One of the individuals who racially abused Bukayo Saka has apologised and bizarrely is criticising Instagram for only blocking his account for 24 hours.
As part of BBC File on 4 programmes, an investigation shows a shocking revelation, out of the 105 accounts reported after the Euro 2020 Final, 79 are still active.
It again shows social media’s refusal to have zero tolerance to racism. This man, in his early twenties, openly admits to sending monkey emojis to a 19-year-old.
He doesn’t fake ignorance; he acknowledges that he understands the context of what he was sending.
If the likes of Facebook and Twitter wanted to, they could insist that any user has to register their details, no different to what you have to do to do online gambling.
The only reason this hasn’t happened is because a lot of people don’t like to share personal information on the internet, and therefore you would lose a percentage of your audience.
Which is fine, I’m not naive enough where I don’t know how a business works, just don’t offend the public by pretending you care.
It’s almost as bad as FIFA pretending they have zero tolerance towards racism by allowing Hungary to have fans in the stadium when UEFA had already ordered them to play behind closed doors.
Why would anyone then be shocked that their World Cup qualifier is marred by monkey chants?
It’s strange in 2021 to see a grown man in the stands make a monkey gesture. He must know that cameras are everywhere so must not care about the consequences?
When I see those scenes though I feel that society has failed him.
Society has taught him that Hungary will get sanctions for discrimination but can get away with it on a technicality.
That the majority of players won’t really have the gumption to walk off the pitch if they hear abuse.
That you can racially abuse a teenager online and you might have to go a day without social media.
The UK Government doesn’t have zero tolerance towards the issue. Some MPs are trying to push legislation to make all online abuse illegal because at the moment there remain loopholes.
Hence this coward who spoke to the BBC is able to confirm he sent a monkey emoji to a teenager, knowing it was racist and yet is not in jail.
Why not just say anyone caught racially abusing someone online goes to prison?
Instead, this man is so sorry, he hasn’t even the bravery to give his name out of fear of embarrassing his family and his employers finding out what he gets up to in his spare time.
Being sorry is about taking accountability and showing remorse.
A coward who abused another human being while hiding behind his keyboard says sorry while once again hiding his face. That shows he hasn’t learnt anything so therefore can’t be sorry.
We have to educate the next generation that racism is unacceptable.
We can do that by having discussions and showing zero tolerance.
It’s not okay to send a teenager a monkey emoji, face zero consequences, stay anonymous and just say sorry.
Be Kind in The Comments
Dan
Facebook, twitter, Instagram are all in it for money. No morality, no civility.. Capitalist everywhere.
“One of the racial abusers is bizarrely criticising Instagram for only blocking his account for 24 hours”
I agree that there should be a harsher punishment for those abusers
Unfortunately the main social media platforms continue to hide behind the right to freedom of speech when essentially they are more concerned by the monetary ramifications should they bring in any proper form of censorship.
As dreadful as the online abuse continues to be we do seem to have a “holier than thou” attitude in this country when very little is said or done to seek out and eject any so called England supporters who repeatedly boo through the National Anthems of opposition countries.An act which is no less racist than the actions of the opposition fans that we witnessed last week.
I’m still waiting for other sports stars football players/pundits…to follow TH14 and get off social media,how many have done so? I’ll hazard a guess and say few,why is that?they did it for the Super League but won’t to fight racism,am I missing something here??
Concerning FIFA, Hungary used a “loophole”the ban from UEFA doesn’t cross to FIFA but agree it would be easy to close it and soon.
A GROWN UP ARTICLE FROM DAN, who is one among countless millions of fully evolved and decent human beings.
But the problem that all such evolved humans face is that articles such as this truly worthy one are , in essence , simply preaching to the converted.
How to reach the Neanderthals is the REAL problem we evolved folk all have.
And even if we somehow reached the many Neanderthals in Hungary, a pariah government such as theirs simply cares nothing and will laugh at decency and evolvement.
I am pledged to fight ALL bigotry and racism til my dying breath but HOW we can ever punish the racists and imprison them(I’d gladly throw the key away too!!) is our REAL challenge!
I do not believe in the existence of racism .
We are all monkeys . Different coloured monkeys . Racism starts from the mind
If a footballer believes a chant is made at you then it exist.
However if a player takes to the football field not for the fans , but for the love of the game or money involved , then racism doesn’t exist.
Dani Alves ate the banana .