UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson has said that any racist offenders will be banned from going to any future football matches.
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The aftermath of the Euro 2020 final between England and Italy has caused plenty of issues for the former. Whether it be fans causing mayhem before the game or racist language used after the game, the fallout has been ugly. And it got worse when Marcus Rashford, Bukayo Saka and Jadon Sancho were targetted with racist abuse. The issue seems reminiscent of a time when hooliganism ran rampant in English football. Now, UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson has said that any racist offenders will be banned from going to football matches.
“What we’re doing is today taking practical steps to ensure that the football banning order regime is changed, so that if you are guilty of racist abuse online of footballers then you will not be going to the match,” he told MPs.
He also said that steps will be taken to ensure social media companies do more to combat racism. The issue of racist abuse on social media is not a new one, but the British PM says fines are now a possibility.
“Unless they get hate and racism off their platforms, they will face fines amounting to 10 percent of their global revenues, and we all know they have the technology to do it,” he said.
Of course, there is the small issue that in many cases, racist abuse comes from outside of England. Thus, stadium bans will not work on all people. But the fact that steps are being taken at all is a start.
However, there has been an outcry within the media and on social media against the government. Many think that recent events are partly to do with the current government.
Home secretary Priti Patel dubbed England football players taking the knee as ‘gesture politics’. She further said that it was okay to boo players for the gesture.
Johnson too has a checquered history of insensitive remarks. As a newspaper columnist, Johnson once referred to people of African descent as “flag-waving piccaninnies” with “watermelon smiles”.
He also said that Muslim women who wore veils were “letterboxes”. As if that wasn’t enough, the PM also stopped short of calling on fans to stop booing players for taking the knee.
The PM, however, said his statements were taken out of context. But the fact that such a rhetoric exists is in itself problematic.
