THE very title of the short film ‘Where You Really From?’, about the issue of racism within youth soccer in Northern Ireland, is a kick to the guts, a blow to the heart of those at whom it is directed.
It’s not a question that should be asked. At the very least it’s insensitive. At worst, it’s aggressive, insulting, intended to ‘other’ the hearer, to make them feel they don’t belong. In their own home.
That was literally the setting for my wife being repeatedly asked that. By a community midwife.
A woman who would never have considered herself racist, but who became increasingly agitated, almost angry, by our polite responses ‘She’s from here. Born in Belfast. Spent the vast majority of her life here.’
As if we were lying.
Simply because my wife has brown skin, the combination of her Nigerian father and Northern Irish mother.
No doubt many other people of colour living in this part of the world have had similar experiences, at the very least.
The journalist in me means I often ask people of colour about their background, but I hope I do so with interest and sensitivity.
If I ask them where they’re from, I mean what part of Belfast.
It’s a simple rule for being a good person, but ‘Treat people as you find them, as they treat you’. Don’t dislike someone just because they look a certain way, or sound different. Equally, don’t like someone just because they look or sound like you if they also happen to be a git.
There’s an irony that this columnist is someone who wants people to respect each other, no matter their creed or colour, but gets incredibly, intensely infuriated by racists and bigots.
The interviewees and film-makers involved in ‘WYRF?’ are remarkably understanding and almost forgiving towards their abusers.
Yet racism still hurts. Words may not break bones, but the damage often lasts longer than a cut or a bruise.
As Aaron Brown, one of the fabulous contributors, explained, being racially abused is “like someone sticking a knife in your ears. It’s really hard to hear, especially when someone comes with so much aggression behind it, so much intention. You think ‘That person really meant that’.”
Soccer is the global game, played worldwide, with players of colour among the best ever since they laced on boot, even before that, barefoot in Brazil.
There are still idiots cheering on ‘their’ teams, which include four, five, six, or more players of colours, and these so-called ‘supporters’ still spout racist bile.
Last week I had the privilege to attend the delayed launch of the Ethnic Minority Sports Leadership Summit report by EMSONI, the Ethnic Minority Sports Organisation founded by Nigerian Adekanmi Abayomi, popularly known as ‘Kanmi’.
He has done wonderful work, but there is much more to do, so much more help required for people from ethnic minorities to integrate as they want to do.
There was so much warmth in that upstairs room at Belfast City Hall - but also chilling accounts of ongoing racism, directed at children and adults, including the highly-talented professional cricketer Steve Lazars, who still can’t get selected for Ireland despite years of starring in his adopted country.
Steve also made the point that Kanmi should be appointed to Sport NI. No ifs, buts, or delays. Get that man on board now.
Besides a typically intelligent, impassioned speech from Kanmi, we heard other disturbing personal accounts.
From a 14-year-old girl originally from Algeria who struggles to participate in her chosen sports because bigots object to how she dresses.
From a 14-year-old Nigerian boy who is left on the soccer sidelines while less talented ‘local’ - translation, ‘white’ - players get picked every week.
That’s led to him and his friends forming their own team. Not because they want to stay apart but because they have been excluded.
‘Where You Really From?’ is merely the tip of the iceberg. An iceberg of filth and scum.
We must stop ignoring what’s going on below the surface.
It’s not just in soccer, of course, far from it.
It’s not just sport, either. It’s a societal problem.
The heavy-handed, inconsistent policing of the Black Lives Matter protests and marches in Belfast was an absolute disgrace. If so many peaceful, socially distanced protestors had been arrested at an equivalent event for the unionist or nationalist communities, we’d still be hearing about it.
Yet sport can be force for good, an element of positive progress.
Give more backing and support to EMSONI.
Listen to Aaron Brown, Ross Tharma, and Rosie Zubier. Read their accounts in today’s and tomorrow’s papers.
Watch the short film ‘Where You Really From?’, made by Charlie Rollins and Cameron Tharmaratnam.
Be good. Be better.
Finally, for those who are triggered by this, label me ‘Woke’ if you like; I won’t care, in fact that’s a badge of honour.
Better to be ‘woke’ than sleepwalking through a life of bigotry, intolerance, and spite.
As the superb broadcaster and author James O’Brien put it in a Tweet:
‘Countries aren’t threatened by gay rights, sexual equality & opposition to racism. Homophobes, misogynists, & racists are.’
Similarly, ‘politically correct’/ PC isn’t an insult to me either. I’d rather be correct than on the wrong side of history.
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This week’s column could easily have been about sport’s response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Those apologists for and fellow-travellers of the odious Vladimir Putin may have a point about the Russian element of part of eastern Ukraine. However, they don’t seem so concerned about the vast swathes of territory Russia has long occupied and in which it has imposed its own language and culture.
Back to sport, and at least the soccer authorities, FIFA and UEFA have done the right thing in banning matches involved Russia and Russian clubs.
That’s in contrast to the International Olympic Committee, which not only allowed Russian athletes to compete at this year’s Winter Olympics but also the delayed 2020 summer Olympics in Tokyo last year, despite repeated evidence of the systematic state doping programme.
The sheer hypocrisy and effrontery of the IOC calling for a ban on anything involving Russian athletes earlier this week was staggering, if not actually surprising.
A clear case of closing the bank vault door after they’ve pocketed multi-millions of roubles, having sold the Sochi Winter Olympics in 2014 in Russia so that Putin could soften his country’s international image.
IOC? Idiotic Opportunistic… Chancers. As this is a family newspaper, I’ll say ‘chancers’.
