Social Media Hate And Football

The Finest Football Tweets The World Has Ever Seen

I get to write about football? Yes I do. Yes this is amazing. No I won’t rant about Liverpool’s season. Does this mean everyone is going to start hating me for being a Liverpool fan? Be nice, we've got it rough enough this season already. I didn't even laugh at United last year either. Well, not that much.

source: mcfc.co.uk

Social media and football. Well, the two definitely have some chemistry together. Some footballers have some serious social media profiles up there. Unfortunately, with social media offering the opportunity for anonymity it allows for the more cowardly users to lash out at the players.

Earlier this month, Manchester City player Yaya Toure re-joined Twitter after a five month break so that he could focus on Ivory Coast’s world cup campaign. Within hours of re-joining, he was hurled with a string of abusive and racist messages. What lovely folks they must be. I bet they felt like they’d given it a hard day's graft after that.

Earlier in the season, Liverpool’s Mario Balotelli was also the subject of racial abuse after he made fun of Manchester United after their loss against Leicester City. Silly Mario, you know the Devils can’t take a joke. According to Kick It Out (KIO), the anti-discrimination organisation in charge of trying to stamp out the weeds, half of all the complaints they received last season were related to social media abuse.

Of course, the police will now actively try to track down those who are guilty of this abuse and are already trying to find Yaya Toure’s abusers. But whether or not they find them is a different story. With racism in the stands already proving tricky to eradicate, it appears that social media isn’t being correctly utilised to stop this new breed of cowardice before it’s allowed to grow. KIO has already spoken about its frustration with the police not properly communicating with Twitter in order to help catch abusers.

source: skysports.com

It’s a shame to see footballers attacked in this way. Seeing them on social media finally gave them more of a platform and personality outside of the very tame post match interviews. It would be sad to see this opportunity wasted due to some people’s ignorance. I've seen more footballers sign up for Instagram this year than rainy days and I’d like to see this trend continue.  

This issue we face is not just with social media, but the internet as a whole. When anonymity is offered, people will take advantage of it to hurl abuse and show their true colours. Amid the conclusion of the Ferguson court case and the beginning of riots, I spent my evening browsing different social sites. What I saw appalled me. People were flocking out in droves to point out how the young lad deserved it for attacking an officer and condemning thepeople in Ferguson for rioting. I mean, come on. I've seen people riot over their team losing a bloody hockey or basketball game. But obviously, when a young man is killed in cold blood there’s no reason for discontent.  

Still, not all hope it lost yet. People are now being tracked down and punished for hurling abuse and racism online. In 2012, Liam Stacey received a prison sentence after racially abusing the former Bolton player, Fabrice Muamba. Twitter has also started taking steps to try and eradicate this behaviour. 

source: thedrum.com

The world is still quite a dark place. Even when you consider the leaps and bounds we’ve made in terms of basic human rights, we’re still nowhere near what we need to be. The internet and social media offers hate groups a new platform to speak from – a platform they don’t deserve.

Don’t tolerate it just because it’s behind a screen. Stand up to the cowards.

Tom Welby

Tom has just graduated from University of East London in Creative and Professional Writing. He loves writing and is currently interning as content writer hoping to go further. His other loves include Arnold Schwarzenegger films and his dog. Follow him @TomAtSMF

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