I have just visited the Leeds board for their view on the Rafik business. It is off the radar what they think, especially on their political page. By comparison our Conservative leaning members on here are raving commies!!!!!
I was open minded about it all but felt something was not quite right. He went back for a second spell and invited some of the accused to his wedding. Was he genuinely upset by it all or was he joining in with “some” of it as banter?
In the case of Vaughn I read somewhere he used the term “you lot”. Is this racist or insensitive? Take it another way, if it was three Australian test team members and you used the term “you lot” is that racist?
Then last week he was guilty of posting his own racist remarks and inappropriate behaviour on a plane with a 16 year old.
My issue is you know he won’t be tarnished with the same racism brush as those he has accused. His crimes are not lesser than those he is making accusations against. Yes if the accused are guilty deal with them but deal with Rafik in the same manner.
The issue with racism has a few varied problems. We have a huge proportion of 50-60 something year olds who grew up accepting Jim Davidson, Love Thy Neighbour, Until Death Do Us Part and Freddie Starr were all very funny. Times are changing and the older you get the harder it is to accept change. Paddy and Jock are these racist terms? Within the next 20 years they’ll probably be frowned upon as much as P and N are now. I only discovered last week that the word Eskimo is actually considered racist.
Rappers and music artists are releasing records with degrading comments to women, using words like bitch and the “N” word so kids are growing up thinking it’s acceptable behaviour.
The approach to racism is wrong, we need to teach why it is wrong. Issuing fines or bans from stadiums as a punishment breeds more anger and resentment, it fuels more racism, it isn’t a cure.
Companies like Sky and BBC are going through box ticking exercises, best person for the job is fine but we all know they’re scampering for more women and dark skinned presenters. It angers a huge percentage as does the taking the knee before games. This wasn’t thought through either.
It divides opinion which defeats the object, many feel BLM is too close to American extremist, Sky adopted and pioneered for this ignoring the UKs very own “Kick It Out” as it was probably on trend for them.
I don’t wish to argue about BLM or taking the knee, just pointing out it was a gesture that didn’t have everyone on board, it created more divide.