishment has gone faster and further down the disastrous path of abusing their own fans.
Let’s not forget – most of the woke/ BLM policy preferences do NOT help Blacks or other supposed victims of systematic discrimination. Good schools and safe streets should be everyone’s goal.
Players shouldn’t be kneeling, fans shouldn’t be booing. Players aren’t kneeling to show support for BLM, fans aren’t booing because they are bigoted racists. This issue doesn’t seem to be so complicated
On the pervasiveness of the moral hectoring: you know the iPhone auto-complete function? Where it displays what it thinks should come next in whatever you’re writing? If you’ve started typing a word, it will display options for the completed word. If you’ve just finished a sentence, or have yet to start writing, it usually provides a selection of likely words. (Just then it suggested “I”, “yes” and “thanks”). Well, there was a day or two last year when, in the latter case, it displayed the words “Black Lives Matter.” Minor detail, perhaps, but it rankled and most definitely did not achieve the desired effect.
I thought I heard the England manager saying that players were taking the knee to highlight ‘racial injustice’. But there seems to be the insistence from people that are noting to do with the England squad, that they are supporting BLM. Even though they say they are highlighting racial injustice. Maybe they are appropriating the gesture from BLM? Maybe they are reclaiming the gesture from BLM, who appropriated from US sportsmen?
if they are supporting the supposedly Marxist BLM, whilst all earning in excess of £100k a week, wouldn’t they be first in line for a pay cut when the revolution comes?
The people booing and most of us on here are saying, no, you aren’t kneeling to highlight racial injustice, even though you said you were. You are either BLM supporters, or at best just virtue signalling.
No one on here, including the author, seems to be able to help me understand why we know what the England players are doing even though they tell us it isn’t that.
My favorite insult is that one is also ignorant as well as a racist—bigot being a two bit rather than a ten cent word. You would not lose money if you would get a significant amount of dollars that you will be called ignorant. And any list will have a series of three, to show they mean business, as in equity, diversity. and inclusiveness. A holy Trinity, to show the ignorant.
I’m out of this sorry pit…
Whereas the anti-white racism is most visible on the MSM.
Paul Embery never addresses racism in the fire brigade, where he worked for many years and represented its members. This racism is well documented and acknowledge by the fire brigades leaders. Is it because Paul doesn’t want to address it? Or is it because, despite the evidence, he doesn’t believe it exists?
Coming from a working class football area I agree that branding these fans as Racist is far too simple ,some are but not many Racism remains a huge issue , even if Britain is one of the more tolerant societies and if the players feel the need to take the knee to show this in my view fans should at least accept this , Kick it out does work diligently but has not really made a huge impact
If they wish to take some form of stand against racism out on the field them maybe doing something other than taking the knee? This gesture has become far too linked to the BLM movement and just turns people off – and that’s completely counterproductive. Although I think a Tory MP actually said this in public and is now being heckled…of course…
Amazing bunch of comments here. All that’s missing is ‘I’m not racist but…’ and ‘Some of my best friends are black’. Here you go, tolerance fans who prefer your own delusional reality to the unpleasant realities, educate yourselves with some recent examples of ‘pure & bracing freedom of speech’ from the ‘folk theatre’ of football. https://tinyurl.com/eueauz7a, https://tinyurl.com/3v5mvfj2, https://tinyurl.com/ujzssr5u, https://tinyurl.com/rsftu4tf, https://tinyurl.com/eueauz7a, https://tinyurl.com/b7burc5j And for those who bravely threaten to boycott the game – for something less challenging, lawn tennis or bowls – do it. If you can’t see there’s a problem that BLM and the taking of the knee – flawed as they might be – are addressing, then you’re part of it.
I read you loud and clear: We have to choose: either you are in favour of BLM, kneeling etc. or you are a racist enemy. On those conditions I choose to be the enemy of you and your friends. Too bad – if there was a slot for people who were against racism without sharing your politics I might have gone for it.
Interesting framing. You see taking the knee as a full endorsement of the American BLM movement with all its objectives – others, I suspect the majority but I’ve no clear evidence as I don’t think anyone has researched it, see it as a way of expressing support for black players (and people generally) who are subject to racism.
By booing the gesture people might be saying ‘I don’t agree with all of BLM America’s objectives and I’m not a socialist and I resent having them thrust down my throat’ or they might be saying ‘I don’t care about racism’.
