As loads of people in the UK will know, Ron Atkinson “resigned” from his job with the ITV (and lost his column in the Guardian) after saying something he shouldn’t have after Chelsea’s Champion’s League match on Tuesday. Basically, the microphone was left on, though the broadcast had finished in the UK, and viewers in the Middle East heard him comment on the lack of performance of Chelsea’s Marcelle Desailly.
According to The Sun, he said something along the lines of “******* lazy big nigger”. Ron’s come out and said he’s sorry blah blah blah, not intended to offend blah blah blah just an upset fan who wanted to see the team do well. OK, to some extent he has a point, as Desailly (and Chelsea as a whole) had a howler, but…
What if he’d called Desailly a “******* lazy big ****”? Would the furor have been quite so extreme? Somehow I think not. Don’t get me wrong, I’m dead set against meaningless racism, which is quite difficult living in Bradford. The place suffers from a large contingent of Asians who seem intent on giving their people a bad reputation. Surely, though, Ron’s choice of words was wrong but his intent was to insult the guy and get some frustration out of his system?
This tails back to another of my personal niggles. Is “****” really worse than “crap”? Is “crap” worse than “poo”? They’re all words after all. Go back 10 years and “crap” would not be heard on TV. Now I even hear “****” on daytime radio – a much more tightly-controlled medium in the UK.
I love the politicians who are just crying “Think of the children! What about the children?” Have any of them walked past a playground in the last 5-6 years? ****, even *my* ears start to burn. I even heard one whinging vote-grabber going on about the last “verbotten” word left being “****”. Her worry, get this, was that if we run out of swear-words, people will no longer be able to take their frustration out verbally and what will they do then?
So there you go. The rise in civil violence is down to TV and radio being more free with swearing. Social anarchy is all XFM’s fault. But not Big Ron as he apologised for it and made swearing seem bad again. Good lad, Ron. Saving the world again.
All I ask is that if we play like crap tonight, one of the commentators of a darker skin colour calls Laurent Robert a “useless, lazy honky”.
But it’s never about the world itself, more the context in the society it’s used in. If Ron Atkinson was a black gangsta rappa in Harlem, then he’d probably have gotten away with using that term. But he isn’t, so he didn’t.
And to be fair to the guy, he departed gracefully and didn’t try to justify it at all.
And of course, being CHinese, the only overt racial abuse I’ve had in the last 10 years has been from Asian kids in Bradford and black kids in Cardiff. The only connection? Both in inner-city deprived areas. It’s about the lack of power/money, not race per se.
I acknowledge your point.
It’s just like that program ‘The Koumars at No. 42’ or whatever it’s called.
If myself you and Lydia dressed up like that and acted stereotypically we’d be up in front of a judge before we could say ‘but it’s just a bit of fun’
Double standards everywhere.
I just think it’s a bit poor if a black guy can call another black guy “nigger” and that’s fine. But if a white guy calls a black guy “nigger” he’s vilified. Same word.
Go back some years and calling a gay person a “pouf” and you likewise be called sexist or whatever. Nowadays virtually every gay guy I know will quite happily refer to himself as a “pouf” and let me do it as well. It’s just a word.
Out of interest, if Big Ron had said “lazy, lumbering person of African descent” would that have been as bad? Or referred to him a a “lazy French git”?
I’m hearing a lot of people jump to his defence, however you just don’t use words like that nowerdays. BUT to just come out with it, the word has to be floating araound your head.
People who have worked with him are saying he is not racist. Well perhaps not openly but to make a comparison; I’m sure there are pleanty of happily married men out there who are gay. Perhaps he just keeps his racism in a closet.
I started this off playing devils advocate, but the more I think about it (like I said earlier), you won’t say words like that (even by accident) if they are not already floating round your head.
Food for thought
C
The choice of the number 42, there, a deliberate reference to Douglas Adams. By the way. No, seriously. Sanjeev Bhaskar is a huge fan and championed Hitchiker’s Guide on the Big Read series.
One complete change of subject later…