Euro 2020’s racism
Following England’s defeat to Italy in the Euro 2020 final, Bukayo Saka, Marcus Rashford and Jadon Sancho were victims of racial abuse on social media after missing their penalties. Their comment sections were flooded with users calling them monkeys, the racial n word, phrases like ‘go back to Africa’ and many more racial slurs. The metropolitan police stated they have launched an investigation into the ‘offensive and racist’ social media comments directed towards the Three Lions players. There was a great amount of support in response to the racism with many condemning it, including Harry Kane tweeting ‘if you abuse anyone on social media, you’re not an England fan and we don’t want you.’
Outside of Wembley stadium mobs of England supporters were attacking both people of colour and Italian supporters, in which one reported ‘my head was on the floor and they were kicking and stamping on it repeatedly.’ The Mirror also reported that two people were stabbed in a mass pub brawl after watching the match.
In Manchester, a mural of Marcus Rashford was defaced with racial graffiti, but the community rushed to fill the wall with messages of love and support leaving Rashford ‘moved to tears.’ One of the letters read ‘not all hero’s wear capes, some wear football boots. We love you Rashford.’ A Black Lives Matter peaceful protest also took place at the mural in support of the Rashford, Saka and Sancho.
Sadly, racism cases in football are not a recent occurrence and Karim Benzema (France national team player) spoke out about it 2016 saying ‘If I score, I’m French, if I don’t, I’m Arab.’
- Just because someone is a celebrity/earns more money doesn’t mean they aren’t human and it doesn’t give people the freedom to be racist towards them and treat them any less than they should be.
