Is the England football team killing this government’s cynical culture war

Could not agree with you more Sparkling.
Fabulous and accurate.

The football fan is incredibly fickle. They hate a player one week when he's had a poor game and then he's the best player ever the next week when he's had a great game. The same with the way they see football managers. Taking the Knee hasn't done anything much for kicking out racism. There have always been and will always be racists. If Sterling was to miss scoring a vital goal in the next game, out would come the haters with their abusive messages and monkey emojis. Some European supporters are so unacceptably racist with their comments it would make your ears bleed. The minority they may be but they are present in the game of football and whatever is put in place to eradicate racism will mean nothing to them.

foxie48

*growstuff Thanks for posting the link, it made me smile as indeed did the title of this thread! I think the behaviour of some football fans is disgusting and if players taking the knee reduces the racist behaviour, than that's fine by me. Perhaps tennis players should do the same. The racism that the Williams sisters have endured has been appalling.

Ah! you mean take the knee for the Canadian-born mixed race Chinese/Romanian player who's done amazingly well at this year's Wimbledon?

PS. Apparently, she's British. She's lucky she didn't arrive on the Windrush.

25Avalon

growstuff

BLM isn't a political party.

It is a political and social movement.

Interesting that Biden that well known Marxist along with the Democratic Party and even the odd Republican support BLM.

growstuff

BLM isn't a political party.

It is a political and social movement.

*growstuff Thanks for posting the link, it made me smile as indeed did the title of this thread! I think the behaviour of some football fans is disgusting and if players taking the knee reduces the racist behaviour, than that's fine by me. Perhaps tennis players should do the same. The racism that the Williams sisters have endured has been appalling.

BLM isn't a political party.

How is an anti-racist gesture "political"? It's basic human rights and not the concern of any political party. People seem to be confused about what politics is.

Sparkling I'm not misinformed. You obviously don't understand irony. I don't suppose for one moment that any footballer are Marxist, which is what the BLM movement is claimed to be.

If you accept that bending the knee doesn't mean a thing and you're not that interested in football, why does it bother you? Go and be concerned about something which matters.

No I am not a footballer, nor a politician, but I do have my own views on both. I object to bringing politics into football and taking the knee is a submissive gesture invented by the Woke movement (Harry a recent concert along with Megan) just accept people for who they are. I don’t need to be lectured at by people that don’t know what they are talking about, I don’t bend the knee to anyone. Grow stuff, where do you get your misinformation. Football is not Marxist ,it’s a game enjoyed by many people, it’s offensive to all the decent young people that love the game to accuse them of such.. If people want to go round doffing caps and bending the knee it’s their prerogative, doesn’t mean a thing.

Trisher fans are booing taking the knee as it is the imported emblem of a political Marxist party. They are not booing the players.

Yes players and LGBTQ people have suffered abuse but A lot has been achieved through the FA’s own inclusive Kick it Out campaign. A Spurs fan was banned by the Club for throwing a banana skin at a black player. We don’t need political movements which are, in fact supposed to be banned in football. Football is not supposed to be political. That makes the heading to this thread very ironic doesn’t it? The poster evidently is very anti the government. It has no place in sport.

25Avalon

There is no need to use the imported emblem of a political Marxist organisation. Fans are booing this. We have Kick it Out in football which we should be promoting to fight racism and discrimination. This is inclusive of LGBTQ.

BTW Most other teams in the Euros are NOT taking the knee except when they play England. English footballers may fear they will not be selected if they don’t do it.

So it would have been OK if there had been some kind of "Kick it out" gesture?

I just don't understand why people are objecting to a gesture against racism.

Anyway, here's a philosophical take on football:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=LfduUFF_i1A

England has been playing pretty well since it became a Marxist team. I wonder why nobody thought of becoming Marxist years ago.

I wonder if having started taking the knee before every match, if the England team will feel that if they stop, that will be seen as a political and/or racial 'statement'.

25Avalon Fans are booing this if players or anyone had taken notice of the opinions shouted out during games by the crowd there wouldn't be a black player or indeed many other players left in the team. Most of them have been told they shouldn't be playing at one point or another.(in much cruder terms than this)

There is no need to use the imported emblem of a political Marxist organisation. Fans are booing this. We have Kick it Out in football which we should be promoting to fight racism and discrimination. This is inclusive of LGBTQ.

BTW Most other teams in the Euros are NOT taking the knee except when they play England. English footballers may fear they will not be selected if they don’t do it.

One of the players went to one of my boys schools

It is really weird that we are in a position that has our football team had more moral authority than our government.

Kandinsky

That’s probably because football is the most popular sport in the world, followed & watched by millions. So law of averages means you’ll get more racists.
How you deal with that isn’t as simple as a few players bending down for 2 seconds before a match.
What about all the teams refusing to do it?
What should we do about that?
Last night England took the knee but Ukraine didn’t.
What message is that sending?

Kandinsky the fight against racism in football has been going on for a long time- it's referred to earlier in the thread. It's had various titles- Kick Racism out of Football, Show Racism the Red Card. It's involved educational sessions in schools, community work, posters, videos and loads of other things. Taking the knee is just the latest of those measures and is part of a much bigger picture.

Kamiso

lemongrove

Yes, the title of the OP was predictable, but the written OP itself didn’t mention anything political, and if you had stuck to that it would have been better and a good subject for discussion.

Personally I think they should be encouraged to spout their nonsense. It’s what is holding them back from forming any kind of opposition.

They forget that the electorate are now perfectly capable of forming their own views and voting accordingly.

Looking down their noses at voters and implying that, if they disagree with the left wingers, they must be stupid shows a huge lack of respect.

It will keep them out of power, until they come up with some viable policies, unite and stop stabbing each other in the back.

Who is they?

GillT57

vegansrock

What’s the betting Johnson and co take the credit for the success of the football team ? At least it takes sleaze off the headlines which they will be grateful for.

I fully expect that by the middle of next week, we will have been gaslit into believing that Johnson, not Kane, scored two goals. After he sacked Hancock of course.

I'm waiting for someone to claim that England couldn't have got this far if we'd still been in the EU

vegansrock

What’s the betting Johnson and co take the credit for the success of the football team ? At least it takes sleaze off the headlines which they will be grateful for.

I fully expect that by the middle of next week, we will have been gaslit into believing that Johnson, not Kane, scored two goals. After he sacked Hancock of course.

Kandinsky

Ahh. So racists only go to football matches?

Well that’s that sorted.

I followed British Ice Hockey a few years ago. Plenty of racists among the spectators there... booing and monkey noises very common...

kandinsky the message?

That Ukraine has a far right neo-Nazi supporting government.

Populism refers to a people who are considered excluded from power and not listened to by representative democracy, deemed cut off from reality.

Hmm. "a people who are considered excluded from power and not listened to by representative democracy"

Sounds like a description of 16+ million of the electorate over the past 5 years...