Racism In Football

Russian football fans.

I'll be perfectly honest and admit straightaway that I find the constant whining from footballers and others about racism highly tedious and counter-productive. Of course that depends on what you regard as racism. Apartheid was quite obviously racism, as was the Nazis slaughtering of Jews, Slavs and others. The Ku Klux Klan are quite clearly racist as are groups such as the Black Panthers.

So why is a Manchester City player talking about a boycott of the World Cup in Russia by black players? Is it because of Russia's pretty dodgy human rights record? Is it in protest at what the Russians did in Chechnya? Maybe they're all Pussycat Dolls fans who object to their imprisonment? No, none of them. It seems that when Toure and City played in Moscow last night he heard something racist coming from the crowd. Bloody hell, get a grip! So you boycott the World Cup because of some imbecile making a monkey noise, which I assume it was unless Russian football fans speak extremely good English or Toure speaks fluent Russian.

I grew up in what I am fast coming to regard as 'the old days' when one of the phrases often heard was 'sticks and stones may break my bones but names will never hurt me'. It seems that even referring to somebody's skin colour or ethnicity these days is a greater crime than false imprisonment. Let's face it, when the manger of the England football team has to apologise for using the word monkey in front of black players something is seriously amiss.

I wonder if Toure and others will be as highly principled and boycott their clubs money spinning trips to China next summer in protest at the huge numbers of executions and the imprisonment of pro-democracy activists by the Chinese government? Don't hold your breath. But maybe if a pro-democracy activist made a monkey chant, precipitating a boycott, they could spin it in their favour. 

It seems, in these politically correct times, that you can carry out mass murder and curtail the freedoms of millions as long as they are the same race as you. But dare make a joke about Polish builders and you're in deep shit.