We’re not vigilant enough in pursuing racists ONLINE ABUSE
TIME GOVERNMENT & TECH GIANTS ACT
MARCUS RASHFORD stood strong for our children when it came to free school meals. Now it is time to stand up for him.
If we cannot kick racism out of football any time soon, we can at least kick out the racists.
Slowly, suffocatingly, by denying them the oxygen they crave.
The Manchester United striker declined to share the latest abhorrent messages he found waiting for him after the 0-0 draw at Arsenal on Saturday evening.
“I have beautiful children of all colours following me and they don’t need to read it,” Rashford wrote in response.
But nor should he have to read it – a point made succinctly by Ian Wright on Match of the Day. “Sometimes you have your phone with you and you are talking about shoes and jumpers and all of a sudden shoes and jumpers come to your blog,” he said.
“There are ways of being able to catch people but I don’t think they are vigilant enough.
“There should be a law. How much do they care, deep down?
“So long as the powers-that-be continue to let people feel it is something they can do… because it seems to be a fad now. Black player plays poorly – or people on social media think they played poorly – and they come with all the emojis or whatever it is.
“Until they do something, really do something…” Now it appears the Government something.
Online Harms laws, first discussed in December, are designed to allow wide-ranging powers to act against the internet companies in a bid to stop harmful content, from child sex abuse to terrorist activity.
But the recent abuse suffered by high-profile black sports people, in particular, has made it important to pull these kind of attacks into the scope, and to that end Oliver Dowden – Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport – met current players led by Jordan Henderson and former players last Monday.
Since then Reece James, Romaine Sawyers, Axel Tuanzebe and Anthony Martial have been subject to similar abuse, and it is easy to are ready to do
think racism is spiralling out of control. But is it really getting worse, are the racists themselves just emboldened because they are able to get away with it?
Is the abuse really borne of ignorance or, more likely, do the haters turn to racism precisely because they know it is wrong?
Algorithms seem able to monitor every click and move we make on our keyboards when there is money to be made, as in Wright’s shoe and jumper analogy.
Now it is time the owners of this technology – Twitter and Facebook – find a way of blocking the harmful aspects of their lucrative industry.
Or, in the name of Marcus Rashford, the Government need to make sure they lose their technological meal tickets.