🚀 go-pugleaf

For Italy's 'ultras,' nothing black and white about football and 
racism

http://www.cnn.com/2013/02/21/sport/football/italian-football-
racism-milan/

(CNN) -- Hardcore Italian football "ultra" Federico is a Lazio 
supporter who happily admits directing monkey chants at black 
players.

It is "a means to distract opposition players" says Federico, a 
member of the Irriducibili ("The Unbeatables") group which 
follows the Rome-based team.

"I am against anyone who calls me a Nazi," Federico told 
academic Alberto Testa, who spent time "embedded" with Lazio and 
Roma ultras for the book "Football, Fascism and Fandom: The 
UltraS of Italian Football," co-authored by Gary Armstrong.

"What I do not like is people who come to my country and commit 
crimes; Albanians and Romanians are destroying Rome with their 
camps," Federico adds.

"But I'm not a racist. One day, I was waiting in my car at the 
traffic lights and, as usual, there was a young female gypsy who 
was trying to clean the car windscreen and was asking for money.

"Suddenly municipal police officers started to mistreat the 
girl. I jumped out of my car and almost kicked his arse. I hate 
injustice."

There is nothing black and white about Italian football.

Days after his return to Serie A, following his move from 
Manchester City to AC Milan, Italy-born Mario Balotelli was 
referred to by his new club's vice president Paulo Berlusconi -- 
the younger brother of the team's owner and the former Italian 
prime minister, Silvio Berlusconi -- as "the family's little 
black boy."

That remark came after, in what appeared to be an innocuous 
friendly match against fourth tier Italian side Pro Patria last 
month, Milan midfielder Kevin-Prince Boateng picked up the ball 
and kicked it into the stands before tearing off his black-and-
red striped shirt and walking off in protest at the persistent 
monkey chanting to which he and three of his black teammates had 
been subjected.

In the aftermath of Boateng's walkout, Italian interior minister 
Annamaria Cancellieri told Radio 24 that if only a small group 
of fans were involved in racist chanting, games should not be 
suspended, but if "a significant part of the fans take part" the 
game should be stopped "by those responsible for public order."

As Italy grapples with how best to confront racism, it is worth 
remembering it's not the only country working out a solution as 
to how to deal with the problem.

Neo-Nazis and neo-Fascists

This season, matches across Europe have been punctuated by 
repeated racist outbursts, which have led to calls for world 
governing body FIFA and European counterpart UEFA to show 
greater leadership and impose harsher sanctions.

Amid the monkey chants and racial stereotyping, there are no 
easy answers to the question of just how prevalent is the 
incidence of racist abuse in Italian football.

According to the Italian Football Federation (FIGC), there have 
been 50 incidents in Italy of racist abuse over the last six 
years. Of those 50 cases, 48 relate to racist chanting, with two 
relating to abusive banners.

"And the total of violent episodes diminished from 209 to 60 and 
the majority of them happened outside the football venues," FIGC 
spokesman Diego Antenozio told CNN.

"The introduction of stewarding has also reduced the need of 
intervention by police officers inside the venues significantly."

However, talk to the head of Italy's Observatory on Racism and 
Anti-racism in Football, Mauro Valeri, who has been monitoring 
racism in Italian football for over a decade, and a different 
picture emerges.

His organization estimates there have been over 660 racial 
incidents since 2000 and puts the number since 2007 at 282, 
nearly six times as much as the FIGC figure. In all, fines of $5 
million have been handed out as punishment in those 660-plus 
cases, equating to a fine of $7,500 per incident.

"The numbers I record relate to the decision that the judge 
takes in the sports court and lays down fines and any 
disqualifications. The FIGC figures concern the criminal law," 
said Valeri.

"So in the Boateng case the sports court ruled that Pro Patria 
had to play the game ... 'behind closed doors' and were fined 
$6,689.

"But the ordinary court -- the criminal law -- has instead 
decided that those songs were not racist. For me it's racism, 
for the Ministry of the Interior, no."

Valeri added: "In Italy, no club has a real anti-racist 
strategy, because it believes the fight against racism is not a 
priority.

Read: Blatter insists FIFA will hit racists hard

"Since the early 1990s, many curves of the stadium have been 
occupied by neo-Nazi and neo-Fascist groups, but this problem 
has been addressed only as a problem of public order."

That is a view that is supported by Italian football writer 
Charles Ducksbury, a fan of Verona, who added: "The ultra still, 
and always will hold all the power at clubs. They choose what is 
sung, what everyone does and how they do it.

"Stewards and police hardly ever enter the curve as they would 
most likely get beaten up. Ultras say if the authorities stay 
out the curve, there won't be any problems. Almost all trouble 
happens outside the ground anyway, so that's where police tend 
to hang around."

Time warp

While Boateng walked off, former Netherlands international Edgar 
Davids, who played for both AC Milan and Inter Milan as well as 
Juventus, said he felt it was important to show that racist 
abuse did not affect him as a player during the many years of 
his career he spent in Italy.

"You would have a problem in certain areas," Davids told CNN. 
"But you are a professional, you have an obligation to your 
team. My opinion was I'm a professional and the smartest way is 
to play so good that you make them even angrier.

"It is also about ignorance, a fear of the unknown. If you are 
interested in different cultures, it's normal.

"If you're not, you don't understand that concept. It is not 
only in Italy and it is not the whole of Italy. It was only 
certain teams you played, but 80-90% I didn't have a problem in 
Italy," added Davids, though Valeri's analysis suggests the 
problem is much more widespread.

Yadda yadda yadda.  Liberal whining and bullshit.

Remember during the course of all this, the niggers are calling 
each other nigger, but don't any of the rest of you call them 
nigger.  That's racist.

Tell you what Italy, we'll trade you our nigger problem for 
yours.  You take Obama, we'll take your nigger loving liberals 
who are crying racism.  We got plenty of building construction 
where they'll never be found.

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