Racist action on Paris subway by Chelsea supporters latest stain on the club - and soccer
Perhaps the most striking thing about the footage of a black man being pushed from a subway train in Paris by Chelsea fans is how the offenders aren't skinheads draped in Union Jacks making Nazi salutes. Joining in the chanting of “We're racist, we're racist and that's the way we like it, like it” is a motley crew of characters, gleefully belching vitriolic, hateful bile that will certainly see them banned from ever watching another soccer game live again.
But, where a hooligan culture proudly wore its racism and violence and sectarianism on its sleeves along with everything else, this modern-day incarnation dresses like you or I. It works in the same offices. It has the same circle of friends. Where racists had their own self-imposed isolation before, a certain demographic just for them, now they're embedded in the fabric of society. And soccer appears to be a regular, nasty front for their preferred recreational activities.
Of course, the men at the centre of this video will probably contest the damning content. In their minds, this was a simple case of boys being boys. It was banter – that phrase that has cropped up continuously through a variety of soccer scandals in the United Kingdom. There was the sexism row at Sky Sports that resulted in the resignation of host Richard Keys and analyst Andy Gray's sacking. “Prehistoric banter”, Keys called it. No. It was sexist.
More recently, when it was revealed Malky Mackay had been exchanging sexist, racist, homophobic and anti-Semitic text messages with a colleague when manager at Cardiff, the League Managers Association (LMA) issued a statement defending Mackay, infamously describing his actions as “letting off steam to a friend during some friendly text message banter”.
Inevitably, those that do wrong desperately attempt to evade a tag at all costs. A few years ago, VICE produced a documentary on the Old Firm rivalry between Celtic and Rangers. We meet Abdul Rafiq who had been banned from games for five years after he was found guilty of singing anti-Catholic songs. “It's only a game, it's only a bit of banter”, he says. He's shown examples of anti-Celtic banners and asked for his opinion. One reads “Jungle Bhoys Against Reporting Paedophiles”, a reference to Celtic's religious ties and the spate of sex scandals that brought the Catholic Church to its knees. “I'd put that down to banter”, says Abdul. How about “Sweeping Child Abuse Under The Carpet Since 1972”? “I'd just put that as banter”, says Abdul. He's shown a picture of a Celtic fan making a monkey gesture at the black, then-Rangers player El Hadji Diouf. “Some people would take that serious, but other people would look at that as banter, you know”, says Abdul.
Many are blind to offensive acts. They seek to rationalize their behavior by pushing the blame on those that have the audacity to be offended. But in my lifetime, soccer has never been as bad as it now is. There has always been a charm and energy to a game-day ritual. The trek to the venue, the pre-match pint and discussion and then the match itself – the majority of the occasion given over to intense concentration, sound-tracked by several seasoned songs over the course of two hours. It's really quite simple. But, much like how Twitter trolls gain some perverse sense of notoriety when sending abusive messages to well-known personalities and are subsequently investigated, some socially-inept, immature loudmouths will cross the line, seeking some form of weird pseudo-celebrity, just like Abdul and Rangers. They embarrass themselves and humiliate themselves, but - as has been the case for a number of years now - there's little difference anymore between being famous and being infamous.
What happened Tuesday night is another stain on the character of Chelsea, too. And it's impossible for the club to ignore the frequency of race-related incidents that have taken place in recent years. In 2012, there were investigations into alleged racist chants on a train following the club's Premier League game against Norwich. Later that year, a fan was caught on camera making a monkey gesture at then-Manchester United player Danny Welbeck during a League Cup game. And going further back, The Guardian's Simon Hattenstone memorably detailed another train journey in 2006 in which a group of Chelsea hard cores busily immersed themselves in casual sectarianism (“No surrender! F**k the Pope and the IRA”), casual racism (“Who Let The Drog Out”, with accompanying monkey noises to, you know, celebrate their own black player Didier Drogba) and casual anti-Semitism (“Spurs are on their way to Belsen. Hitler's gonna gas 'em again”).
And what happened at that subway station also dredges up the John Terry saga of almost three years ago. The Chelsea captain admitted to using racist language to then-QPR player Anton Ferdinand during a league game but denied racially abusing him. Terry's defence, quite incredibly, was that when he screamed “F**k off, f**k off f**king black c**t, f**king knobhead” he was doing so sarcastically. Terry was cleared of any wrongdoing in court. The Football Association (FA) disagreed, banned Terry for four matches and fined him $340,000.
It always seems to be soccer though, doesn't it? And Tuesday night, these fans engaged in a racist act in a public place in a different country. What are they doing in private? A quick glance at the age profile of the people on that train would lead you to assume that at least some are parents. Some, surely, bring their children to watch Chelsea play at the weekends. And some, surely, raise their children to think that it's okay to abuse others. Some, surely, raise their children to think that this is all banter, part of the atmosphere, part of the lifestyle of being a soccer fan.
And that's the most worrying thing.
