hypochondriac

I'd like to see him do well at least in part because he's black because it would prevent race baiters like that bloke from the association of Black lawyers from calling everyone racist due to less black managers.

It made me sad seeing Sol Campbell doing the rounds the other week angling for jobs and implying racism is to blame for his poor performance and I despaired if this was the representative being used for a black person working in football.

I predicted a while ago that eventually they will announce something like a black inclusion task force or something like that and then use that announcement to end the knee taking whilst claiming victory. It's really the only way they can do it without letting the "racists" win.

It's equality of opportunity that's important not equality of outcome. I don't want to see tokenism in football but I'd love to see a black manager at one of the top teams arriving on merit and performing really well.

What's very sad is that well meaning liberal and compassionate people are co-opted into this cult-like way, of thinking and then are unwittingly used for insidious purposes. I have no doubt that most people who subscribe to this way of thinking believe that they are doing good and that's a tragedy. Of course there's also soggy types who use it as an excuse to feel superior to others, to upset who they see as their ideological opponents and who actually don't give a damn about others but just want to have their preconceived bias confirmed.

Think you got me confused with someone else as I didn't say that. With regards your point on players, that would be fine if I didn't know for a fact that some of the players don't actually want to do it but felt that it would cause a bigger issue not to do so. Of course its the players doing it but they are the representatives of the clubs so it's not just the players doing it in a personal capacity is it.

I wasn't going to bother reading this because it was addressed to an entire racial group but I skimmed through and goodness me that is absolutely appalling and on an NHS website as well. Shockingly racist but sadly when you promote these people you get this sort of thing to justify their salary.

I think it depends though doesn't it. "Improving things even further" for some people is where there is disagreement. Positive discrimination in jobs for example, or job applications where only those of a certain race can apply. Then there's the whole minefield of women's rights and abolishing women only spaces. Some believe this is simply improving things even further but for others it's an intolerable infringement on their rights. Same with gender issues and children. Some of the awful abuses from the Tavistock centre outlined in their recent court case loss were committed in the name of improving things even further. So there's a debate to be had there about what constitutes improving things further and it's certainly not a settled issue.

A boo doesn't really cost anything and I'm not sure it's really a sign of a real strength of feeling, it's more just a quick and easy response from some of those at the game to something they dislike. I doubt many think too deeply into it they just don't like the knee due to its previous associations whether the football authorities want to admit them or not.

The sad fact is that people will express frustration on social media towards high profile targets normally and out of tens of thousands of replies some of those people will be abusive and some of those racist, sexist, homophobic etc etc. The elephant in the room is that for all the good that social media can do, this is the bad and an inevitable consequence of allowing this sort of medium to exist in this format. Changing these platforms is unworkable due to their global nature and how they work so the general public and those in charge need to either accept social media for what it is and learn to block, ignore and track abusive comments without putting every comment on the front of a newspaper or they need to ban social media.

The flip side of that is it's 5 seconds of expressing your vocal opposition to the gesture before getting on with the game and supporting your team. It's not like it's a particularly onerous task to boo.

Well all of those things exist in society sure but I think it suits the agendas of some people and their politics to exagerrate the extent to which these proliferate in society. Like with hate crimes for example where annual figures show record levels of hate crime being reported and then we find out that actually its because the police have changed the definition of what a hate crime is and have been trained that it isn't acceptable for hate crime to go down. So yes homophobia, sexism, racism and m discrimination all exist in the UK but in reality it's a minority of incidences, the country is getting more tolerant and accepting over time and we should celebrate being one of the most tolerant and accepting nations on the planet. Deal with those idiots who are overtly racist, and discriminatory of course but let's not pretend that we live in a systemically and irredeemebly racist, homophobic and evil society because that doesn't help anyone.

I think you'll just have to accept that some people object to the gesture, dislike it and some express their opposition to it by booing. I don't personally think booing actually makes anything better but I certainly support the right of those who've bought a ticket to boo and I wouldn't brand everyone who boos the gesture as racist for doing so. That's a bit like calling all Hungarian football fans racist because there were reportedly some racist monkey chants at yesterday's game.

No of course it won't. The sooner people accept the fact that abuse on twitter is a fact of life and that you just need to accept it if you want social media to exist the better. It's either that or you don't have social media because there isn't really an alternative. Of course anyone can discuss abuse of footballers on social media but let's not pretend that it's some sort of football problem rather than an issue for anyone on social media. Football does not have any more of a problem with racism on social media than anyone or anything else.

We have an issue with social media making it easy for anyone to send abuse to anyone else anonymously from anywhere in the world. It's not a football problen or a problem of racism. Every single day thousands and thousands of people receive all manner of vile abuse for any number of reasons. It's not confined to black people and its not confined to footballers. Some of the vile abuse that someone like Nigel Farage receives on a daily basis for example regardless of what you think of him as a person is completely unacceptable. Issues on social media should not be conflated with issues of real world racism and racist abuse in football stadia which is something very different.

If there was clear racist chanting then I support the players in them doing whatever they think is necessary including walking off. They shouldn't have to put up with that as part of the job description no matter what they get paid. The whole episode if true though does highlight the very real differences between football in parts of Eastern Europe and elsewhere and the UK though. You simply don't get this sort of thing in the UK anymore thankfully so for Southgate and some on here to suggest that any issues we have are in some way comparable is absurd.

Couldn't you make the same argument against keeping the knee going as those who want the booing to stop? Both are set up in opposition to one another and both sides would use the same logic for keeping it going.

I agree with that. It's not really a widespread issue in the English game though is it. The fact that Hungary have apparently shouted some racist abuse at English players just highlights how different this real racism is in comparison to the exaggerated stuff from twitter.

Not sure what you're saying here? If England fans were doing monkey chants at their players from the stands then I'd be encouraging strong punishment against them to. But we aren't so it's not really comparable is it.

I'd be interested to know what you mean by "the momentum has gathered pace." Those who have replied to my post all agreed that racist chanting in UK stadia was completely unacceptable prior to the taking of the knee so what momentum are you referencing? It's not like people heard racist chanting in the Premier league 4 years ago and it was just sort of waved through, it's been anathema for decades and life bans have been in place for that sort of thing for donkeys years. I don't think I've ever demanded that people stop taking the knee, in fact I support their right to do it if they want to. My question was if the belief is that stopping means the racists win, will it ever be acceptable to not take it?

Would be better for the conversation if you actually answered the question. You think taking the knee is a positive thing because it's increased condemnation of racist chanting. All I asked was if there were any available examples that illustrated that assertion? Because I really didn't see racist chanting being ignored prior to the knee unless we go back a few decades. I don't think there's any evidence that it's increased condemnation of racist chanting and a fair bit of evidence that it's actually been quite divisive.

If no one knows then why would someone claim that taking the knee has been a good thing because it has increased condemnation of racist chanting? Bit of a bizarre thing to state if it's unknowable?

Can you point to an example prior to taking the knee in recent years where racist chanting was ignored? And then the same sort of chanting being widely condemned after taking the knee where it wasn't before?

Sadly I would say things are much more racially divisive than they were a decade ago. Some surveys have shown a drop in lgbt acceptance from Western Liberal democracies in the last couple of years for the same sort of reasons. It's an unfortunate trend.

I find it strange that Southgate would try to conflate monkey chants from Hungarian fans - if that's what they were- with anonymous racist abuse of high profile players in England as if the two problems are in any way comporable. It's a totally false dichotomy to compare cretins on twitter with open racist abuse and chanting in stadia. It's odd that Southgate and others do this.