Topic: Racism in Football

[El Lobo]

I don't think abandoning a platform is letting my somebody win, you might.

Considering there is unlikely to be any sort of comeuppance to anyone racially abusing someone on social media, what sort of impact do you think it'd have if Liverpool said 'right, we're closing down our Instagram account and so will all of our players'? You think that'd then force racists to go 'Oh no I didnt actually want to offend them that much to leave Instagram entirely'? Or do you think its far more likely that they'd go 'fucking hell that worked a treat! Lets try some more'?

[naYoRHa2b]

Considering there is unlikely to be any sort of comeuppance to anyone racially abusing someone on social media, what sort of impact do you think it'd have if Liverpool said 'right, we're closing down our Instagram account and so will all of our players'? You think that'd then force racists to go 'Oh no I didnt actually want to offend them that much to leave Instagram entirely'? Or do you think its far more likely that they'd go 'fucking hell that worked a treat! Lets try some more'?

I think platforms would actually take notice if all these accounts with millions of followers suddenly shut down there pages and in turn hopefully implement something to verify its users.

[wah00ey]

Sadly, the internet is awash with keyboard warriors, people who will post things from behind a keyboard that they wouldn't say in public or to a person's face.  If, somehow, we could get rid of any racist element they would still find other ways to abuse people.

As a good friend of mine puts it, "some people are just c*nts."

[WhereAngelsPlay]

I think platforms would actually take notice if all these accounts with millions of followers suddenly shut down there pages and in turn hopefully implement something to verify its users.

Fuck that,the bastards would love to get all their users verified but don't because of the implications for the poor bastards who use those platforms but live in states that send people to jail for simply saying "fuck that".


You ban the accounts,rinse and repeat,may not be a silver bullet solution but all things considered,it is the best one.

As for Clubs and players,they only have the accounts for pr purposes so imo the players should think about handing then over to their pr people & leave them to deal with it.Again not ideal but the best solution & much better than giving the socials an extra (more important) layer of data to mine & sell.

[Father Ted]

IP Bans, better moderation, word filters so you can’t actually write certain offensive stuff - there are steps they could take but presumably it would cost to implement. Ideally self-moderation and not posting vile abuse would be the best answer, but that’s not gonna happen.

The stupid football banter culture of just hurling abuse everywhere when things go wrong on the field doesn’t help.

[rob1966]

Come and stand outside the Albert and call Naby or Trent a n***** or whatever shite they threw and them and see what happen.

Will there be any takers to the offer?, will there fuck, the fucking shithouses.

[jillcwhomever]

The club needs to identify these arses and take action against them. They don’t deserve to follow this team. It makes me despair, people need to be made accountable for behaving like this.

[El Lobo]

The club needs to identify these arses and take action against them. They don’t deserve to follow this team. It makes me despair, people need to be made accountable for behaving like this.

I guess the beauty of being able to racially abuse people online is that you can also just pretend to be anyone. I'd be very surprised if its actually Liverpool fans doing it.

[WhereAngelsPlay]

IP Bans, better moderation, word filters so you can’t actually write certain offensive stuff - there are steps they could take but presumably it would cost to implement. Ideally self-moderation and not posting vile abuse would be the best answer, but that’s not gonna happen.

The stupid football banter culture of just hurling abuse everywhere when things go wrong on the field doesn’t help.

Word filters wouldn't cost them a cent but ip bans would be useless.

[cdav]

Fuck that,the bastards would love to get all their users verified but don't because of the implications for the poor bastards who use those platforms but live in states that send people to jail for simply saying "fuck that".


You ban the accounts,rinse and repeat,may not be a silver bullet solution but all things considered,it is the best one.

As for Clubs and players,they only have the accounts for pr purposes so imo the players should think about handing then over to their pr people & leave them to deal with it.Again not ideal but the best solution & much better than giving the socials an extra (more important) layer of data to mine & sell.

Yeah its a tough one but saw a good proposal the other day. Effectively they have two strands- one for verified users and the other non-verified users and allow everyone to choose if they see stuff posted by the non- verified people.

Would protect people in repressive states but also stop people seeing abuse from anonymous users.

Also think they should remove the monkey emojis as it seems it is only used for racist abuse

[Chivasino]

The club needs to identify these arses and take action against them. They don’t deserve to follow this team. It makes me despair, people need to be made accountable for behaving like this.

The problem is it could be a number of kids and/or grown adults, based in another country, lets say India for example, with nothing better to do and just want to act like absolute c*nts. They might even follow another club. What can Liverpool FC do in that scenario?