True – by kneeling you are taking a side, there is no room for nuances. Witness the utter condemnation of anyone who opposes the gesture. But they might also be saying that whatever their, and your, feelings of solidarity, this is not the slot to promote them. “Leave me alone and let me watch my football in peace”. Regardless of the individual thoughts of the players, a concerted action by the national team at the start of a match presents itself as a united action of the team, on behalf of the nation, something that all fans and spectators and Englishmen are expected to share and join in. If you want to do that you really have to stick to stances that unite the nation instead of dividing it.
I have no problem with players expressing their support for President Xi, the Chagos Islanders, or Kentucky Fried Chicken – on their own time – but it is not appropriate to promote it as the official English view at matchtime.
Well phrased – the professional virtue signallers just can’t see the blindingly obvious …
Completely agree with you, Rasmus.
You don’t know what my politics are. I am pleased that we can agree that racism is a bad thing though.
I am not. I would feel more secure in my opinions if you did not share them.
I am sorry that my anti-racism makes you insecure in your own anti-racism. Your anti-racism makes me a little more secure in my own because it tells me that there’s one more person sharing what I consider to be a basic human decency. We agree that victimising fellow human beings because they don’t look like us is wrong. That’s good. As for what else you believe, I’m not bothered and its none of my business anyway.
Right, so your argument is:-
1. Willian, Rudiger, and Sterling were racially abused online, and a black Rangers player was racially abused by an opponent.
ergo
2.Anyone who boos “taking the knee” is a racist
Your argument is invalid. The conclusion doesn’t follow from the premise.
Your interpretation of what I posted above is – your interpretation, I guess. I used the word ‘racist’ in the context of some of the comments on this thread before I posted, using a well-known cliche in quotation marks. I did say that if ‘you’ (one) refuse to see that taking the knee is a response on the part of the players to a serious racism problem around the game, and in society at large, makes you part of that problem. I did not say that it makes you a racist. I didn’t say that booing an overtly anti-racist gesture makes you a racist either, although it’s quite clearly a questionable thing to do in the context of racism. But if that’s what you’re feeling, and the shoe fits – Good Germans – Godwin’s Law… Thanks for at least following up the links.
Ah, the old if your not one of us your evil routine. It works so well…
Good, glad it got through.
Please just add to the debate and cut out this playground crap.
Excellent addition to the debate there, Ian, thanks for the contribution.
Why not bu*** to some other Woke blog….You are clearly disturbed…
Excellent response. Lol. I am new round here – is the standard of debate normally as high as this? Not sure what ‘bu**’ is, and not aware that this is a ‘Woke blog’ either. Is it? Please, enlighten me, Rob. Blog I understand, but this term ‘Woke’ – I see it everywhere and I really don’t know what it means – although it does seem make you and many others here very hot under the collar. Does it mean anti-racist? Marxist? Something to do with the modern bogeyman – sorry, bogeyperson – Identity Politics? Does it threaten you? Do I threaten you? ‘Disturbed’ I assume you mean as an insult, but, while I’d be the last to make any great claims for my mental health, I assure you that you can go in harder than it if you’re trying to rile me.
Grow up please.
See below where I address this issue in response to Johannes’ identical request (it was more of an instruction or order from him – like your previous iteration, above – the one about playground crap.)
Why don’t you take five minutes out to identify the problem you are part of? The problem a growing number of people here and elsewhere are becoming more than a little sick of?
You know already what problem people like me are a part of, now have a go at trying to understand why we find the project you defend so utterly loathsome and intrusive. Why people like you are our problem.
