Racist supporter

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fleabane
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Racist supporter

Post by fleabane »

From Wednesdays Guardian

Leicester's Nemani Nadolo accuses fan of 'casual racism' over post

Supporter requested signings ‘with names we can pronounce’

Kini Murumurivalu among new players revealed on Monday

The Leicester wing Nemani Nadolo has accused a supporter of casual racism following a comment on social media in which the fan suggested the club sign “players with names we can pronounce”.

On Monday Leicester announced five new signings including Nadolo’s fellow Fijian Kini Murimurivalu. A Facebook user responded to the arrivals by commenting: “Great signings but please can we have some players with names we can pronounce lol.”’

Australian rugby faces further fracture as New Zealand plan prompts fight for survival
Nadolo, who arrived at Leicester as a signing from Montpellier this month, having won 30 caps for Fiji, made his opinion clear on social media. On Instagram he wrote: “I don’t stand for this I’m calling it out for what it is … casual racism. It’s just a shame it’s from a supporter of my club! Our name isn’t good enough??”

Earlier on Twitter, alongside a screenshot of the supporter’s post, he wrote: “A comment made on the signing of my mate Kini Murimurivalu by one of the supporters.. sorry but I don’t stand for this s**t … I’ll let head office know tomorrow to change my name to Bob to make it easier for some!.. oh yeah I bet it was joke too.”

Leicester, who reported to police in April 2019 “vile and disgusting” abuse of some of their players on social media, issued a swift statement in response: “Rugby prides itself on being an inclusive game for all and as a club we do not condone any form of discrimination. The club has a proud record of combining local players with signings from other parts of the world and we are certain that the Tigers Family will, as always, warmly welcome all of the new signings to the city and county, as we saw with the overwhelming majority of comments this week.”

I expect the club to ban any follower who spouts racist nonsense.
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trendylfj
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Re: Racist supporter

Post by trendylfj »

The quicker the better - my one gripe is with the headline in several posts and newspapers which states "supporters" not !supporter" - it was one idiot saying things he shouldn't
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jgriffin
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Re: Racist supporter

Post by jgriffin »

On FB it was clear that some had issue with Simon Cohen because of His name, a point I made on here a year or so ago as well as on there. It is worth remembering that this surfaced briefly over the Manu visa business too. :smt013
Importantly, also worth saying that Tigers supporters in general have embraced all nationalities as fans favourites.
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Crofty
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Re: Racist supporter

Post by Crofty »

Not defending the fan, purely attacking the Grauniad; spectacularly ironic that it would appear they misspelled the name in questionn in the third sentence of the article reporting on a fan being called out because she made a racist joke about not being able to pronounce it.
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Re: Racist supporter

Post by ads »

I think people genuinely believe they are joking with these sort of comments, but don't realise its the casual nature of them that makes the whole situation worse. If this is acceptable as a joke, are 80's comedian jokes acceptable, then is certain name calling acceptable and then where does it stop......

People just don't think before posting on social media, well done for Nems for calling them out. If the club see fit to ban them or make an example of them, I'll support that.
JP14
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Re: Racist supporter

Post by JP14 »

It’s not funny, it’s lazy and ignorant. Believe me this isn’t an isolated incident, hope the club deal with this and any future occurances appropriately.

Also Murimurivalu isn’t difficult to pronounce anyway :smt013.
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Mark62
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Re: Racist supporter

Post by Mark62 »

What is this Casual Racism, that has suddenly appeared, God Help Us All.

Storm in a tea cup, woman made what she thought was a funny comment on Facebook, honestly don’t think she meant anything by it.
Nadolo took offence, I can sort of understand why, he didn’t think it was funny, let’s face It the British can have a weird sense of humour.
Since then he has accepted apology and said move on he doesn’t hold grudges,

What hasn’t been mentioned is the tweet from Matt Tomua basically saying that Tigers have the best fans in the world, which Nadolo acknowledged
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Re: Racist supporter

Post by JP14 »

Nadolo wasn’t launching an attack on the entire fanbase, just those minority and I fully support him for it.
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sam16111986
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Re: Racist supporter

Post by sam16111986 »

Every village has it's idiot and unfortunately all the villages now have internet access. Good on Nemani for calling them out.
TigerFeetSteve
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Re: Racist supporter

Post by TigerFeetSteve »

To my mind this person crossed a quite clear line

I myself am dyslexic and have trouble spelling, I try and take extra care with names (but I'm sure plenty of mistakes slip through)

A few people were joking on there how commentators may struggle with some of the names, to my mind that is a joke (if I'm wrong I'll happily be corrected).

This poster however much they tried to make it a joking tone, clearly stated that a player's name should be considered when signing a player.

A joking tone does not fix the statement, can you imagine the uproar if someone stated "can we sign some players who's skin tone doesn't clash with the away shirt lol" It's unacceptable simple as, the lol does not make it better, it makes it worse it disguises the sentiment in a joke and tries to make it seem acceptable

It may be ignorance, (there's been a lot stated on the Exeter Chiefs thread about how some of their stuff can be racist through ignorance) I actually hope it is ignorance and I hope that the person involved actually learns from it. Either way it was a racist statement and Nadalo was right to raise it, it has raised awareness and that is a good thing.
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Mark62
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Re: Racist supporter

Post by Mark62 »

Can I just ask the question that if this same person had made the same comment about Mamukashvili would this debate be taking place.
Because I’m willing to state here and now that we wouldn’t.

Marcus Ayerza played for the club for many seasons without people pronouncing his name properly.
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Re: Racist supporter

Post by TigerFeetSteve »

Mark62 wrote: Wed Jul 22, 2020 9:05 am Can I just ask the question that if this same person had made the same comment about Mamukashvili would this debate be taking place.
Because I’m willing to state here and now that we wouldn’t.

Marcus Ayerza played for the club for many seasons without people pronouncing his name properly.
To my mind it's not about pronouncing names correctly or incorrectly. If a person mis-pronounces my name I'm not bothered I'd just correct them.

If someone says that my job should hire people with more pronouncable names as the struggle with mine I would say that's discrimination.
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AngusMcCoatup
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Re: Racist supporter

Post by AngusMcCoatup »

This is not the good news that we want given the efforts of the new Management teams.
It looks as if the "Direct line" to the Daily Mail was not stopped with the leavers! :smt013
ttps://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/rugbyunion/ar ... -post.html
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Flash
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Re: Racist supporter

Post by Flash »

Mark62 wrote: Wed Jul 22, 2020 9:05 am Can I just ask the question that if this same person had made the same comment about Mamukashvili would this debate be taking place.
Because I’m willing to state here and now that we wouldn’t.

Marcus Ayerza played for the club for many seasons without people pronouncing his name properly.
Depends if the new star signing picked it up and correctly called out the casual racism. Just because thing have been acceptable/tolerated in the past doesn't mean it should still be acceptable.

I don't think the fan is necessarily racist but it does highlight the systemic, ingrained racism that is present in society and it needs people like Nadolo to highlight this to create the change needed.
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Re: Racist supporter

Post by Flash »

AngusMcCoatup wrote: Wed Jul 22, 2020 9:12 am This is not the good news that we want given the efforts of the new Management teams.
It looks as if the "Direct line" to the Daily Mail was not stopped with the leavers! :smt013
ttps://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/rugbyunion/ar ... -post.html
It's been widely reported from Nadolo's tweet so not a direct line in this case. Although I'm sure their comment section will make for depressing reading.
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