My son was born in Spain and has lived here for all but 2 years of his life(he's 25).I asked him if he would use this language to a black mate."not to often" was his reply.Says it all really.
If what Evra said is true, what Suarez did is not so much use a racist term as say in plain language that he, Suarez, is racist. "Te pego porque eres negro" means "I hit you because you're black." "No hablo con negros" means "I don't talk to black people." No doubt he did it like a nasty kid, to wind Evra up, as people are saying, but to me, saying in plain language you're racist is about as bad as it gets if you're trying to discourage racism on the pitch. And then trying to spin a tale, badly, to get out of it, says even worse things about his character. The point he makes doesn't make what he said any more acceptable. And the combination of his admitting using the word "negro" and the touch on the head prove Evra's story is believable and his isn't. (The point Suarez was making, which to me doesn't excuse what he said at all, is that in Spanish and in many other cultures including some English-speaking ones, it's common to refer to someone by a salient characteristic. So someone might say to me, to get my attention, Alto! which means, Hey, tall guy! So someone else might say Negro! Hey black guy--though I think they wouldn't do this unless it were pretty urgent. I've even heard Bomba! Hey, pretty woman.) El informe reveló que Suárez llamó “negro” a Evra al menos de siete veces durante el encuentro y tras una dura entrada del atacante charrúa, Evra le preguntó por qué lo agredÃa, a lo que Suárez respondió: “Porque eres negro”. Ante esto, Evra se manifestó y le dijo que no se quedarÃa de brazos cruzados si seguÃa dándole patadas, pero Suárez hizo caso omiso al comentario y coronó su intervención con un “no hablo con negros”. El uruguayo, que también fue multado con 47.800 euros, trató de defenderse diciendo que el término “negro” no es racista en su paÃs, sin embargo no tuvo mucho éxito.
Given that 'Pool has admitted that Suarez has no defence to the charge that he racially abused Evra, will the FA now charge Queen Kenny and all the other Fascists who support him, in that little outburst? I truly hope so. We need to stamp out racism in football, not have it encouraged by an institutional display of fascistic loyalty.
"OK, so he made a racist comment - but we'll still say he's not a racist." Given they've been proven hopelessly wrong on the first point, it would've been wise to button it in case the second wrong comes up in future. Just a thought...
