Racism and football

Section 37 · 12-12-2005, 04:43 PM

A racist chant being directed toward one player but not another is not some sort of "clue". Naturally, in the course of one game, the fans are going to pay more attention to certain players in an attempt to throw off their play.

The problem is when racism is used to "get the goat" of a player. It's not right.

In Europe, there is a huge racism problem that manifests itself in soccer and their leagues are correct in using tough measures to clear it out of the stadium.

We have to let people know that racism is not tolerated anywhere. Not just in the game, but in society.

We have problems with racism in America as well. I shudder to think what could start to happen when Chivas starts playing well. It's important that we keep that crap out of our stadiums.

If it pops up in MLS, it will be correct for the league to take harsh measures early.

Also, "identifying racism makes you the real racist" sounds wrong to me. We have to remember, racism is not an academic problem. It's a problems that needs to be dealt with firmly in the real world.

I think everyone should re- read Deuce's account of living in a mixed race family. We need to be reminded that in the real world, pseudo academic apologists aren't worth two nickels.

Old Ska · 12-13-2005, 06:04 PM

FIFA is distancing itself from Sepp Blatter's earlier suggestion that the banning of National Anthems before World Cup matches would be a way to combat hooliganism. More recently they have said that they are coming up with a plan to ensure crowd members don't boo or jeer during the playing of the national anthems of opponents.

I wonder how this will work? And would they object to something like what we did in Sam's Army at the US/England match this year...singing "My Country 'Tis of Thee" during "God Save the Queen"? The England fans were sure annoyed...

AreliusIII · 12-14-2005, 05:10 PM

http://www.football365.com/opinion/f365_opinion/story_171338.shtml

Old Ska · 12-22-2005, 07:22 AM

Interesting story on racism in the Australian / South Africa cricket match recently:

http://in.today.reuters.com/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=sportsNews&storyID=2005-12-22T153005Z_01_NOOTR_RTRJONC_0_India-229025-3.xml

They are proposing fining individual fans and expelling them from the stadium, with the potential for a permanent ban. Putting this in the hands of stadium security seems rational to me, especially on the heels of racial tensions in Australia over the past few weeks.

The complication here is that they are thinking of ways to brief stadium security before games on what are racist slurs. Apparantly the ones the fans were using (kaffir and kaffir-boetie) were unfamiliar to Australian stadium security who obviously were not up on racist slurs in Afrikaans.

Deuce · 12-22-2005, 09:14 AM

Well if you ask DC and Metros fans if they want the power in the hands of security, specifically CSC security, you will probably get a stoning at best!

We dealt with CSC at the Mausoleum at Mile High and if they will be deciding who stays and goes... then we are all in trouble.

But at least they are taking action, that is commendable.