Racism in English football?

[Gingerfinch]

Roy Hodgson is the latest to fall foul of the PC brigade.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/24563131

[mikesiva]

I don't see this as the "PC Brigade"....

I'm sure that Hodgson did not intend to offend, and Townsend was clearly intelligent enough not to realise it.

However, Hodgson's choice of a joke was not the best, and it would not have been one I would've used, for obvious reasons....

Put your feet into the shoes of a less intelligent black player than Townsend, who has represented his club in European matches on the Continent, who has been subjected to monkey chants, and is bitter as a result. He would react angrily to any joke that equates a black person to a monkey, no matter how innocent the joke.

Hodgson didn't mean offence, but he's right to apologise...put it down to experience, and move on.

[sussexpob]

Put your feet into the shoes of a less intelligent black player than Townsend, who has represented his club in European matches on the Continent, who has been subjected to monkey chants, and is bitter as a result. He would react angrily to any joke that equates a black person to a monkey, no matter how innocent the joke.

Maybe even if Townsend had been capped for about 2-3 years and was settled enough in the squad to feel he could openly complain without it having the effect of removing him from a Rio bound plane in the summer.

Its just like Wilshere's comment about the English players for England, maybe no malice involved but its pure stupidity in such a regulated and aware society to make remarks or jokes that can be twisted or bracketed as racist.

Hodgson should have known better and should use his brain next time.... if he had said something like that to the French squad he could have got a punch in the face!!

And Henry Winter made a good point... if everyone in that room was comfortable with the joke, who linked it to the press?

[sussexpob]

Maybe it was a throw away comment, which the press turned around? Maybe nobody was offended?

Winter is a journalist( I think Telegraph - found it on someones twitter this morning), and the point came at end of an article in which he wrote a very balanced and sensible view, even criticising the press pack for trying to destroy a positive air about the squad just as one emerges..... so the article doesnt try to turn anything around, it seemed quite honest to me.

Someone obviously felt the comment was risque enough to throw it in the way of the press

[sussexpob]

Maybe it was a throw away comment, which the press turned around? Maybe nobody was offended?

Winter is a journalist( I think Telegraph - found it on someones twitter this morning), and the point came at end of an article in which he wrote a very balanced and sensible view, even criticising the press pack for trying to destroy a positive air about the squad just as one emerges..... so the article doesnt try to turn anything around, it seemed quite honest to me.

Someone obviously felt the comment was risque enough to throw it in the way of the press

What about the original sun article?

Not seen it

[Gingerfinch]

I don't see this as the "PC Brigade"....

I'm sure that Hodgson did not intend to offend, and Townsend was clearly intelligent enough not to realise it.

However, Hodgson's choice of a joke was not the best, and it would not have been one I would've used, for obvious reasons....

Put your feet into the shoes of a less intelligent black player than Townsend, who has represented his club in European matches on the Continent, who has been subjected to monkey chants, and is bitter as a result. He would react angrily to any joke that equates a black person to a monkey, no matter how innocent the joke.

Hodgson didn't mean offence, but he's right to apologise...put it down to experience, and move on.

Wasn't the analogy to do with astronauts and space, not monkeys as in black people? Why do people feel they should fight for people who really couldn't give a monkeys (no offence) about some harmless remark.

[Gingerfinch]

Put your feet into the shoes of a less intelligent black player than Townsend, who has represented his club in European matches on the Continent, who has been subjected to monkey chants, and is bitter as a result. He would react angrily to any joke that equates a black person to a monkey, no matter how innocent the joke.

Maybe even if Townsend had been capped for about 2-3 years and was settled enough in the squad to feel he could openly complain without it having the effect of removing him from a Rio bound plane in the summer.

Its just like Wilshere's comment about the English players for England, maybe no malice involved but its pure stupidity in such a regulated and aware society to make remarks or jokes that can be twisted or bracketed as racist.

Hodgson should have known better and should use his brain next time.... if he had said something like that to the French squad he could have got a punch in the face!!

And Henry Winter made a good point... if everyone in that room was comfortable with the joke, who linked it to the press?[/quote]

Maybe it was a throw away comment, which the press turned around? Maybe nobody was offended?

[Gingerfinch]

Maybe it was a throw away comment, which the press turned around? Maybe nobody was offended?

Winter is a journalist( I think Telegraph - found it on someones twitter this morning), and the point came at end of an article in which he wrote a very balanced and sensible view, even criticising the press pack for trying to destroy a positive air about the squad just as one emerges..... so the article doesnt try to turn anything around, it seemed quite honest to me.

Someone obviously felt the comment was risque enough to throw it in the way of the press

What about the original sun article?

[Gingerfinch]

Maybe it was a throw away comment, which the press turned around? Maybe nobody was offended?

Winter is a journalist( I think Telegraph - found it on someones twitter this morning), and the point came at end of an article in which he wrote a very balanced and sensible view, even criticising the press pack for trying to destroy a positive air about the squad just as one emerges..... so the article doesnt try to turn anything around, it seemed quite honest to me.

Someone obviously felt the comment was risque enough to throw it in the way of the press

What about the original sun article?

Not seen it

Me neither, but I can only assume the 'journalist' COULD have made out the player was complaining about Roy's comment, and that, it may not have been the case. Who know's, but it sound like then press are trying to sell newspapers.

[Alviro Patterson]

I don't see this as the "PC Brigade"....

I'm sure that Hodgson did not intend to offend, and Townsend was clearly intelligent enough not to realise it.

