Nothing Matters Other Than This...

It’s not often that a question leaves me completely stumped, but it happened to me last week, when I was asked if there was an antonym for euphemism; flummoxed, I was forced to confess that I had absolutely no idea, and then got immediately to work on the internet to find out the answer. The correct term, I discovered, is dysphemism, which arises as a result of a process of pejoration. It may not be a common word, but it is a distinctly common concept, especially in relation to the latest outrages perpetrated by the human dust that classify themselves as sunderland supporters. This Blog isn’t explicitly about their latest appalling conduct, but we will take last Sunday’s game as a starting point. This means that thankfully in this week’s missive, I don’t have to mention the Toon Stasi’s latest urgings that next season the club should be sponsored by one of their three preferred corporate partners: Jacamo, Regaine or MIND.

As I pointed out in my Blog about the last Tyne Wear Derby (http://payaso-del-mierda.blogspot.co.uk/2012/03/barbarians-at-gate.html), things have got completely out of hand among the red and white contingent when it comes to this game, mainly because of the indulgent and malign conduct of their former Chairman in relation to repeated acts of  brutishness by sunderland fans, from the Bristol Airport debacle onwards. Despite Quinn losing his job in the early part of this year, there has been no attempt by the club to address the situation that has led to a legitimised lack of self-control that verges on mass hysteria on Wearside during derby week. On Tyneside, lads like Basher can attend North Shields v Alnwick Town the day before the clash at SoS in a relaxed and friendly state of mind; the idea of that happening on the other side of the regional divide is simply too ludicrous to countenance. Following on from the week before’s BNP march in sunderland, tactical planning for the scum game among the ageing, footwear obsessed messageboard mendicants no doubt took place in cramped rooms at the back of shabby back street boozers on Hylton Road.

If we can accept that with 11 on the pitch, Newcastle would have cantered to a 3-0 win and that Tiote’s punishment would only have been fitting if it had been mirrored Larsson’s for the Swede’s ignored chest stamp on Shola, then there is a slight air of disappointment because we’ve only taken a single point from the game. To say the very least, referee Atkinson didn’t have his best game; he booked 5 Newcastle players in addition to sending Tiote off. Goodness knows what would have happened if he’d be in charge of the Corsican derby between Ajaccio and Bastia that was taking place simultaneously, where each side lost a player after a mutual head-butting contest, the dug-outs were peppered with flares and smoke bombs all game and running battles were fought in the stands for the whole 90 minutes. If Joey Barton took to Twitter to complain about it, things must have been bad. I only hope the Mackems didn’t get to hear about it, as they’ll no doubt take it as their text for next season, if they stay up that is. Fair’s fair, they didn’t do what many had expected they would and attempt to outdo Leeds United after their carry-on at Hillsborough on Friday. Knowing Chris Kirkland, he’ll be out of action for six months after that fall, though it mystifies me why he was the victim of an assault. Let’s be honest, if anyone involved with Sheffield Wednesday deserved a clout, then it’s that awful brass band.

In short, achieving parity with Marty, the man who is rapidly losing the support of the less bovine elements of sunderland’s support as his dinosaur football and appallingly one-dimensional tactics have been so comprehensively found out, is nothing to shout about. That said, other than remarking that James McClean is simply a shit Keiron Brady, the relative abilities of Newcastle’s high quality outfit when contrasted with sunderland’s limited plodders need not detain us. Suffice to say Steven Taylor was correct in saying none of the sunderland players would get in our team, though Mignolet, Fletcher and Johnson could make the bench, at a push.

Taylor’s interview in The Daily Mirror on Saturday morning was obviously tongue-in-cheek, but I would suggest this was an inopportune time to be making such pronouncements. Simon Bird obviously had to run with the story as it made great copy, but I doubt either journalist or player expected the result of this article to be the entire sunderland support singing we wish you were dead to Taylor as he warmed up and subsequently came on as substitute. It is a mark of the man that Taylor laughed these chants off; it is a mark of those singing them that it wasn’t the worst example of their conduct during the game. The most erudite Newcastle United blog, replete with brilliant graphics and superb, logical analysis of the club, is to be found at http://tt9m.tumblr.com/ and I suggest you read it regularly. The gifted author behind this site was struck perilously close to the eye by a coin on Sunday, by some idiot unaware he was potentially destroying the sight of a genius; thankfully he’s ok. 