Kremlington, I do try. I really do. I try to see why ‘people like’ you – and now I am talking to you as individual I don’t like using the term, we’re all individuals and we all have our own values, but to keep the conversation going, ok, people like you – I do try to see why you are so offended, so upset, so apparently scared by a group of professionals, racially very mixed, who have made a decision to express, collectively, their refusal to accept any longer persistent abuse of some of their number because of the colour of their skin. I cannot find anything in that to upset, offend or scare me. It seems like a right thing to do, a good thing, an unwillingness any longer to accept what is plainly – to me – a vile and obviously vile wrong in the world. On this basic issue it is as simple as black and white: attacking people because of the colour of their skin is wrong, full stop. Making a gesture to express that is right. It’s not an empty gesture. It’s not virtue signalling. The abuse is real and present and disgusting and frightening, offensive and upsetting – which I why I posted the links in my original post. And I try, I try, I try to see what it is that you see that makes it ok to object to it, and to defend those who object to it; and I can’t see it, Kremlington. I cannot see what you see that makes it ok to object to a group of colleagues kneeling to express their disgust at the racsim some of them are subject to. I wouldn’t call it a ‘project’, as you do, by the way. It’s simple, human decency, I hope – certainly a very strong feeling that if it were me getting the death threats and rape threats and the violence in my work because of the colour of my skin, I would want all the support I could get. And I just can’t see why you find that ‘loathsome’ and ‘intrusive’. (Not least because you do, of course, have the option of turning away.) So please – and I am deadly serious in this request – please tell me why. And try and do so without insulting me, or the players, or using the terms ‘woke’, ‘identity politics’ or Marxism, if you can help it, because, believe me, those terms have nothing to do with the evil reality of racist abuse in football, or anywhere else. Thanks.
Then you are not trying hard enough, or seriously enough. You think there has been such a vocal backlash because people want to hang on to their racism?
Assuming you don’t believe that (and how could you?), there must be another explanation. Try to find it.
Who knows, should you succeed in understanding, the left may once more govern here.
I have tried. And I have gone out of my way to explain my position. So help me, please. Spell it out for me. Because I can and do believe that people do want to hang on to their racism. That’s what I see. I see people hanging on their racism by not getting behind a very public, very high profile, very simple and sincere expression of anti-racism by a community of multiracial fellow professionals. What do you see, Kremlington? What sinister motives lie beneath? Who do you think is pulling Gareth Southgate’s strings? What shadowy menace has got Harry Kane by the throat? I cannot understand why this is not a straightforward issue for anyone who defends those who oppose a very basic, simple expression of anti-racism. I literally don’t get it. Explain, please. In simple terms without insinuation or QA-style allusion to some mystery ‘another explanation’ that I am tasked – by you? – with finding. This is not a mysterious issue for me so please enlighten me about what makes it so for you. Simple sentences, please, forming a simple and straightforward argument. My argument:
There you go. Now it’s your turn.
One other thing: this is not about ‘the left’. The ‘left’ is as meaningless term in 2021 as ‘the right’. A strongly conservative government is currently printing money to give to non-workers, nationalising the railways, gunning for a green future and raising corporation taxes. Individual and party values about the economy, society, law and order, immigration, taxation, the environment, digital society – all of these are in the mixer now, and combinations of historically hard left and right policy are increasingly common at an individual level.
You don’t get it. Nothing to do with the colour of their skin (in fact dark skin is one of their few redeeming factors, as it looks better on humans), but with their collective traits, characteristics and behavioural patterns. Obviously not ALL, accounting for all the atypicals and outliers, but the statistical average. The skin colour is a coincidence – correlation, not causation. Statistical average IQ, propensity to criminality, propensity to welfare dependence, educational attainment, high birthrates – those facts are undeniable, no matter how the “antiracism” industry tries to whitewash them. “Racism”, if it exists at all, is the least problem in European societies. Fascistic “antiracism” and institutional wokery are much more pressing issues, along with thirdworld mass immigration and the resulting population growth.
Grow up.
I am not with you there. The skin colour serves as a visible group identifier – it would be hard to feel te same about people of Polish ancestry, because you cannot see if someone’s grandfather was Polish. And while you are quite right that attitudes to a group is determined by the group characteristics, are you assuming that the average IQ, propensity to criminality and welfare dependence etc. are determined by biology?? I really do not think it is, and there is zero reliable evidence to prove it.
Nothing to do with biology, i fully agree with you on that. Everything to do with culture, and ingrained cultural practices and habits can affect outcomes in material ways (e.g. the developmental effects of prenatal / infant malnourishment caused by high birthrates; the medical effects of cousin marriages; etc.). These culture-specific things cause endemic and culminating problems which roll on through the generations.
Yes, skin colour serves as a visible group identifier. But it’s not the cause of any sentiment towards a group. We don’t avoid eating fly agaric mushrooms because they have red, white-dotted caps, but because they contain toxins. The pretty red caps are their visual identifier, to communicate the presence of toxins.