However, Hodgson's choice of a joke was not the best, and it would not have been one I would've used, for obvious reasons....

Put your feet into the shoes of a less intelligent black player than Townsend, who has represented his club in European matches on the Continent, who has been subjected to monkey chants, and is bitter as a result. He would react angrily to any joke that equates a black person to a monkey, no matter how innocent the joke.

Hodgson didn't mean offence, but he's right to apologise...put it down to experience, and move on.

Wasn't the analogy to do with astronauts and space, not monkeys as in black people? Why do people feel they should fight for people who really couldn't give a monkeys (no offence) about some harmless remark.

Spot on Dr Robert, this shouldn't even be news. It's amazing how offence can be taken when there isn't even a victim.

Feed the Monkey means fuel the desire, in which Townsend (and Baines) have. Pass the ball to those two players and they will do things with it.

[mikesiva]

"West Brom sponsor Zoopla have decided to end their sponsorship of the club at the end of the season because of Nicolas Anelka's "quenelle" gesture. Anelka, 34, made the sign, described as an inverted Nazi salute and declared by some to be anti-Semitic, after scoring against West Ham on 28 December, 2013. Zoopla, co-owned by Jewish businessman Alex Chesterman, will focus on other marketing activities. The incident is being investigated by the Football Association."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/25810659

The FA are quite right to investigate Anelka over this....

But it is curious how this "quenelle" gesture is being treated more seriously than di Canio's full-fledged Nazi salutes to Lazio fans, and his never-renounced worship of Mussolini.

[sussexpob]

"West Brom sponsor Zoopla have decided to end their sponsorship of the club at the end of the season because of Nicolas Anelka's "quenelle" gesture. Anelka, 34, made the sign, described as an inverted Nazi salute and declared by some to be anti-Semitic, after scoring against West Ham on 28 December, 2013. Zoopla, co-owned by Jewish businessman Alex Chesterman, will focus on other marketing activities. The incident is being investigated by the Football Association."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/25810659

The FA are quite right to investigate Anelka over this....

But it is curious how this "quenelle" gesture is being treated more seriously than di Canio's full-fledged Nazi salutes to Lazio fans, and his never-renounced worship of Mussolini.

Are the FA right to bungle into an argument about Free speech in France that holds its roots in political context since 1890? To say this is simply "anti semitic" misses the point totally.....

M'Bala M'Bala is a nasty piece of work, a French-Belgian Journalist who recently died and was a close friend of mine had spent years trying to fight him in the press in Belgium, but even he conceeded in private that fighting him only fuelled the haphazard debate on free speech he was forwarding, which weirdly, in the most cruel and twisted ways was creating a valid point. I sadly would have loved to know Marc's take on this issue, but judging on previous ones he no doubt would have disagreed in action been taken.

The Quenelle is after all more anti-establishment rather than anti-semitic. M'Bala says some horrid and downright sickening things, but he seems to do this to argue about restrictions in free speech, and purposefully has picked the most sensative of topics to make his stand.

The bottom line is that he challenges the Gayssott Act for limitations of free speech, which basically made not only made holocaust denial illegal in France, but made any challenges to the "facts" decided at Nuremburg legally unchallengable or debatable. Obviously it takes a rather twisted individual to argue about those facts, but making it illegal to do so has made anyone who argues against them an instant martyr, having their right to free speech make them look like a victim even when they are debating anti-semitic messages.

This in turn has given DMM a sense of rebel leader, and a sense of growing popularity as he sucks in young and impressionable people who look for taboo, or throw themselves onto his banner under a belief that they are fighting a great injustice than the injustices they are charged with. Banning Anelka makes him the victim and extends the argument that a simple gesture is against his free speech. The French government have struggled with this and other issues and had to concede that they were unenforceable before.....

And I dont think it can be forgotten that Hollande, who is very vocally resurrecting the issue, has just had his marriage fall apart and maybe guilty of trying to distract his public with a new contraversy not linked with where he puts his "petit soldat!"??? He must know that previous attempts to ban this (a) didnt work (b) only heightened its pull and public interest.

[Gingerfinch]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/26383249

What complete twaddle.

[mikesiva]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/26383249

What complete twaddle.

'Sol Campbell has claimed he would have been "England captain for more than 10 years" if he had been born white. The former England defender makes the claims in an authorised biography serialised by the Sunday Times. "I believe if I was white, I would have been England captain for more than 10 years - it's as simple as that," said the 39-year-old, who won 73 full caps, including three as captain.'

I totally agree with Sol....

John Terry was an England idol who was captain for many games, despite controversies surrounding him. Sol was a much less controversial figure, but he would never be given the captaincy...the only conclusion I could draw back then was because he was black.

[Gingerfinch]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/26383249

What complete twaddle.

'Sol Campbell has claimed he would have been "England captain for more than 10 years" if he had been born white. The former England defender makes the claims in an authorised biography serialised by the Sunday Times. "I believe if I was white, I would have been England captain for more than 10 years - it's as simple as that," said the 39-year-old, who won 73 full caps, including three as captain.'

I totally agree with Sol....

John Terry was an England idol who was captain for many games, despite controversies surrounding him. Sol was a much less controversial figure, but he would never be given the captaincy...the only conclusion I could draw back then was because he was black.

Sorry mike, but Sol is talking crap. Sol wasn't the Arsenal skipper, unlike Terry, who captained Chelsea, and to be fair, was a good one at that. The only time Sol was really likely to be skipper was when Beckham got the job, and at the time, most people agreed with the decision. All this talk is because he has a book to sell.