Vile views tarnish game on the pitch, in the stands

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This article was published 28/12/2018 (2501 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Italian soccer has a racism problem.

On Boxing Day, during a Serie A match between Inter Milan and Napoli at San Siro, Partenopei defender Kalidou Koulibaly was harassed with monkey noises by a section of Nerazzurri supporters in the stadium’s Curva Nord. By the 80th minute the Senegal international, who is one of the best centre-backs in Europe, was sufficiently frustrated with the match officials’ lack of interest in the matter that he sarcastically applauded the referee, who proceeded to show him a second yellow card.

Koulibaly will serve a two match ban as a result of his ejection, although Napoli are appealing the decision, while Inter will play a pair of games behind closed doors, with the Curva Nord to be empty for a further encounter.

“Sooooo… incessant racism and monkey noises throughout a match = same punishment as sarcastically applauding a referee,” tweeted Goal.com’s Carlo Garganese.

“Really!?” added Manchester City captain Vincent Kompany. “Koulibaly racially abused at San Siro. Raheem Sterling at Stamford Bridge. This is unacceptable! Elected politicians set the tone with divisive rhetoric granted but some level of reason has to return!”

To the Belgian’s point about elected politicians, Matteo Salvini, Italy’s interior minister, downplayed the Koulibaly incident on a Thursday television program, referring to the abuse as “healthy teasing among fans.”

“Bonucci got booed by Milan fans,” he continued, referring to the former Rossoneri defender, who is white, and who was jeered for poor play before transferring back to Juventus. “Is that not racism?”

Not only would Salvini, the leader of the anti-immigrant League party, not seem to know what racism is, but his comments also echo the nonsensical and frankly dangerous rhetoric coming out of the United States.

“I don’t understand why the overwhelming majority of Inter fans — good people — have to pay for some criminals who were fighting two kilometres away,” he continued, seemingly confusing episodes of violence outside the stadium with the racism inside it. “Let’s not put everything in the same pot. In the stadiums they also sing Milan in Flames. Would that be racism, too?”

No, Mr. Salvini. It would not be.

“If we want to condemn and defeat violence we can’t pretend it’s all the same stuff,” he said. “The vast majority of the organized fans are good people.” (His “good people” refrain might as well have been lifted from one of Donald Trump’s bumbling excursions through false parallels.)

It goes without saying that racism is hardly limited to Italian soccer, the country of Italy or any one place or time. As Kompany pointed out, Raheem Sterling, his City teammate, was racially abused at Chelsea earlier this month, and a banana was tossed at Arsenal striker Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang in the North London Derby a week before that. The United Kingdom, of course, is in the midst of a messy separation from the European Union — a Brexit that was never about economics but has everything to do with xenophobia.

Not that Brexit or Matteo Salvini, labelled “The Most Feared Man in Europe” by Time magazine, or Donald Trump, for that matter, invented racism, although their unabashed courting of it to realize political ends has quite clearly allowed it public presence.

Even the United Nations linked Italy’s recent “racist and xenophobic anti-immigrant and anti-foreigner rhetoric” with a spike in hate crimes in a November human-rights report. Salvini’s trampling of rights protections for migrants was singled out by the UN for feeding a “climate of hatred and discrimination.”

Again, this is neither a soccer-specific nor Italy-only problem. There are warnings for Canada in all this, as well. For example, Conservative Leader Andrew Scheer’s intentional misrepresentation of immigration and flagrant and repeated lies about its effects risks fanning similar racist flames — a blaze he and many of his supporters seem to want. And, to be clear, they are not “good people.”

“Unfortunately, something is lacking in Italy,” observed Juventus manager Massimiliano Allegri in his Friday press conference. “We’ve lost a bit of education and respect. It’s not just football. To really have a new start we need to impress these things upon people when they’re young children.”

And for those people who have already “chosen how to live their lives,” he added, there is a quick solution: “You see them, you catch them, and they’re not allowed in the stadium anymore.” In other words, their racism is named for what it is, and they are shamed out of the public square. At the very least, they can hopefully understand that wider society holds their views to be unacceptable, and that to have a place in public discourse — or to attend a soccer match — they must first check their xenophobia at the door.

Bundesliga outfit Eintracht Frankfurt, in an extraordinary step taken last season, went so far as to discourage proponents and members of far-right parties from associating themselves with the club. “Check yourself and check honestly,” advised club president Peter Fischer last February, because (Eintracht values) and (xenophobic views) do not go together.”

“Mine is a condemnation with no ifs or buts,” stated Inter manager Lucio Spalletti during his press conference, when asked for his reaction to the monkey noises and the Nerazzurri’s resulting stadium ban. “The time has come to say ‘enough’ to those who engage in racist chants, discriminatory chants…, ‘enough’ to hatred in football in general.”

From a purely soccer standpoint it’s heartening that some of the sport’s key figures have spoken out strongly against what happened at San Siro on Boxing Day. Of course, given soccer’s global nature, its interconnectedness and the diversity of its administrations and workforces, it’s also not surprising.

What’s disappointing is the xenophobia and blatant racism of political movements of national purity it has come up against. But that it is naming the problem, and confronting it, at least shows a way forward for society as a whole.

“Everyone must do right in the role they have,” concluded Spalletti.

Koulibaly, meanwhile, was still abused because of the colour of his skin, and unless his suspension is overturned he’ll sit out Napoli’s next two games because he called out the official who turned a blind eye to what was happening. Justice for him, like so many others, will arrive too late, if it does at all.

And so, he can only speak for himself, making a deeply human appeal he should never have had to consider. “I’m proud of the colour of my skin,” he tweeted. “To be French, Senegalese, Neapolitan: Man.”

 

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