Until Twitter/Facebook etc take some serious steps to validate accounts then it's not going to stop.

What we're trying to do is get a massive range of different cultures, languages, races, with differing political ideals, to come together and decide that being racist is a really shit and totally unacceptable. Sadly, that's really fucking hard.

[WhereAngelsPlay]

Yeah its a tough one but saw a good proposal the other day. Effectively they have two strands- one for verified users and the other non-verified users and allow everyone to choose if they see stuff posted by the non- verified people.

Would protect people in repressive states but also stop people seeing abuse from anonymous users.

Also think they should remove the monkey emojis as it seems it is only used for racist abuse

That's already an option,you can make it so that everyone can see your tweets but only people that you have followed back can reply.

I agree about the monkey & even banana emojis

[Coolie High]

The players should just limit their accounts to people who they follow being able to post, there’s no real way to stop it.

[El Lobo]

The players should just limit their accounts to people who they follow being able to post, there’s no real way to stop it.

They probably should, but these are all 'solutions' which shouldn't have to be considered. These solutions suggest that social media itself is the problem, when the problem is actually racist people. Its like a policeman witnessing someone on the street shouting racist abuse at someone and then telling the victim to just cover their ears and cross to the other side of the road.

There's got to be a complete rethink of social media and how it works. If that costs billions, so be it. This is just the tip of the iceberg. There's numerous examples of people taking their lives because of shit they've received on social media from anonymous trolls. I watched the Louis Theroux documentary on 'Tiger King' the other night and Carol Baskin was just getting message after message online talking about her dying, wanting her dead, watch your back etc. And there's no comeuppance. It cant just be 'well dont go on social media then'.

[ToneLa]

Block by MAC addresses
block IP ranges
block email addresses
Contact ISPs with the information, Twitter
Contact police,  ISPs

[liverbloke]

What action would you suggest against an anonymous acccount?

Or you think we should just let racists win and abandon any platform where they're able to have free reign to racially abuse people?

nobody is saying that any victims that have been called a n***** to not use social media platforms

it's just saying that a mass block by something like a football club or all football clubs will get the message across - and not to the racist twats (you're kinda missing the point there) but to the media giants LOSING money £$

it's a shame that we have to do it that way but it looks like no other way has worked so far and we're not talking about a lifetime ban but just period of protest

buy yeh, maybe these platforms should advertise truthfully saying 'we allow all free speech but not hate speech but you might be called a n***** or have someone tell you they're going to rape you or kill you and your kids - if that's okay with you then sign up free below'

then you hold the hand of fate in your own hand

[killer-heels]

Just fucking ban the platforms or make it a legal requirement for peoples details to be passed to the authorities. There is no other option.

[didi shamone]

Is it becoming more common or more commonly reported?
Are these clowns actually being inspired by the media reporting it?

Genuine questions as I've never been on social media aside from rawk. I firmly believe my life is better by not mixing with the bottom feeders.
 Just seeing the bantz on the likes of YouTube or the bbc website makes me feel like my iq is plummeting.

[Sarge]

Just fucking ban the platforms or make it a legal requirement for peoples details to be passed to the authorities. There is no other option.

Far too many cowrads hide behind a twitter  or various other social media handle.

[wenlock]

Racism can be harder to auto detect then copywrite or porn so it's hard to compare how they are dealt with, I understand that. Saying that though, once it is identified as racism I don't see why steps can't be taken against the people concerned like it is for copywrite and such.

I didn't read all of Henry's comments and didn't agree with everything I did see him say (like giving proper ID) but he does have a point on how stringently different issues are dealt with.

[Only Me]

Another example of the utter shithousery that is social media.

“Condemning strongly”and all the other PR driven bollocks never works, these snide scumbag US corporates have shown on countless occasions that they have no conscience and no intention of doing a fucking thing unless they’re made to.

It’s our turn to condemn these twats this week, it was Man U the other week, and virtually every other teams done it to.

If they’re serious about the issue, why don’t all the footy clubs in Europe make a stand and tell Facebook, Instagram et al that they will shut down their entire social media operations on a given future date, unless they are shown unequivocal evidence of meaningful progress by these twats to clean up their act?

The threat of accounts with billions of followers in total just vanishing overnight, and the horrendous publicity that would generate (not to mention the effect on their sacred advertising click income) would have a much better chance of concentrating minds than any condemnatory statement.

