Come on you Whites is racist, soccer fan told
‘Offensive to good taste’
A fAn of fulham fC is suing the US authorities because they deemed the phrase ‘Come on You Whites’ racist.
University professor Jon Kotler, an American, wanted to put the abbreviation ‘COY-W’ on his car’s personalised number plate.
The phrase ‘ Come on You Whites’ has been associated with the West London club for years and is used by its PakistaniAmerican billionaire owner.
But Mr Kotler, 73, ran into trouble with the California Department of Motor Vehicles which refused to let him display the COY-W plate on his Honda.
now he is suing the DMV after filing a civil rights lawsuit in which he says: ‘There is no evidence that the slogan carries racial connotations, and thus no reason that Mr Kotler should not be able to display his message the same way that thousands of other Americans express on personalised licence plates every year.’
Mr Kotler became a fulham fan many years ago. About ten times a season he manages to visit London and watch them play at their Craven Cottage ground.
Often he will fly 11 hours to London on a Thursday for a long weekend and return to the classroom on the following Tuesday after an 11,000-mile round trip. Yesterday he said he was shocked at the decision to ban his licence plate. ‘It’s just a shirt colour,’ he said. ‘The people at the DMV are either extra thick or very PC.’
The professor – who was born in new Jersey but now lives in Calabasas, California – teaches media law at the University of Southern California. He took legal action after the DMV said the slogan he wanted to display could be considered ‘ hostile, insulting or racially degrading’. Before filing his lawsuit he argued that fulham’s 68-year-old American owner Shahid Khan often uses the phrase ‘Come on You Whites’ when supporting the team.
‘I sent the DMV tons of material,’ said Mr Kotler. ‘Press releases, stories from the British media, letters from the chairman who uses the phrase Come On You Whites.
‘I pointed out that many clubs in Britain are known by their colour – the Blues [Chelsea], the Clarets [Burnley]. nobody ever thought the Liverpool reds were communists. new Zealand’s rugby team is known as the All Blacks.’
‘But it was the furthest thing from my mind that anyone would object to it.’
Mr Kotler currently has a number plate which reads ‘ffC SW6’ – which incorporates part of the club stadium’s postcode.
He wants California DMV’s vanity plate criteria ruled unconstitutional. There are currently strict rules in on plates not being ‘offensive to good taste and decency’ or referring to sexual connotations or ‘lust or depravity’.
The DMV refused to comment of the case because of the lawsuit.