‘I’ve been going through it since I was 12’
England and Liverpool footballer Rinsola Babajide, 23, who is currently on loan to Brighton, was first racially abused when she was a teenager. She says, “I was 16 years old and playing for Millwall Football Club when I opened my Instagram and saw a direct message calling me the “N” word. I was so shocked I didn’t know how to react or what to do, so I deleted it and told no one. I didn’t want to tell my parents as they’re so supportive and I knew it would worry and upset them.
“I thought it might be a oneoff, but the more my career has progressed, the worse it’s got.
“Racism is the worst part of football – a game I’ve loved and played since I was five. It’s sad and shocking what I’ve had to put up with. The first time I experienced it in person was when I was about 12. I was playing for our school football team in south west London, that was otherwise all male, and fellow pupils were making racist remarks about the shade of my skin and saying it was an embarrassment to have a woman in the team. It left me in tears, but I told no one, I didn’t know how to speak up and I felt embarrassed.
“It’s with time that I’ve realised that I can stand up against it and, in April this year, I did so publicly. Along with other footballers and their clubs, we boycotted social media to demonstrate our collective anger. We called upon and challenged social media companies to make changes to their platforms and urged the government to introduce strong legislation quickly. We also requested that individuals are called out and for people to report online abuse when they see it. We used the hashtag #StopOnlineAbuse, but on my post I received a comment from a troll saying, “Football is only for men, you n*****.”
“Horrified, I reported it immediately to Instagram
and so did my agent, and the women’s football team, the Lionesses, called out the user publicly. Perhaps the most shocking thing is that when some users reported the message, Instagram replied stating the account ‘doesn’t go against our community guidelines’.
“Social media companies have to take responsibility for what’s posted on their sites. They should ban anyone who’s made racist remarks for life.
“The abuse escalates when I haven’t had a good game – and it makes it worse. As an athlete you feel crushing disappointment when you don’t do your best. To add racist abuse to that is horrendous. But I won’t let racist remarks stop me from doing what I’m good at and what I love.
“I feel so sorry for the boys in the England team for the hate they’ve received. They will be giving themselves a hard enough time anyway for missing the penalties, they don’t deserve the racist hate on top of that.
“It should never have happened in the first place. There should be zero tolerance – people should be reported, arrested and imprisoned.”