Willian has attempted to show how bad social media abuse has affected him and says he is afraid of checking his phone sometimes because of the latest abuse he might come across.
The Brazilian is one of several professional players who have suffered racist remarks from fans around the world.
These abuses have been rampant in recent months and have forced Arsenal legend Thierry Henry to delete his social media accounts until the owners of the platforms do something about it.
There have been calls for Twitter and Instagram to become stricter on users who abuse players, but no serious step has been taken so far.
Willian says he is open to being criticized, however, what he cannot take is his family members also suffering abuses.
He also admitted that there have been times that he has contemplated deleting his social media accounts and still gets scared of checking them after matches.
“It’s really, really affected me when they say about my family,” he said via Arsenal’s website.
“As I’ve said before, if they want to criticise me, that’s no problem, I will always accept that. But when they come to attack you and your family with bad words that I cannot say here, that hurts. That’s really affected me and it’s a big problem.
“I feel that straight away I want to delete my social media accounts. I have seen some people [do that] because of the racism and the abuse and straight away I want to do that, but when you think and take a few minutes and relax a little bit more… but the first action is to delete straight away!
“Sometimes, yeah, to be honest [I am scared to check my phone after a match], because we are human. I want to understand who these people are and who they think they are to come to speak like that with us.
“We are professional and we do the best to help the team on the pitch. We want to win and we always want to win. We never want to lose, but we have our bad days and sometimes we’re not feeling good and having problems like everyone has.
“We have personal problems and families have a lot of problems as well, so sometimes you’re not in a good day, you have a bad game and they come and they say these kind of words that hurt you. That’s why we want to stop it. Enough is enough.”
The way Arsenal are playing at the moment, I am afraid to answer my phone too!
😂
Yes it is very serious and my heart bleeds for Willian. Other people only have to worry about little things like rent power food clothes kids school clothes car repairs electrician builders and plumbers Bill’s replacing fridges washing machines and the such like.
Being paid to kick a ball around a few hours a week is tough and £70,000 a week hardly pays for the extension on my 5th Villa in Spain. It’s just that I have no choice to accept this salary and life style. Believe me I would play for free at Accrington Stanley but they won’t let me. I am stuck here 3 more years having to accept the rest of my £10 mill salary. It’s just so damn hard you just could not imagine how hard my life is”.
I am really starting to lose sympathy with these multi-millionaire complainers. Don’t get me wrong, racism/abuse where ever is a disgrace, but we’re talking about words on a screen, that you don’t even have to look at! If Willian was getting it in public face-to-face, of course that’s a different story, but from what we keep hearing from all the victims, is that it’s from online.
Do these people not realize that if you put yourself out there online, and especially on social media, you are almost guaranteed to get abuse. Even if you’re the nicest person in the world, you’ll get abused!
People are starving, and homeless, and yet we constantly hear that the super rich are afraid to use their Instagram, or Twitter, etc. Pathetic!
Spot on third man. I don’t understand their whining too afterall they re in d limelight and William has been especially poor doe so in his case I think he deserves wot he gets. I’m sorry bt seriously does he expect otherwise from d fans. I hope he can just step up and channel d hate he getting into motivation and start performing fine on d pitch ,its d only way to silent critics off and online. Else he should just shutup about it.
Up gunners!
Despite the fact that I am a die-hard arsenal fan, despite the fact that I feel so terrible to watch arsenal lose a match in a stupid way or without challenging the opponent, I disagree to lousy, stupid, senseless or prejudiced comments about the entire team. More so, when it is racial, and worst still when it is directed to their families. Common guys! are we supporting these guys or discouraging and moralising them? I know that it is annoying and heart-breaking to watch our beloved team ripped apart, without it making any reasonable resistance. But we should learn how to cheer them up in time of win and lost, help them dust off and face the next Please let us learn to stick with our BELOVED TEAM, win or lose.
Two solutions brother – improve your performance on the pitch or quit the club. One more solution – quit the social media and focus on what your paid . You can chose what to do / not to do on social media, so do not blame social media for any poor performance.
There is no shame in losing after a fight, but there is disgrace in losing without a fight. The latter has become a norm at AFC,
While we condemn all abuse, no one can control another’s thoughts, so be prepared for the consequences or follow either of the above three solutions brother.
Get off social media. Stop being narcissists.
Why would one want tl plaster their private life on the internet?
These are some of the Cons that narcissism can lead to. You want to show off about your amazing life on the net then expect good and bad..
People are depressed and unhappy in their lives, so venting their frustrations with life on others on social media is no revelation.
Stay off social narcissistic media.