Anelka’s controversial gesture a childishly stupid act, at best

WEST Bromwich Albion striker Nikolas Anelka has never been far from controversy. From his intemperate days at Arsenal to a glittering career around Europe, he has never been far from a headline.

It was so during the hectic Barclays Premier League holidays schedule too. Having scored his first BPL goal in 28 months, the lanky Frenchman celebrated by extending his right arm down and then “cutting” across it with his other.

The gesture is known as “la quenelle” in France, and the gastronomes among readers will associate the word with a delicious spiced meat dumpling. But thanks to the comedian Dieudonné M’bala M’bala, it is a word associated with something else entirely.

To say that the comedian is a controversial performer would be an under- statement. Having started off left-wing, he drifted into anti-Semitic and anti-Zionist territory and has had run-ins with French authorities for his shows, which insult the memory of Holocaust victims.

So, is the quenelle just an anti-establishment gesture, or is it a downward, reverse Nazi salute, as several Jewish groups have claimed? It’s become something of a meme, with people taking photos of themselves doing it in front of “establishment” or government buildings. Yet some have also done it in front of explicitly Jewish buildings. Two French soldiers were sanctioned in September for saluting in front of a synagogue.

Anelka’s celebration brought the quenelle to a global audience and, rather predictably, it sparked a massive uproar. It emerged other French players such as Manchester City’s Samir Nasri and Liverpool’s Mamadou Sakho had been pictured making the gesture. The players have largely denied the gesture’s anti-Semitic overtones, saying it is an anti-establishment gesture for them. West Brom made their striker promise not to do it again.

Outside the BPL’s strict rules around conduct and political expression, the quenelle is very likely to continue to flourish after the attention it got. Even as the controversy began to explode, there was a sense that perhaps the entire context was misunderstood.

France has a rich history of antiestablishmentarianism, but also a dark one of lingering anti- Semitism. There was a disappointing lack of solidarity with Jewish people throughout the saga. Anelka and Nasri ought to know better than to do something that associates them with racism against Jewish people.

In a way, this controversy was the perfect metaphor for general public response to outrage against racism in 2013. Please forgive me for bringing Justine Sacco up again (she’s apologised, it must be said), but in the aftermath of her stupid tweet about Africans and HIV and the ensuing controversy, the commentariat was far more worried about saving her from “the mob” (whatever that is) than they were with, oh I don’t know, condemning her vile racism. It seems they were far more concerned about the dehumanising effect of the widespread condemnation than they were with the fact that her racism dehumanised black people.

Where, I wondered, was the concern about racism in general? I ask the same of those who support Dieudonné.

Anelka’s decision was childishly stupid, at best, knowing how unsmiling the Football Association’s disciplinary board is about such things. His excuse that suggests the rightly offended are in the wrong simply won’t wash any more.