Footballs Social Media Boycott — Will the Silence be Deafening?

By Ross McAtasney

Many will be wondering, how much of an impact will your football team not tweeting or posting on Facebook over the weekend be in the grand scheme of things in regards to racism. I would genuinely love to be the one to beat my chest and say what a powerful message this sends in 2021, in all honesty, it just feels a bit hollow.

I know what this whole discussion needs is some white guy pontificating on the right and wrong way to boycott or protest in relation to racial issues, and I genuinely don’t have a come back to that, all I can say is, I have an opinion, not saying its right or that it can’t be disputed, but just the way this boycott has left me feeling, which I am writing before it has even started.

Now taking this back to Sept 2016, when Kaepernick first took a knee, (explaining the reason for kneeling check here) which caused so many to lose their shit. Much of the right wing narrative seemed incensed at the insolence of a black man not standing for the national anthem, I mean, why could he not appreciate the fortunate position he is currently in? Why could he not just forget the police brutality he was seeing, the constant racism and just forget his heritage. For some it seemed he should just be thankful they were allowing him not to be in chains.

Now yes, that’s a very lefty socialist viewpoint or whatever term you want to use, for me I just hear echo’s of the old days, a slur used on anyone who would show any empathy to anyone with darker skin. But in truth you are either raised to see everyone as equals, or you see things like gender, race, religion as things to put others on a lower level than yourself, thinking your race, gender and religion make you superior to others. Many may not admit this, or even want to confront this truth, but it is there. Some will even claim they don’t see colour, they couldn’t possibly be racist, they just want the right to implement laws and regulations that would disproportionately affect non white communities (just look at stop and search stats, look at red lining in America or into the voter ID laws). Sometimes the racism is blatant in your face shouting slurs, and other times its that nice guy in a suit, being polite, while telling you why affluent white areas need more money than poorer black areas. It comes in all forms. And when someone like an (American) football player kneels during the anthem, for those with racist views feel their inherited supremacy being questioned “how dare they show that little respect to what this country has done for them” which is pretty much the point.

Now in 2020 we had the lighting of the fuse with the murder of Ahmaud Arbery in February followed by the murder of Breonna Taylor in March , which gained some traction, but didn’t really become global news until after the murder of George Floyd in April, with the brutal visual of the police officer kneeling on his neck for over 9 minutes, which then kicked off a year of protest in America and many other countries, with the simple message of “Black Lives Matter”, but not saying they matter more, simply making the point, they matter too, along with other races. Which was pointing to the core message that the black community for too long felt it was treated like they didn’t matter. They were less than other races. With inspiration from the Civil rights movements in the 60s the black community along with many other races, came together and protested. With the symbolic gesture from Kaepernik, many taking a knee as a gesture of solidarity to the cause.

Now with that, this spread to the UK, with protests on the streets, and also gestures in sporting events, when they were allowed to start back up during the pandemic. Where the whole English league stood by the kneeling gesture along with the Scottish league, along with the backing of Uefa for European games. I fully supported the cause, but did voice some disapproval at the mass protests, due to the pandemic. I am willing to take criticism on my views then, but I still stand by that view in context of a global pandemic, although fully acknowledge being white and not living a day as a black person I could never fully understand or appreciate the need for that mass protest during a pandemic.

Now a year later, the kneeling has subsided, becoming more of a empty gesture, as a way for football clubs to do some form of gesture without actually doing anything to change things. I may be totally wrong on that verdict, but a year later, I genuinely can’t say I see much difference, except maybe one racist has been voted out of office in America.

It may be unfair to claim nothing has changed in the space of a year, when these fights for equality take years, but I just struggle to see what real term impact of the kneeling has done when it became just par for the course in the game, and not a gesture than caused shock and forced people to ask hard questions. Just for me it feels like a year down the line, the symbol of footballers kneeling feels less about pushing a question or forcing change as it feels like a minutes silence for a royal member when you hate the royal family. I will have to caveat that with I certainly won’t be speaking down on any players or clubs kneeling, I have no issue with it or if it makes the bond between the team stronger and feel the deeper meaning to the kneeling, and if that’s the case then that will totally disprove my earlier point about it being hollow, and to be brutally honest, I’d rather be proven wrong on that than be right.

