Brazilian racism fallout misses the point
You may recall how Gremio were thrown out of the Copa do Brasil after their fans were found guilty of racially abusing Santos keeper Aranha.
Personally, I've long been in favor of punishing individuals rather than entire clubs, except in situations where there is evidence the club is colluding with or simply not doing enough to police crowd behaviour. I thought holding individuals accountable for their actions is the fairest and most effective way of dealing with this. Public naming and shaming works well in most cases.
On this occasion, a number of Gremio supporters were punished, but the media focus was entirely on one person, a young lady named Patricia Moreira. She was caught on camera shouting "Macaco!" which is a type of monkey, at Aranha.
She lost her job and was roundly abused on social media, where she also received death threats. Last week, someone set fire to her house.
- Blatter praises Gremio ban
Does it mean the "name and shame" approach is wrong? I don't think so. Folks need to be held responsible for what they do, whether it's hurling racial insults or trying burn down a house.
But it does raise a question about the media. If Moreira, instead of being an attractive young lady, had been a middle-aged balding pot-bellied man, would she have received so much attention? Would we even know her name?
The fact of the matter is that there were hundreds of supporters racially abusing Aranha that day. Every one of them should have been punished and identified. Perhaps if that had happened then the backlash would have been spread out across all the racist abusers.
http://www.espnfc.us/blog/marcotti-...uniteds-evolution-and-barcelonas-bright-start
You may recall how Gremio were thrown out of the Copa do Brasil after their fans were found guilty of racially abusing Santos keeper Aranha.
Personally, I've long been in favor of punishing individuals rather than entire clubs, except in situations where there is evidence the club is colluding with or simply not doing enough to police crowd behaviour. I thought holding individuals accountable for their actions is the fairest and most effective way of dealing with this. Public naming and shaming works well in most cases.
On this occasion, a number of Gremio supporters were punished, but the media focus was entirely on one person, a young lady named Patricia Moreira. She was caught on camera shouting "Macaco!" which is a type of monkey, at Aranha.
She lost her job and was roundly abused on social media, where she also received death threats. Last week, someone set fire to her house.
- Blatter praises Gremio ban
Does it mean the "name and shame" approach is wrong? I don't think so. Folks need to be held responsible for what they do, whether it's hurling racial insults or trying burn down a house.
But it does raise a question about the media. If Moreira, instead of being an attractive young lady, had been a middle-aged balding pot-bellied man, would she have received so much attention? Would we even know her name?
The fact of the matter is that there were hundreds of supporters racially abusing Aranha that day. Every one of them should have been punished and identified. Perhaps if that had happened then the backlash would have been spread out across all the racist abusers.
http://www.espnfc.us/blog/marcotti-...uniteds-evolution-and-barcelonas-bright-start
