Like many I was shocked
and appalled at the footage of Chelsea fans denying a Parisian entry to a train
on the Paris Metro. If that wasn’t bad
enough, the fans then delighted in chanting about being proud to be racist, as the
Frenchman was black.
Next morning Chelsea
Football Club released a statement saying if any of those involved proved to be
season ticket holders then they would be banned for life.
Of course many supporters
of other clubs couldn’t pass up the opportunity to stick the boot in and claim
they weren’t surprised, or that it confirmed everything they hate about the
club. It seems to be beyond their
understanding they’re simply exhibiting prejudice of a similar nature to that
of the racists. You cannot label the
whole club & particularly all Chelsea fans as racist purely because there
were a few idiots who wanted to throw their weight around in a foreign country.
I have only seen a few comments
seeking to justify this in some way, and some of them even suggested ‘what has
happened to this country’ as a reason for it.
Again, if you are outraged by foreigners coming over here acting like
the own the place, then you can hardly defend those who do the same elsewhere.
There are several things
to note about this whole unsavoury event.
Firstly, it’s irrelevant which team they were supporting, in fact you
could argue it’s irrelevant the reason they were in Paris. People are far more ‘brave’ in groups than
they are on their own, and that includes men and women these days. What we had here was a group of English men
portraying thuggish behaviour in a foreign capital city, purely because they’re
English. Let’s just imagine one of these
fans trying to get on the tube at Leicester Square only to find a group muslims,
Poles, Turks or Bulgarians, unable to speak any English, barring their
way? You can imagine the calls for
throwing these foreigners out of our country.
We expect, even demand,
people from other countries respect our country and traditions and yet time and
time again British people go abroad with an arrogance it’s everyone else who is
at fault.
How many people arrive in
Tenerife and head straight for Lineker’s Bar?
How often do you see Britons in Spain passing all the local restaurants
and cafes looking for one advertising ‘full English breakfast’?
What you will also have
heard said many times in Paris the other night was groups of supporters looking
for somewhere to eat and drink and turning down options because they were too
full of locals (this would’ve been phrased in more Anglo-Saxon language).
Watching the footage of
this incident seemed to take us back about 30 years to a time when English fans
went abroad in the belief we owned the place.
Of course many will point to there being elements of these incidents
within plenty of clubs in the country and hopefully the fact it has now been
brought to the attention, it should deter people from repeating it. But I must admit I thought Chelsea had left
that type of ‘supporter’ back in the 1970’s.
These blokes will have
family members who have seen the footage.
Some of them will have children, they may possibly work with people who
found the whole business abhorrent. Their
employers may be very interested in what they’ve seen. As this footage is now on the internet it’ll
be very difficult to completely remove it.
This is how I suggest we
deal with the perpetrators. Personally,
I still believe in public shaming people.
Just banning them from grounds will not change their views, and this is
the key. There’s little point continuing
to punish people unless they understand what they have done is wrong. They must be educated so they can see how
wrong their behaviour was. Their
pictures are already being spread around the net and hopefully their names will
be soon too. There may be the view you
are giving them further publicity, but the publicity you are giving them will
have repercussions for years. When
employers receive job applications one of the first things they do is ‘google’
the name to see what comes up. If they
see all the coverage about this incident they are likely to think twice about
giving them a job. In this way there is
a great opportunity for the suspects to admit their mistakes. As I said earlier, people are far more brave
in a group than on their own and one or two of the group may well have been
uncomfortable with the chanting, but weren’t ‘brave’ enough to stand up and say
so. They now have an excellent
opportunity to distance themselves from this.
Get your face on camera
apologising to the victim would be a good start.
Many have long pointed
out the idiocy of supporters chanting racist abuse one minute then cheering a
black player from their own team the next.
It is perfectly plausible to think that just after the ‘we’re racists
and that’s the way we like it’ chant, these idiots then went onto sing of their
love for Didier Drogba.
Of course an education
programme takes time, money and motivation.
It is far easier and cheaper to just ban these people, but you’ve not
dealt with the cause, only the effect.
If you have blisters on your feet it is far cheaper to put a plaster on
it, yet the problem is your shoes are too tight. Much the same as it’s fairly pointless continually
locking up drug addicts without curing them of their addiction. Unless these people see the error of their
ways they will not change. They should
be made to view the footage again and then have it turned round to show them as
the victim and see how they’d feel about it.
The anger of their social circles should also shame them into looking
inward to ask themselves whether they really should be treating others in this
way.
It also should be pointed
out there is racism within all cultures and religions and white people are
certainly prejudiced against in a number of situations. However, it hardly progresses the issue
further if we hide behind the rather juvenile “well they’re doing it, so why
can’t I”?
Much as it took Italy a
long while to truly accept the English back in the country after Heysel, this
will make things tougher for supporters of other clubs going to Paris and it
could well impact on non-football fans.
If you think that’s unfair then consider Parisians are merely
demonstrating an underlying prejudice against the English in exactly the same
way many supporters of rival clubs have been waiting for an incident such as
this as a reason to spout their hatred of Chelsea.
This has nothing to do
with Chelsea, they are powerless to control who does and who doesn’t support
them. These were middle-aged English men
who are part of our society and we are all responsible for our society.
Let’s hope society can
deal with them.