Racism

I remember once reading that a good writer should never write under the influence of rage; I remember it being disclosed as a golden rule as all neutrality fly’s out the window. Well in my opinion there is only one side of the fence in this argument so neutrality isn’t an issue. The subject I speak of is racism. Recently in the world of football there have been a few incidents. Suarez, Terry, Blatter and then there have been many on Twitter, anonymous death threats from cowardly people hiding behind the shroud of invincibility the internet seems to provide. This blog will not be directly about sport, yet it will, society and sport are intrinsically linked and in the current climate I suddenly realise now how blind I have been to the argument whether racism exists, ladies and gentleman it does, and it still goes strong.

Tonight I went out with two of my closest friends; one of them is of Indian heritage. We were having a thoroughly enjoyable night before an incident occurred which has left me incapable of sleep. We were messing around and I was spinning my friend on my shoulders for a laugh, when a group of lads began to hurl abuse at us. I am all for walking away in the face of issues like this yet I felt aggrieved that our care-free attitudes had somehow offended these repressed, ignorant Neanderthals. The smallest of this group then proceeded to ‘start’ on my friend Bobby. He, after many personal insults, including such ones as ‘I spat on your Nan’s grave’ was asked by my friend to punch him. He declined, and, in his cowardly manner, decided instead to slur him and call him a ‘Paki cunt’. I won’t apologise for the lack of censorship because this stuff is real, and sweeping it under the rug is not going to help anyone.

 During this altercation the urge to fight was difficult to suppress. In all honestly I wanted to inflict pain on these lads, although the term lad infers they are human, to the point they cried. Unfortunately we were outnumbered and the old cliché ‘this isn’t worth it’ kept coming to mind. I suppose it wasn’t worth it. What are the two final scenarios that could have arose from this incident. We end up in a police cell or a hospital bed. Neither phone call to my parents appeals to me much. I kept telling myself we are above them. They are so ignorant and backward that a slur about physical characteristics is all they had in verbal combat. They wanted a rise and knew how to get it; I like to think by not swinging at them Bobby has won this fight in some way. However it just sums up life in this silver lined cloudy age we live in.

These three men have now got away with this, and they will probably never receive their comeuppance. I don’t wish violent retribution on anyone; in fact taking to the keyboard is my way of venting anger other then drinking whiskey to paralysis and punching holes in my wall. I hope they one day achieve redemption and become decent living men of the world or that the same ignorance that drove them to such cowardly and sickening defence mechanisms paralyses them mentally and emotionally and they live a life full of personal torture. I only wish this on them if they do not want redemption, if they are happy to be racists. Because that is what they are, racists, of the sickest kind. My friend showed tremendous courage, humanity and bravery to walk away from this altercation a bigger person and a stronger person.

The acts of a few cowardly humans should not detract from the way we live our lives and I will never think twice about being who I am, being friends with who I like and acting the way I do because our happiness may offend the sad, little, cretinous people of the world so blindly affected by their own self loathing they have to take it out on us. They did not know any of us; the lives we had lead, the things we have seen, done, achieved, lost and had no intention of finding that out they simply had one motive. They wanted a fight, and I like to think they got one. Perhaps not roundhouses, jabs and headlocks but a battle of minds, one in which our strength of personality, desire to achieve something with our lives, and, at least in my case, the pity for these poor young men’s futures with the attitude and hatred they currently carried with them. I just hope justice prevails and we all get the success we deserve and these awful people have to in some way redeem themselves. I am not saying I am a saint. Absolutely not, I have done things that are wrong, but my morality has never let me get away with these things. I feel guilt like scar tissue on my mind that will never fade what upsets me, is that people like the ones we encountered tonight don’t, yet seem to get away with it. I just hope, even if we never find out, our decision tonight is vindicated and we can look back on tonight and realise it could have all ended so differently.

A little break from sport but sometimes things are more important, next blog though will be all about sport. Start to finish, stay hooked.

Peace out

Mathew