Raciist abuse still alive and well
Some “fans” seen to think money is an important reason to turn their backs on the game at the highest level. But there are far more important issues for concern, mainly bigotry is still unfortunately alive and well at all levels.
To be fair there has been a massive change in attitudes since I first started watching football, and for a while football was probably ahead of society in general, in facing up to racism issues. I think the UK had done better than many other countries in facing these issues, but there is obviously still a deep rooted issue, for sexism and homophobia the football authorities have barely scratched the surface.
I think the problem now is that a teams own players and fans don’t call out the racists in their midst. For the players, they may fear being isolated by the team and manger, especially if it involves an important player, they may even fear losing an important player to challenge for silver ware or survival. For fans it is often just group psychology, they may be involved in behaviour that they wouldn’t normally dream of, or at least feel they shouldn’t speak out for some misguided group loyalty.
I don’t know what the solution is, and I accept it is difficult for the authorities to deal with, they have the rules to prevent it, but often rules aren’t enough, there has to be a much stronger acceptance of the problem, and a will to deal with it.