[El Lobo]

nobody is saying that any victims that have been called a n***** to not use social media platforms

it's just saying that a mass block by something like a football club or all football clubs will get the message across - and not to the racist twats (you're kinda missing the point there) but to the media giants LOSING money £$

it's a shame that we have to do it that way but it looks like no other way has worked so far and we're not talking about a lifetime ban but just period of protest

buy yeh, maybe these platforms should advertise truthfully saying 'we allow all free speech but not hate speech but you might be called a n***** or have someone tell you they're going to rape you or kill you and your kids - if that's okay with you then sign up free below'

then you hold the hand of fate in your own hand

How did the one day 'blackout' after George Floyds death effect things? Because it seems like things are getting worse, not better.

[CraigDS]

At this stage I’d make the platforms require you to confirm your ID if you want to comment or post. You can choose not to, but then people can block those who do not from commenting or from seeing posts from those who have not.

I don’t care at this point if people feel uneasy by this - I more feel uneasy about other hiding behind a computer screen and throwing racist (and a whole host of other shite including grooming) knowing there is next to fuck all comeback.

[killer-heels]

At this stage I’d make the platforms require you to confirm your ID if you want to comment or post. You can choose not to, but then people can block those who do not from commenting or from seeing posts from those who have not.

I don’t care at this point if people feel uneasy by this - I more feel uneasy about other hiding behind a computer screen and throwing racist (and a whole host of other shite including grooming) knowing there is next to fuck all comeback.

Indeed. I still get annoyed by people who scream about not wanting to give the authorities their details and the best reply they can come back around how to solve this issue is to pressure social media firms. Since when are they ever interested in solving this issue?

If these platforms are to remain then they need to require confirmed identification so that any abusers can be found.

[killer-heels]

Racism can be harder to auto detect then copywrite or porn so it's hard to compare how they are dealt with, I understand that. Saying that though, once it is identified as racism I don't see why steps can't be taken against the people concerned like it is for copywrite and such.

I didn't read all of Henry's comments and didn't agree with everything I did see him say (like giving proper ID) but he does have a point on how stringently different issues are dealt with.

So what do you suggest then to deal with it?

[jillcwhomever]

The clubs themselves need to take themselves off social media, force the social media companies to take the problem seriously. Once they start using their big contacts then they will be forced to confront this deal with the offenders.

[CraigDS]

The clubs themselves need to take themselves off social media, force the social media companies to take the problem seriously. Once they start using their big contacts then they will be forced to confront this deal with the offenders.

Clubs shouldn’t have to. This isn’t like social media don’t know it’s an issue and need to be made aware of it.

There have been more than enough high profile cases around the world. It’s time they’re forced to do something and not by it’s users removing themselves.

[El Lobo]

The clubs themselves need to take themselves off social media, force the social media companies to take the problem seriously. Once they start using their big contacts then they will be forced to confront this deal with the offenders.

I'm not sure it would though.

And racism is abhorrent.....but there's people who have literally killed themselves over abuse they've got over social media and there's seemingly nothing being done about an increased accountability. I fear if football clubs said they were coming off social media for, I dunno, a month then the social media companies would treat it with a shrug and carry on as normal.

[jillcwhomever]

On the back of my post before, Swansea City have just announced that they will not be using social media for the next week, it will be interesting to see if other clubs act the same way. While I take the points of what others have to say, there comes a time when you have to try something otherwise life never changes at all. I listened to a piece on 5live from Clint Morrison who spoke passionately about racism in football. He said basically everytime a black footballer makes a mistake on a football pitch he knew they would get racist comments on social media. That is in no way acceptable and why do the rest of us spend our time saying this won't work, that won't work. We're happy to condemn it as a comment but not actually do anything about it. More clubs need to to be doing what Swansea are doing. It's past the point where we can just shrug our shoulders about it and do bugger all.

[jackh]

On the back of my post before, Swansea City have just announced that they will not be using social media for the next week, it will be interesting to see if other clubs act the same way. While I take the points of what others have to say, there comes a time when you have to try something otherwise life never changes at all. I listened to a piece on 5live from Clint Morrison who spoke passionately about racism in football. He said basically everytime a black footballer makes a mistake on a football pitch he knew they would get racist comments on social media. That is in no way acceptable and why do the rest of us spend our time saying this won't work, that won't work. We're happy to condemn it as a comment but not actually do anything about it. More clubs need to to be doing what Swansea are doing. It's past the point where we can just shrug our shoulders about it and do bugger all.

Agreed - hope others follow their lead.  Here's the Guardian's article about it if anyone wants to read further: https://www.theguardian.com/football/2021/apr/08/swansea-city-to-boycott-social-media-in-fight-against-abhorrent-abuse.