Well he did say correlation not causation so he probably doesn’t think those characteristics are determined by biology. It seems strange to suggest one race has a greater propensity to criminality and welfare dependence as if that is something we can’t change though.
You use the phrase ‘Fascistic “antiracism” and institutional wokery’ and then tell me to ‘Grow up’? I will carry on growing up, Johannes, without any need for you to instruct me to do so or to give me permission, as we all do – ideally trying to learn from each other as we go, without adopting entrenched and antagonostic positions that end up with meaningless jargon being flung around as intended insult. Global population will peak before the end of the century. Economic migration will continue as long there is such an imbalance in wealth and wellbeing as to incentivise it. As well cleaning up your vocabulary – ‘Fascistic “antiracism’, ‘institutional wokery’ FFS – can I suggest that you try to overcome your fear and look at how we might change the world positively, so that you don’t wake up every day feeling that ‘they’ are coming for you. Paranoia and fear of ‘the other’ is no way to live and will certainly stop you from growing up yourself.
What “fear”? I have no “fear”, but disgust and disdain for greedy thirdworlder entitlement.
What “other”? Do you mean the French, the Japanese, the Irish, the Inuit, the Swiss, the Singaporean “others”? Do you seriously believe that anyone has any issue with “others”? Or is it that in your limited mind only specific thirdworld-origin people count as “other”?
Nah. Economic migration from ss-Africa / MENA will continue only as long as it’s tolerated.
Imbalance in wealth and wellbeing will only increase as long as certain populations think it’s a perfectly good idea to birth 5 – 8 offsprings per female on average. They are fleeing their entirely self-inflicted misery.
By that time the planet will be screwed.
Have you missed all the antifa/blm mobs rampaging like brownshirts? Have you missed all the educational cultural etc. institutions acting increasingly like the Reichskulturkammer?
Do grow up.
We live in a racist country. Racist newspapers, racist government and a large proportion of the public are racist. England football team followers- I won’t call them fans- are notorious for being racist and xenophobic.
Prove it, hard facts not just opening your very self opinionated loud mouth. Are you of the founders of BLM, you just be raking it in.
What, every one of them Andy?
Why dont you move to A Non racist country then Like China, USA, or bukino faso or Middle East you’re spoiled for choice,please P*** off
I expect we do live in a racist country. It’s just that it is less racist than any other country on earth.
This, mate, is the Land of Hope and Glory as far as racial integration is concerned.
To butcher a line from a song someone once wrote, we are going to f()k each other coffee coloured sooner or later, and black and white racists are going to hate it.
Are we sure the people booing aren’t the same people sending racist messages to black players?
The point of taking the knee, as explained by the players, is to say racism has no place in football. It’s not a message being ‘rammed home’. It’s the 70% of professional footballers who are white showing solidarity and support for the 30% of their colleagues who receive abuse.
There were probably some racists in the crowd – but the majority of them won’t be and I refuse to be so negative as to believe otherwise. The implication that it is so is the entire reason why BLM and the associated solidarity gestures are going down like a lead balloon with large swathes of the population (self included) who are very much opposed to racism but have grown to sincerely dislike the BLM movement and its tactics. Lecturing and hectoring and forcing an issue down people’s throats is just not a good way to get and keep people onside (pun not intended).
That would be fine if it were the case. But it’s a gesture that is inextricably linked with a divisive, far-left organisation. The players even wore BLM on their shirts last season and their logo popped up every 15 seconds on Sky Sports.
Like other posters, I’ve been to hundreds of games across England and witnessed very few racist incidents. Football jumping into bed with BLM has caused division where there was unity.
You’ve missed the point of the whole article.
People go to football for a lot of reasons but the main reason is to watch football. Not be patronised and lectured by show off displays of ‘solidarity’ by exceptionally privileged multi-millionaire athletes.
Furthermore, as Paul points out. The vast majority of people don’t disagree with the sentiment in the first place, so are tired of the moralising towards them.
And this is why they boo. You just lump everyone in the same bracket. You might as well write “listen thickos, you still don’t seem to get it do you”
They do, and they’re fed up.
Sorry for introducing Brexit but the similarity of approach is remarkable. “you voted for brexit so you’re a racist” etc. I wonder which side Mark voted.
