Dark-skinned players of Eintracht Frankfurt will be offended in Cyprus is racist, the brothers Kevin-Prince and Jérôme Boateng complain of continued discrimination, even in Germany. What is going on in the stadiums?
Fans show flag: The great majority rejects racism
“I was irritated about the fascist character and expressions,” said Axel Hellmann, member of the Board of Eintracht Frankfurt, according to the 3:2 success of the Bundesliga side on Thursday evening in the Europa League game at Apollon Limassol. Followers of clubs from Cyprus have shown in the gallery in Nicosia, the Hitler greeting, and dark-skinned players accompanied with noisy Monkeys.
Racism in many stadiums in Eastern Europe
For Robert Claus, author and expert on right-wing extremism in football to come out of such incidents is not surprising. “There is in all European countries, the Hooligan scenes, which tend mostly to be very far to the right. Since such excesses are on the agenda. The political shift to the right has given the right Hooligan groups in the past few years in the ascendant.”
But there are regional differences. “Countries, where it has been for many years problems with racism in the stadiums, Italy with the best-known example of Lazio Rome and the States of Eastern Europe such as Poland, Slovakia or Russia, where these excesses are really widely used,” says Michael Gabriel, head of the coordination centre for Fan-projects in Frankfurt. “For League games in Germany, such a scene would be like now in Cyprus as a surprise, because here very much to the Positive has developed.”
Radical right-wing Hooligans, in a Cup game in Russia
“Hegemony of the Right in the stadium is broken”
It was a long process. “In the 1980s and 90s, racism was in the stadium really audible and visible. It was in the scene, en vogue. I, however, was clearly in the minority,” says Gabriel. “This hegemony of the Right has been broken. Today, it is the other way around. Anyone who expresses themselves in the stadium racist or right-wing, contrary to the consensus in the curve. Of course, we are also seeing a shift to the right in the company, and, accordingly, are to be found today in the stadium visitors with a right and racist view of the world. But the threshold for these people to Express themselves in the stadium, has become considerably higher.”
Monkey sounds against Jerome Boateng
Jérôme Boateng: “I hear I often, as spectators, monkey sounds from the stands roar”
And yet national player Jérôme Boateng points currently to the fact that the Problem exists also in German stadiums. “If I’m on the edge of the area warm, I hear more often, as spectators, monkey sounds from the stands roar, even though I played for Germany so many games,” said Boateng in a double-interview with the singer Herbert Grönemeyer in Boateng were private magazine “Boa”. In Germany, the 2014 world Cup title without migrant children would have been possible, how Boateng stressed, there is again more pronounced to Think in drawers: “One for the Germans, one for the migrants. And the Germans, whose parents may have foreign roots and are not white, but a totally English feel because they grew up here, to be looked at again more sceptical.”
Also right-wing extremism expert Robert Claus sees a social phenomenon. He advises not to see, in this connection, only on the fan curve. “The Problem is too focused on the Ultra-scene,” says Claus. “The worse Statements I’ve seen in the stadium, came from the main grandstand. This is neglected in the debate. Many ultra groups have in the last 20 years a strong process of self-purification behind, especially with regard to racist Comments. The main grandstands.”
Clubs have a duty
Michael, Gabriel also sees the clubs in the duty, when players like Boateng to be racially offended. “It saddens me, if Boateng experienced something like this. It is absolutely necessary that in the specific case of FC Bayern reacts immediately when he learns of this, and it is not easy to accept.” In the 1990s, the club had been represented in racist incidents in the stadiums still often of the view that it was nothing and they were only responsible for Sport. “You saw more in the victim role instead of taking responsibility. This has also changed significantly.”
Workshops for civil courage
“Some clubs such as FC St. Pauli Anti-racism have long been in their DNA. There, the fan base has been active for 30 years and consistently against racism, and also has a say in the club. Others took longer,” says Robert Claus. “Borussia Dortmund has started the beginning of the 2010s, to work consistently on the subject. There are now Workshops for Fans on the subject of moral courage, to give you, as you are in the stadium against racism may intervene.”
Initiatives against discrimination have helped to create a different climate
But at the Clubs there is still much air upward. “German football has become in terms of right-wing extremism in the last few years, more sensitive,” says Claus. “The extent to which the PR or marketing strategies is owed, or really the house is internally lived, is another question. To Werder Bremen in the approaches, not a single team in the Bundesliga diversity or anti-discrimination has been enshrined explicitly in its personnel policy.”
The fight against pyrotechnics more important than anti-racism?
Both Fan-expert Kevin-Prince Boateng. The half-brother of Jerome Boateng in the last season Cup winners ‘ Cup with Eintracht Frankfurt, now at the Italian club US Sassuolo Calcio under contract – lamenting the lack of progress in the fight against discrimination: “It seems to me as if we are fighting more against pyrotechnics as against racism.” Robert Claus points to the most recent rigorous approach of the security forces in Dortmund against the Ignition of pyrotechnics and riots in the Hertha-guest: “A similar surefire Intervention by the police against racist or extreme right-wing Call in the stadium I never seen before. In this respect, Kevin-Prince Boateng were is the statement something to it.”
Kevin-Prince Boateng (R.) complained for years of racism in stadiums
The same opinion is also Michael Gabriel. “In all the efforts to ban pyrotechnics from the stadiums, is overlooked, that we have in the Share of young hooligan scene increasingly right-wing tendencies. There is an international networking and professionalization in the hooliganism. The shows not so much in the stadium, but outside, such as most recently in Chemnitz”, says the head of the coordination centre for Fan-projects. “This is a worrying development. I don’t think it is necessary that the police and all the security organs to look only more accurate but also more consistent.”