England players want stronger action from FA over racist abuse of Jess Carter

Independent

a day ago

If the Jess Carter story sounds dismally familiar, a further problem is how it affects everyone in different ways. There is a lot of deep emotion around the England camp, since so many could relate to a case of yet more racist abuse.
That is why the group came together, driven by some infuriated players, to tackle this head on. A core of the squad did not want to just write this off as more social media abuse you have to accept. They were adamant.
Even before you get to the bigger issue, Carter is a popular player, who they felt defensive of.
The 27-year-old first decided to discuss it publicly, and state she's taking a 'step back from social media'. The group meanwhile want more from football's authorities, including the Football Association. Lotte Wubben-Moy announced she 'will not continue to feed the very platforms that enable this abuse with no consequence'.
The next step, however, is to take a proper stand. Literally. The England squad will not take the knee before the semi-final against Italy, having done so before every game so far.
Lucy Bronze did the press conference just after the developments were announced, and laid out the squad's rationale in detail.
'I think it was just the fact that we feel as a collective, is the message as strong as it used to be? Is the message really hitting hard? Because to us it feels like it's not if these things are still happening to our players in the biggest tournaments of their lives.
'It's about putting another statement out there to say, you know, it's something that still is a problem, it's something that still needs to be put right.'
It only sums up the many layers to this. Some of the previous detractors of taking the knee will use it as proof that it never worked, and was all a pointless gesture in a culture war. That is nonsense. It is also far from the squad's point, of course, as Bronze herself argued.
'I think there has been change," the defender said. "I think more change needs to happen.'
It is obvious there is much more awareness of this, which has led to more action, certainly in stadiums. Even if some people are persuaded, or some people see a viewpoint they hadn't considered before, it has worked. It's just no longer enough.
'A problem,' as Bronze said, 'is that as the game grows and everything grows in football and in life, as much as there might be change, there becomes more outlets for the abuse or the racism as well. That's something that's hard to strike the balance with.
"People are more educated, there are more places to speak out, to have a platform, there are more changes happening, there are small changes, you see people being held accountable, whether that's online, in stadiums.
'You do see bans happening. It's just not enough. That's the point. Not enough is being done. There are small changes being made. If you look back 100 years to 50 years to 20 years to 10 years, there's always small steps forward.
'But that's the problem. It's always a small step. We don't want it to be small steps anymore. We want it to be: this is happening, there is change, and this is unacceptable.
'There are no more small steps, because we get to the point it's where it should be in the world, and especially in the world of football, footballers it feels like there can be a place where we can control abuse online, especially racism online, because everything's monitored online, so it just doesn't make sense to us.'
Such stridency is admirable, and is in-keeping with this team's legacy for social action, alongside their football success.
The very fact England are going so big, however, is also where it gets much more complicated.
Really, 'the knee' has become normalised in abnormal times.
The world has taken an authoritarian turn, where views recently considered totally unacceptable are now uttered all the time. There is even a disconcerting discussion to be had over how much the men's game has enabled this, given its propensity for toxic tribalism, and how it has been propelled around the planet hand in hand with social media.
Online, the circumstances are very different to when this issue first truly exploded with the men's Euro 2020 final in July 2021.
Elon Musk has bought Twitter/X, with multiple studies indicating that racist abuse and hate speech has risen on the platform. That has been linked to Donald Trump's re-election, which subsequently saw Mark Zuckerberg's Meta announce a series of moderation changes.
In other words, good luck getting the social media companies to do something meaningful. They have recently thrived off people feeling they can say whatever they want.
There's then the point that Bronze made herself, that the bigger the women's game gets, the more exposed they are to this critical mass of disparate views. Or, almost as bad, to some teenager who just poyts something vile simply because he can.
One of the individuals jailed for a post to Marcus Rashford after the Euro 2020 final was a 19-year-old whose solicitor said he was 'ashamed and embarrassed' but that living with a single-parent mother and only working two days a week left him 'with a lot of time on his hands'.
It's difficult to know what one football team can do in that kind of world, no matter how well-intentioned. There's a danger you just keep saying the same things. This very article falls into that trap.
Even if police make arrests, as Bronze and the squad implored, it's like whack-a-mole.
That's why figures such as Wubben-Moy are advocating for different approaches. Her own - final - social media post has certainly given everyone else something to think about.
Should the FA be following suit and coming off social media? To make a stand to go with the players? Such authorities can't do much about that wider context, but they can control how they engage with it.
It might be a dismally familiar story, but the squad now want different responses.