People go to football to watch football but more importantly to be part of a crowd experiencing the same emotional highs and lows and excitement as the people next to them. To sing and to express solidarity with the supporters of their team. The vast majority of fans don’t boo the players taking the knee – they understand that the gesture is all about expressing solidarity.
How would you know why working class people go to football matches, Mark?
Fair enough, it’s my experience of going to football matches. If you want to watch football you get a much better view and have all the replays if you watch it on TV.
It is indeed fair enough, so perhaps you should stop offering your opinion on that which you have only seen on tv.
My experience of going to football matches is based on my experience of going to football matches. Which I did fairly regularly until March 2020. If your objective is only to want to watch football you get a much better view from TV. If you want to experience being part of a football crowd with all that involves you go to the match – which I do.
Really? And just who decided that the televised start of a national match was the place for players to express their feelings?
Football matches, especially national matches, have a unique, symbolic value. The team is playing for and representing all of us, and symbolic acts are on our behalf. The All Blacks do the haka, Welsh rugby sings, and people accept these acts as symbols for the entire nation. How would you feel if these gentlemen – on our behalf and presuming our accept – performed the clenched fist of revolution / genuflected and did the sign of the cross in unison / demonstrated for veganism or the Tory party?
That still leaves the symbol itself. Kneeling is a sign of either adoration, submission, or self-abasement. Willy Brandt knelt at the memorial for the dead of the Warsaw uprising; I’d kneel to God, the Queen or maybe my wife. Who or what are they kneeling to – on all our behalf?
I think, by demonstrating opposition to racism, they are reflecting and representing the majority of the nation.
I can imagine a parallel: The national football team demonstrates explicitly in favour of Brexit before every match, and the Boris tells all and sundry that by demonstrating a desire for Britain to be sovereign they are reflecting and representing the majority of the nation. Not a very convincing argument, is it? He might do it, too, if he had the power to make it happen.
But I do not think you fully appreciate just how heavy this action is. The model, in the US, was standing respectfully as the national anthem was played before match start, a civic ritual shared with the fans that symbolised patriotism and national unity. By kneeling instead of standing, Kaepernick declared, symbolically, that he rejected national unity, and refused any part in the United States until such a time as his group got their demands met. As activism it was brillliant – once the kneeling spread the civic ritual was transformed, for all time, from a symbol of unity and sharing to a symbol of discord and racial strife.
In Britain a one-off bout of kneeling would have passed as an expression of solidarity. By making a rule of it, whoever is responsible is trying to make it into a national ritual. The Kiwis do the Haka, the Welsh sing, and the English footballers kneel. The nation they are playing for is supposed to unite in this ritual, showing foreigners how this nations sees itself. So, what does it show? At best it shows that in England the few percent of black-skinned citizens have a social and cultural importance above and beyond any other group. More realistically the kneeling expresses self-abasement and shame before the tremendous guilt that England feels that it carries for the crimes it has committed. Which would fit rather well with influential social trends, no? I am not British (yet), so you can say it is no skin off my nose. All I can say is that a good way for the English Kneelers to live up to that image would be to lose and keep losing.
“At best it shows that in England the few percent of black-skinned citizens have a social and cultural importance above and beyond any other group” Do you think the all blacks do the Haka to convey that the Maori people have a social and cultural importance above and beyond any other group.
On the contrary. They do not do it as any kind of tribute to the Maori, but as a ritual that they all feel they can share in. The kneeling is either a tribute to dark-skinned people, showing that these have a unique importance in the culture since other groups do not get that kind of prominence, or it is a sign of shared English shame and guilt.
I think it’s a bit of a leap to conclude that. The knee is just an empty gesture, essentially saying look how much we care.
I really do not think this is about what the footballers feel when they kneel. It is about how outsiders can interpret their actions. If this means anything, it means either we all care deeply about the problems of dark-skinned people (and implicitly, that their problems are much more important than those of all the other groups who do not get a slot at national matches). Or it it is a sign of shame and guilt on Englands behalf.
It’s not the same as Brexit because it’s about anti-racism not Brexit. In the States it may mean something different but the people taking the knee in UK say it’s a gesture to indicate how they are opposed to racism. You might think it means something different and it clearly does – to you. That’s your understanding. Expressing anti-racist views does not mean being anti-British, though you are suggesting it does mean being anti-American.