The inability of sunderland’s support not only to police themselves, but to accept the gravity of their actions is particularly disturbing. These are people who are actively wondering if they will be able to bring a coffin, bearing Taylor’s name, to SJP for the return game next April. However not only do their fans throw coins, they pretend Cabaye was pelted not with golf balls, but scrunched up paper, insist, in full knowledge they are lying, that Danny Rose was barracked by Newcastle fans when he was actually applauded on to the pitch by the visiting support and engage in racist chanting aimed at Demba Ba that they subsequently deny happened. This outfit still has the audacity to refer to themselves as The Caring Club and that sickens me.

Racist chanting is disgraceful and unacceptable at any time, but in the context of the week just ending, it becomes repulsive beyond words. These idiots at SoS on Sunday have a player, in the shape of Danny Rose, who endured repeated torrents of vile racist abuse when playing for England Under 21s in Krusevac. Did they not think of this before upbraiding Demba Ba, one of the finest strikers and most Corinthian of gentleman players in the Premier League? Or are these idiots, who no doubt talk about Danny Rose in more dysphemic terms than the Serbian crowd, thinking of referring their club as crne mačke in tribute to their ideological blood brothers in Belgrade?

If we can finally move away from the fall-out related to the Tyne Wear Derby, then we are faced, yet again, with the inescapable conclusion that the football authorities have failed to address the problem of racism in football in an adequate, or indeed timely, fashion. The Serbian FA, in a disgraceful example of doublethink, responded to charges of racism with a flat denial that laid the blame entirely at the door of the victim, announcing on its website that Danny Rose, behaved in inappropriate, unsportsmanlike and vulgar manner… and for that he was shown a red card, which is so nonsensical that it doesn’t even deserve comment. UEFA celebrated Football against Racism Europe (FARE) Week, by charging both teams and announcing they’d come to a decision within a month. If UEFA were serious in their desire to eradicate displays of racism from the game, they would not take so long to come to a decision, nor would they hold the likes of Danny Rose culpable for reacting to the incessant, unchecked abuse he received.

Of course, UEFA, despite their millions in cash reserves and influence as political lobbyists, have no possible way of combatting racism as a wider social problem, nor do they have an ideological panacea that can change racist attitudes, meaning the best we can realistically hope for is that conditions within grounds are effectively established to ensure racists keep their mouths shut in public. Hopefully by a process of education, racists will then realise the wrongheadness of their ignorant opinions and attitudes can be changed, though I’ll accept such a belief is optimistic to the point of idealism.

Being serious though, it should be relatively easy to stamp out conscious racism, in terms of verbal outpourings of racist language in grounds, by fans policing each other and, were the unfortunate situation to exist whereby this would not be possible (in Serbia or sunderland for example), a stringent series of fines, points deductions and ground closures would be enough to get the message across. The harder thing is combatting ingrained institutional racism and racist attitudes, whether that is among administrators, players, employees or supporters, which is where education, rather than peer influence or legal strictures comes in. 

The only time I heard any racism at a game last season, when Benfield’s Jordan Lartey was abused by a Guisborough Town player in January; despite video footage clearly showing this, the North Riding FA and the Northern League opted to do nothing about it. As I pointed out in my Blog of last April( http://payaso-del-mierda.blogspot.co.uk/2012/03/gravitys-rainbow.html), I’m sure there are racists at every game I attend, from Premier League to North East over 40s level; I can’t prove that as I’m not telepathic. However, I have to be content that they do not inflict their bile on me, or any other fan or player at any of the games I attend, and ruin the enjoyment of the game, or make black players feel intimidated or abused.

Closer to home, there is the ridiculous irony of the FA, a body that took almost a year to find John Terry, who brazenly and uncomplainingly wore the FARE Kick it Out captain’s armband during Chelsea’s loss to Shaktar Donetsk in the Champions’ League this week, guilty of the most public occurrence of racist abuse the game has probably ever seen, before issuing a pitiful slap on the wrist in terms of a 4 game ban, having finally abandoned their policy of collaborative appeasement, attempting to find the moral high ground over the Serbian FA. At the same time, the England under 21 manager Stuart Pearce also made his mouth go about Serbian racism, having previously admitted he was guilty of serial racial abuse of the father of one of his team. I wonder how Tom Ince feels about that.

