Thread by @PeteOlusoga

There may well have been outside influence in the barrage of racist tweets aimed at England players.

But to focus on that is to minimise the very real racism of very real people that has a very real impact.

This man is a youth football coach. metro.co.uk/2021/07/13/chi…

Of course, he claims his account was hacked. Which, let's be fair, is a possibility.

And Ron didn't watch no dutty movies either.

But the point is that hacked or not, it takes our attention away from what's happening in front if our eyes...

https://twitter.com/Nadine_Writes/status/1415005120547409926?s=19

It means we're not talking about the fact that on Sunday, a bunch of England 'fans' were tearing up the capital, lobbing trees about - yes trees -, and kicking the shit out of each other.

It means we're able to conveniently distance ourselves from the coked-up radgies who literally stormed Wembley stadium...

And if you think that the violence and aggression we all saw in the same space as vehement nationalism is somehow unrelated to the subsequent outpouring of racism at the Black players, then you're really need to look at that a bit closer.

But here's the thing... I KNOW, I KNOW, I KNOW that it's a minority of 'fans'.

I'm not an idiot.

But how is that helpful? A racist, violent minority is still racist and violent.

Yes, we should of course highlight the many wonderful people out there, offering messages of support, covering up racist graffiti, and not sending racist tweets after drinking all of the Carling.

But constantly highlighting that it's a minority or that there's some hacking going on just means that we have plausible deniability.

And that means we don't have to do anything.

So I don't want to hear "it's only a few racist idiots" or any of that crap.

Because that's still a lot of racist idiots.

And those racist idiots are still coaching our kids, treating our wounds, teaching in our schools, serving us our food... and running the country.