But that is not the stated view of the players taking the knee. You are implying either they are lying about their motives or have been conned into doing something that has a different meaning to that which they intend.
Brexit divided the nation roughly 50/50 – I don’t think the majority of the British population think Racism is a good thing.
Expressing anti-racist views in general does not mean being either anti-British, or anti-American. Specific actions and statements have specific meanings, in context, that do not follow from general philosophical principles or from the actors’ motives. I have no reason to think, for instance, that Kaepernick is anti-American or anti-patriotic. But whatever his feelings, I think it is an objective fact that his protest has disrupted and effectively destroyed what was seen as a unifying patriotic ritual, in the interest of promoting the black cause, of course. What matters is not what you (claim to) feel when you say it, but how other people are going to understand it. Especially when you are acting on behalf of large groups of people (as national teams are) and not just shooting your mouth off.
As for Brexit, I am not convinced that the vague principle of ‘anti-racism’ is that much more popular than the vague principle of ‘national self-determination’ – or that the full BLM movement is anywhere near as popular as the Brexit movement. Having the national team demonstrate for ‘anti-racism’ (and BLM) on everybody’s behalf is no more justified, and no less divisive, than having them demonstrate for ‘national self-determination’ (and hard Brexit).
But you can’t be anti racist, or so I read. If you say you are anti racist , it just proves you are actually a racist trying to preserve their privilege by hiding it in false concern. Or some such nonsense
Do you seriously believe the majority of the nation isn’t disgusted by the BLM thing? Really??
Yes.
Expressing solidarity with whom? Is expressing solidarity something good, no matter who/what the subject of solidarity is? If you decide to express your solidarity with Boko Haram or Hezbollah or whathaveyou, especially at a grossly inappropriate venue, is there any legit reason why you shouldn’t be booed at? Booing is common accepted practice at theatres, political rallies, concerts etc., to express dissatisfaction with the performer/s. Why should spectator sports be different?
What a crock of sh(t. The point of taking the knee is that it is no longer a freely given gesture of solidarity but is instead a submission to an imperative that it become a routine gesture, like it or not.
When you have the Leader of the Opposition taking the knee because some dippy adviser has told him there is political capital in it, there is a problem. We do not elect our politicians to jump on every passing bandwagon in the hopes of scoring a few extra points, we elect them to represent us.
If in sport players feel peer pressure to make this ludicrous gesture then it feeds into the mainstream and becomes more difficult to resist.
What England fans should do, if this persists, is not just boo but boycott. Turn away from the game. Do something else until the authorities comes to their senses.
How do you know what is inside an individual player’s brain when they take the knee ?
If you watch the F1 pre grid parade you will see some drivers making this gesture and some not, so not routine.
F1 is a competition of individuals. Those drivers represent nothing but themselves, their car, and their sponsors. The English football team represents England. Supposedly.
The ‘boycott’ suggestion is a good one I think, though I doubt it’ll take hold given the passion supporters have for sports.
I haven’t watched or listened to an England cricket game since they took the knee in support of the political group BLM. I suspect those who feel like myself need to be a bit more proactive though – inform the relevant media providers and the ECB why I’m no longer buying their products, following their team and why I’ll introduce my grandkids to other sports instead.
The problem is Sport is nowt without spectators & for 15-16 Months there haven’t been Any!
I switch off the TV five minutes before the game starts, and switch it on again a few minutes into the game.
A small gesture of support for those who don’t want sanctimonious wokery destroying sport.
So it’s a gesture to yourself because I don’t think anyone else notices.
That is called faith. It moves mountains.
But the booing is what works. They’re finally getting it into their fat heads that we’re not taking any more of this Marxist anti-white anti-semitic schidt.
More snowflakery. Yawn.
Perhaps you’re right – and the boo-ers are indeed racists. Well, if they commit an offence – for instance, racist or indecent chanting – then they can be identified and arrested under the laws of the UK.
Or should these laws be beefed up further to include “booing”?
There are racists at football matches – they get arrested or removed and banned if they are explicitly racist so they don’t do that anymore. They use the anonymity of social media and the ability to boo at the taking of the knee to express their views. I don’t know if all the people booing are racist – I was suggesting that as we know there are lots of racists who send abuse to footballers then it’s possible that the reason they boo is that they are racist rather than because they’re sick of being called racist.