Perhaps Paul and Tom Ince can reflect on the reasons why Jason, Roberts, The Ferdinand Brothers and several QPR players refused to wear Kick it Out t-shirts during the warm-up to games last weekend. It wasn’t compulsory for clubs to wear them then, as clubs had the option to postpone wearing them until this weekend coming; Newcastle and sunderland decided to delay for a week, on account of the supposed paramount importance of the Derby, while Reading Cem Karacan took his off as he was “too hot” doing the pre match shuttles and, shambolically, West Ham ran out of them for the substitutes. Half the Everton team chose not to wear them either, but that would no doubt be pure opportunism on their part, as it was a chance to have a dig at Liverpool over Suarez, rather than any ideological point as their support rival the mackems in terms of prejudiced and bigoted attitudes.

The first player to announce he’d not be wearing the t-shirt was the articulate, popular and respected Jason Roberts, for Reading’s game at Liverpool. Sir Alex Ferguson is never one to ignore the opportunity to wind up the Scousers and so, the man who allegedly led a strike of apprentices in the Govan shipyards, spent half of Friday’s press conference berating Roberts. For once the Old Trafford boss was hoist by his own petard, as Rio Ferdinand point blank refused to wear a t-shirt as well, which apparently “embarrassed” his boss, who said the player would be “dealt with.” Ferdinand missed Tuesday’s Champions’ League game with Braga, but there is every chance he would have been rested for this anyway; his celebrations on the touchline suggest he’d been rested and not dropped or disciplined.

There is, of course, the bitter irony of white middle-aged managers protesting that young black footballers aren’t adequately fighting racism by ignoring the t-shirts. Fair play to Brian McDermott for supporting Roberts, but the rest of the managers who’ve voiced their disapproval of Roberts or Ferdinand are totally out of step with the reality of what these players have to put up with and, most crucially, the lack of support the players feel they have from the authorities. Even more depressing are the managers who fail to grasp why there are black players who feel the FA has totally let them down. To suggest those not wearing Kick it Out t-shirts are promoting, or tacitly accepting racism is nonsense; black players and supporters know the score.

Those who claim not to understand need to listen to them. PFA boss Clarke Carlisle is a passionate and articulate spokesperson for players; those who are mooting an organisation purely for black players may wish to take time to listen to Carlisle’s comments on the subject, as it is important for players to remain united on this. I’d hope an organisation for black players, if it comes to fruition, would run alongside, not in opposition to, the PFA.

I would imagine that Roberts and Ferdinand made their choices for similar, but different, reasons; Roberts to make a general point about FA ineptitude in regards to racism, and Luis Suarez in particular, with Ferdinand showing support for his brother Anton, by focussing on the footling punishment John Terry received. Consequently, these players opted not to wear the Kick it Out t-shirts as they are produced by the FA funded Kick it Out initiative.

It would be easy to stigmatise Kick it Out as emasculated Uncle Toms, paying lip service to the problems the game has, while dampening the fires of righteous indication by pitiful publicity stunts such as last weekend’s alleged consciousness raising exercise, because their funding and policies are dictated from above by the FA, who have shown themselves unwilling and / or unable to deal promptly and effectively with racism in the game. It would be also easy to sympathise with them as the sporting equivalent of well-meaning early 80s Guardian reading CND supporters in a football context; they have impeccable ideals, but ultimately neither the clout nor the vision to move things on in the fight against racism.

There is one organisation that can do this, but they are utterly hamstrung financially, as funding for them is non-existent. Created on Tyneside by Newcastle United supporters and avowedly, unapologetically anti-racist in its policies and agenda, Show Racism the Red Card is an ideological beacon in the game and the organisation, supported and endorsed by former players such as Olivier Bernard or John Anderson, whose uncompromising educational agenda is doing so much at the grassroots of our local game, as well as working with clubs like Newcastle United, to promote anti-racism. However, the organisation receives buttons for funding and even less since the Tories began their austerity measures. Thus, it is time for the FA to accept Kick it Out has failed in terms of message and approach, which is where Show Racism the Red Card comes. For half a million quid a year, the FA could fund one full time official at every club, with extra ones at each County FA, to work full time on anti-racism; this would cover wages and a proper education budget. If the FA are serious about wanting to clean the game up, a national strategy such as this, funded by sponsors or even by the fines levied on John Terry and Luis Suarez, may not change the world, but it will achieve more than the hollow stunts like last weekend’s t-shirt fiasco.

In relation to racism in the game, like so much else, we need to agitate, educate, organise and that is the real story this weekend, not the bragging rights of a local derby or even the glorious renaissance of Xisco, who scored a hat trick in a 5-1 reserves win over Stoke city that I didn’t even know was taking place!! Francisco Jimenez Tejada; no sale, no sell out.