Now we move onto March 2021, where Rangers met Slavia Prague at Ibrox in the 2nd leg of their europa league run, where the host were 2 goals down, but with only minutes left on the clock a cocky Kudela covered his mouth while enraging Kamara with racial abuse. This led to a big scene on the pitch, and after the match, leading to a week’s of speculation of what the punishment would be. True to form, Uefa decided to ban Kudela, for 10 games… the same time as it would take to recover from a groin strain, less time for gambling on a match. Basically relegating racism to the bottom rung of punishments. Then to throw petrol on that fire they decided to throw Kamara a 3 game for the offence of being so offended at being racially abused at his place of work.

This along with a a lot of abuse players get on social media, with a large majority of it being to players of colour and the abuse being more racial, with the Rangers captain even admitting that every player in the team has been racially abused at some point while at the club (source here). So this has led to the Ibrox club leading the charge on a social media boycott, this started on the 8th of April, which they kept to that boycott for a week. With that not making much of an impact, this boycott has now been strengthened with the backing of their Glasgow rivals Celtic, in fact the whole of UK football has joined in this social media boycott, from the SPFL to the EPFL

Now I do love a good mass boycott, but in essence I sort of feel they can be very useless, they look great at the time, everyone banding together for one big cause, but many of these boycotts peter out, many lose interest and the boycott loses momentum and power. For a boycott to work, it has to be sustained, it has to be united in a singular target and it has to be focused. Latest example I would think of is the whole release the snyder cut phenomenon that pushed a studio to give millions to a director to finish a film that was already finished 3 years earlier, but a sustained boycott on social media, it was focused on its goal, and hammered the point home every day. That was a powerful movement for the release of a film.

Now part of my concern with a social media boycott led by football clubs is, It’s not by the fans, or led by the passionate ones. Yes the players may all agree to not tweet or post on Facebook, but it’s their boss telling them not to for a week, having it forced on players doesn’t mean they fully believe in the cause as it has not evolved naturally from a personal desire but from a business point of view, that they are being forced to by work. I know that’s very Cynical, but I think if we are being honest we know there is that element to it.

I genuinely hate being critical of any positive movement towards racial equality, or to call out racism, but I feel a social media boycott just does not feel that powerful. Now I may be totally wrong, and if I am, then I will be truly happy to hold my hands up and admit I was wrong if it manages to make any impact.

I guess my main fear is too much of this racism is bone deep, too much of it is so deep down in the culture now, that things like a social media boycott just feels like an empty gesture, it looks and sounds nice. But will it force change in the UK? The UK where the latest Race Report was edited by the Prime Minster to claim how we were one of the least racist counties (source here) and just as a FYI “least racist” is still racist, where 4 years after grenfell went up in flames nobody has been punished and many are still seeking accommodation, where it is deemed acceptable for newspapers to be completely bias with their reporting depending on the colour of person in the story, just look at how the daily mail reports on Kate and Meghan (source here). I would love nothing more than to have faith that this will make some kind of change, but I just can’t see it.

Maybe I am expecting too much, expecting a total change in society where racists realise its wrong to be racist, that the systems will be broken down and made more equal, or maybe these gestures are making a difference, a small difference in communities. The only way I can gauge it is what I see and hear, with racism still rearing it’s ugly head daily online and offline, but I suppose its not up to me to to decide, its just for me to have an opinion on it. But I very much echo the opinion of Jean Johansson while on the Old Firm Facts podcast (link here) stating that what we need is to let the black players and community to have their voices amplified, let them steer the conversation and actually listen to them, and to not focus on just white guys pontificating about how best to fix the race issue without having any experience of first hand racism. To not shout down prominent black voices when they speak of the history and their struggle, like Dave performing “Black” at the BAFTA’s (link here) or even Diversity with their Black Lives Matter performance in Britain’s Got Talent (link here), these are black artists using their platform to express their struggles in their chosen art form, and yet it will be shouted down by many quarters of the British people for being too politically charged, when in essence, all they are doing is telling black people to stay quiet, not complain or mention the struggles, where all that shows is that too many are scared to have that curtain pulled back, and don’t want to accept the history, the relevance of that history to now and how that impacts people today.

Will the social media boycott make a change? I honestly don’t know, but if anyone had said at the start of last year a black footballer would have made parliament and the conservatives change their mind on feeding starving kids, I’d have been just as sceptical, but sometimes we can be surprised, but I hope it’s the fans that surprise me this time and even have that difficult conversation or look at their language and behaviour.