When Will SoccerTackle Homophobia?

[Renew Deal]

Run time: 01:02 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1270cn0YxSo   Posted on YouTube: February 11, 2010 By YouTube Member: KickItOutOfficial Views on YouTube: 33426   Posted on DU: September 01, 2010 By DU Member: Renew Deal Views on DU: 165

 
IT’S absurd, but I cannot name a single gay footballer in any division in Britain. Statistically, it’s unlikely that not a single player of thousands is not gay. Realistically though, it can’t surprise us why not a single player has come out. Just imagine the reception they’d get, and consider how much, tacitly at least, it’s us who are to blame.

I went to a thoroughly middle-class school. The majority of the pupils were well-off and white, and I could count about thirty fights in the whole of my time there. I don’t mean thirty fights that I had, I mean thirty fights between the 900 pupils who were there at any one time. In short, it wasn’t exactly Scum. It wasn’t even Grange Hill. A reflection of modern society, I can remember very few cases of racism – in fact, I only vividly remember one case, and I still remember the name of the pupil, because I still consider him vermin.

However, the go-to insults were the usual suspects, ‘gay’, or ‘bent’. This was meant to be a decent school, and we weren’t exactly going through the thesaurus when it came to teasing. Racism was a no-no, homophobia was fair game. Luckily, all the school friends I still know have grown out of lazy prejudice. We’ve all realised that there’s little dignity in homophobia.

Now, in the last twenty years British football deserves credit to the efforts made to combat racism, the Kick It Out campaign especially. Today, there’s a few things to remember about the success of Kick It Out now we’re overdue doing the same for homophobia.
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A lot more at: http://www.whoateallthepies.tv/feature/41021/when-will-football-tackle-homophobia.html