Think your comments about having "to try something" are fair.  In the context of the taking of a knee, I'm fully respectful of Zaha and any others choosing not to do so because they feel it's become a passive gesture.  However, in an interview a couple of weeks ago - I think it was Lewis Hamilton - the point was made that even a (now-)simple gesture like that has the potential for a child to ask their parent "why are they doing that?", or to encourage teenagers to reflect on why a role model is doing what they're doing.  A lot more needs to happen of course, because these gestures and boycotts can risk becoming 'part of the wallpaper' (is that anywhere near the phrase I'm looking for?!  My mind's gone blank!) if action isn't taken to back them up.

[jillcwhomever]

Agreed - hope others follow their lead.  Here's the Guardian's article about it if anyone wants to read further: https://www.theguardian.com/football/2021/apr/08/swansea-city-to-boycott-social-media-in-fight-against-abhorrent-abuse.

Think your comments about having "to try something" are fair.  In the context of the taking of a knee, I'm fully respectful of Zaha and any others choosing not to do so because they feel it's become a passive gesture.  However, in an interview a couple of weeks ago - I think it was Lewis Hamilton - the point was made that even a (now-)simple gesture like that has the potential for a child to ask their parent "why are they doing that?", or to encourage teenagers to reflect on why a role model is doing what they're doing.  A lot more needs to happen of course, because these gestures and boycotts can risk becoming 'part of the wallpaper' (is that anywhere near the phrase I'm looking for?!  My mind's gone blank!) if action isn't taken to back them up.

It would be even better if a number of sporting teams did it all at the same time, something small which builds up and gives maximum momentum to embarrassing those companies who just refuse to do anything and face up to any basic responsibility. We know its a society thing as well but its no reason for the rest of us to just shrug it off and think nothing else can be done. A number of big changes in history started off small and caught a mood in the world at the time and out of that can come something good.

[CraigDS]

If these companies aren’t embarrassed when ever major celeb posts blank black pics for a day, or when their users kills themselves, or when high profile individuals quit their platform and cite the abuse they get, then I doubt even all clubs refusing to use the platform for a week is going to persuade them otherwise.

[Ziltoid]

These social media companies seem to be doing a lot more to help Kardashian take that photo down that she put up before she'd airbrushed the fuck out of it.

[CraigDS]

I see Henderson has decided to hand over the running of all his socials to an anti-cyberbullying charity. He was going to come off completely but thought handing them over would help a lot more.

[WhereAngelsPlay]

At this stage I’d make the platforms require you to confirm your ID if you want to comment or post. You can choose not to, but then people can block those who do not from commenting or from seeing posts from those who have not.

I don’t care at this point if people feel uneasy by this - I more feel uneasy about other hiding behind a computer screen and throwing racist (and a whole host of other shite including grooming) knowing there is next to fuck all comeback.

Well you should maybe google all the people across the world who have been jailed for simply tweeting about human rights abuses.

You could then google to see just how many people are arrested and charged in the UK over racist posts.

[liverbloke]

If these companies aren’t embarrassed when ever major celeb posts blank black pics for a day, or when their users kills themselves, or when high profile individuals quit their platform and cite the abuse they get, then I doubt even all clubs refusing to use the platform for a week is going to persuade them otherwise.

but it's a start - and if you don't start somewhere then you're going nowhere

[CraigDS]

but it's a start - and if you don't start somewhere then you're going nowhere

It has started though. As said not long ago nearly ever major celeb and influencer (urgh, hate that word) posted nothing but black on their social media for a day or two. Many high profile people have vocally quit social media, and there have been countless news stories going viral about people killing themselves (often kids) in part due to cyber bullying.

They don't care. Until they are forced to change, by regulators, they'll pay lipservice whilst doing very little.

[So… Howard Philips]

Well you should maybe google all the people across the world who have been jailed for simply tweeting about human rights abuses.

You could then google to see just how many people are arrested and charged in the UK over racist posts.

So the authorities in those countries, obviously with the help of Twitter, could identify those people.

Why can't those tweeting racist abuse be equally identified?

[WhereAngelsPlay]

So the authorities in those countries, obviously with the help of Twitter, could identify those people.

Why can't those tweeting racist abuse be equally identified?

Yes just like they were able to identify those that have been charged and in some cases jailed in this country.

[So… Howard Philips]

Yes just like they were able to identify those that have been charged and in some cases jailed in this country.

It would be interesting to see how many of those tweeting the abuse are actually in this country.

If not there is nothing the authorities here can do about it.

And it then goes back to the social media companies - who have algorithms that detect at what time you have your daily shit, you'd think they would be able to simply identify any racist expressions or emojis.