That statement requires you to define “lots” and to prove that the scumbags sending racist abuse are actually football supporters. From what I’ve read, the quantity of people sending vile racist abuse is better described as “a few” rather than “lots”.
I mean, we’re talking about a country of 60 million where football is the most popular sport. That’s a huge pool of people, so I’m not sure “lots” is the right word.
And some of them could be trolls from hostile regimes, as far as we know.
68-69 million, which strengthens your point.
70 million &thousands of Dinghy people Oh My gut thats So ”Racist” not…
But again, if someone is caught doing that on social media, we have laws to deal with it. It may be trickier to catch them, under as you say the cloak of “anonymity”. But what’s anonymous online hate got to do with a stadium full of football fans? Where do we draw the line – detain a supermarket full of people in case one of them is a Facebook troll?
Doesn’t this all go back to last summer’s BLM message that “it’s no longer enough just to be not racist”? We have a national sport that is not racist, watched by a stadium full of people who are not racist. who quite reasonably believe they should be left in peace to enjoy the game until or unless they actually do anything wrong. Yet there must be a piece of repeating theatre to remind everyone to behave themselves. You’re always going to get pushback against something like that.
So guilty until proven innocent then – maybe you should join BLM.
You would fit right in …
Don’t give them ideas, for Heaven’s sake!
You may be joking but the initially proposed hate bill up here in Scotland came very close to it. Even the police were against it.
And yet this alien import, of taking the knee, was not deemed necessary until a career criminal was killed thousands of miles away in a different country (and those responsible rightly put on trial and later convicted). British football fans can smell the oh-so-fashionable inauthenticity by people who are far more privileged than they on every measure a mile off.
Would you support similar ongoing gestures in favour of the Uighurs, a million or so are now in ‘re-education camps’ – or hundreds of other examples – and if not, why not?
So you and the poor put upon (multi millionaire) footballers are happy to outright condemn the vast majority of reasonable people because of the actions of a vanishing minority of idiots? That’s the definition of bigotry. Smear everyone just to show your superiority. I would turn my back on and probably boo the footballers who bent their knee in support of any radical political party of whatever shade of politics. Not because I am a racist but because I have a right and duty to protest against bigotry. I also support the Kick it out movement.
You dope..If you see my note the majority 90% of online Abuse comes from Arab ,or african Countries,fACT..i know you dont like truth , but BLM rubbish will make people more opposed not Woke opposite
They are not trying to show their “progressive” credentials. Black England players are systematically abused from the terraces and they are quite rightly protesting. You may not be a bigot but you are insensitive.
Really? When did you last go to a football match in this country?
Don’t confuse your fantasy with reality.
Manchester City fan fined for racially abusing United players https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-manchester-57344621
Yeah, but when did you last go to a match?
You have no idea what really goes on at a football match do you? – Because you have never attended one. And you have never encountered a working class person, of any skin pigmentation, have you?
‘working class’ lol. Come on then, Terry, give us a definition of what ‘Working Class’ means in 2021.
Not you, lol. Okay, bourgeois liberal boy?
https://www.skysports.com/football/news/12016/11835769/england-players-suffer-racist-abuse-in-bulgaria
https://www.vice.com/en/article/k78zdz/boo-the-knee-england-twitter-football
https://fanbanter.co.uk/gareth-southgate-sends-message-to-fans-who-booed-players-taking-the-knee/
Love the word ‘systematically’ arbitrarily stuck into your sentence to try to give it some heft. Sorry, but I’m not buying it.
https://www.theguardian.com/football/2019/dec/15/foul-play-how-racism-towards-black-footballers-is-moving-online?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other
https://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/1397395/viv-anderson-racism-football-england-stars
Wherever Paul is, it’s circa 1980 there.
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2021/1/31/humanity-at-its-worst-man-utd-star-rashford-racially-abused
https://theundefeated.com/features/raheem-sterling-manchester-city-chelsea-and-the-racist-media-coverage-of-black-athletes/
Lying sanctomonius Drivel, most Online abuse comes from MIddle East memes or Africa, but ”They aren’t racist are they”.
https://www.eurosport.co.uk/football/euro-2020/2021/paul-hayward-england-supporters-who-boo-the-players-are-damaging-what-they-claim-to-love-ahead-of-eu_sto8361158/story.shtml