Luis Suárez

[dom9]

Carlisle puts Taylor to shame with his response. No shirking, no shifting, no squirming, no arrogance, no shifting the blame onto anybody else but his own organisation. The polar opposite of that parasite Taylor.

Whether you get / agree with the comedy is a personal thing, but Carlisle hs articulated his position brilliantly imo.

[dom9]

Isn't the crux of the matter that Carlisle and co. probably thought it's okay for a black man to use the 'N' word and it isn't racist.

Personally, I think Gordon Taylor's comments are ridiculous. Why doesn't he just come out and blame Suarez. He'll be ringing Talksport later

The opposite, no?

They had no idea what they were getting, apart from seeing him on the occasional panel show.

[Sarb]

The opposite, no?

They had no idea what they were getting, apart from seeing him on the occasional panel show.

I think they must have known the jokes he tells surely. If you're going to book a comedian then you must have to know something about them and the types of stand-up they do??

Taylor's response just smacks of arrogance. He is much like the FA. Only takes a stand against racism when it suits him. I'm not saying that this was racist but the use of the word is plain inappropriate, especially at an event like that and at this moment in time too

[dom9]

I think they must have known the jokes he tells surely. If you're going to book a comedian then you must have to know something about them and the types of stand-up they do??

Taylor's response just smacks of arrogance. He is much like the FA. Only takes a stand against racism when it suits him. I'm not saying that this was racist but the use of the word is plain inappropriate, especially at an event like that and at this moment in time too

Somebody knew (the booking agency), but the top brass didn't. Why would they? It's not their job. This is all outsourced to booking agencies generally.

See Carlisle's quote here:

'My experience of him is on the satirical shows where he is probably milder than he is down the comedy club....

Then the article goes on...

But Carlisle admitted that Hunter's appointment was a mistake, saying the players' union should have done proper research before booking an act.

Completely agree about Taylor though.

[Tee]

Carlisle is doing a decent job of getting out of this, but that old cunt Taylor is being shown right up. He cannot and should not survive this.

[Sarb]

Somebody knew (the booking agency), but the top brass didn't. Why would they? It's not their job. This is all outsourced to booking agencies generally.

See Carlisle's quote here:



Then the article goes on...



Completely agree about Taylor though.

Yep, they should have done their research for sure. You couldn't really make this up to be honest. I'm surprised Taylor hasn't been ousted yet. Not just over this, but he just does a piss poor job representing his members I believe

[dom9]

Carlisle is doing a decent job of getting out of this, but that old cunt Taylor is being shown right up. He cannot and should not survive this.

Yep, they should have done their research for sure. You couldn't really make this up to be honest. I'm surprised Taylor hasn't been ousted yet. Not just over this, but he just does a piss poor job representing his members I believe

Let's hope this is the beginning of the end for the odious hypocritical parasite.

[Shaggy]

http://blogs.thetimes.co.uk/section/the-game/101952/wrong-to-expect-pfa-to-determine-rules-of-race-relations/?shareToken=caca749501f3fd1a0f24132de7d89da9

Wrong to expect PFA to determine rules of race relations

Rory Smith
April 29 2013 12:04PMald

It is not yet 18 months since Gordon Taylor, chief executive of the Professional Footballers’ Association, was abundantly clear on this issue. “It is never right,” he pronounced, “to make reference to a person’s skin colour or nationality.”

At some point in the last couple of months, someone, somewhere in Taylor’s organisation deemed it appropriate to book the comedian Reginald D Hunter for the body’s annual Player of the Year shebang, held in the lavish halls of London’s Grosvenor House Hotel.

A cursory journey down what was once known as the information superhighway would have told them that Hunter is not averse to using what might be termed racial language. Hunter and the N-word are not strangers, put it that way. It has to be assumed that the PFA knew exactly what it was getting. Otherwise, it would have to be characterised as a gaggle of out-of-touch buffoons, and that seems distinctly unlikely.

That is the context to the accusations of hypocrisy and double-standards which followed Hunter’s set at the PFA Awards last night. In the aftermath of the Luis Suarez affair, Taylor had followed the lead set by David Bernstein, the chairman of the Football Association, and decreed that terms of racial abuse are unacceptable – to quote Bernstein – “regardless of context”.

That, it had been presumed, was now de facto FA – and PFA – policy. That, after all, is why Paul Elliott, who has worked tirelessly to combat discrimination in football, was sacked after it emerged he had used the N-word in a private text to Richard Rufus, the former Charlton defender. This had become a zero-tolerance issue. And then the PFA goes and books Hunter, and Taylor defends his act with the words: “Well, he’s a comedian.”

This would appear to contradict its cant. This would appear to suggest that there are contexts in which making “reference to a person’s skin colour” is, if not right, then certainly acceptable.

This has aggravated a number of people: those who find the lack of logic and consistency in many of the FA’s decisions infuriating and, probably in greater numbers, Liverpool supporters, annoyed by what they perceive to be a morality conceived on the fly, by a dogma that applies differently, depending on what the PFA – and by incorrect extension, the FA – wants to achieve, and that seems to be at its strictest when Suarez is involved.

There is some merit to this argument. It is hard to see why the PFA, in the current climate, chose to take the risk, unless it was simply hoping that hiring a black comedian would show that an organisation that was still turning women away on the door as recently as 1998 is more forward-thinking than many would suggest it is.

Likewise, it is easy to understand why the comedian’s act would have offended those who fervently believe that the PFA should not have booked Hunter precisely because Taylor was right in his assertion after the Suarez case, who feel that the idea that a pejorative term can be reclaimed is misguided, who call a slur a slur, regardless of who uses it.

At this point, it should be noted that the vast majority of those who have decried the PFA’s hypocrisy, who have denounced Hunter as inappropriate, who have suggested that he used “racist slurs” in his act, were not present at Grosvenor House. This is outrage by proxy, that most modern phenomenon, best illustrated by the incident with the actor Andrew Sachs which brought Russell Brand and Jonathan Ross such opprobrium.

It should also be noted that a large proportion – most likely a majority – of those expressing their disapproval at Hunter, at Taylor, at the PFA’s decision, are white, or at least not black. That is not to suggest that the views of these groups do not matter, but it is relevant.
Why? Well, because it is a matter of personal morality whether you believe Taylor and Bernstein were wrong to declare that using terms of racist abuse is wrong, no matter what the context. Most people would suggest that non-black people should not use the N-word, because that word is necessarily loaded, because it is pejorative, because it is offensive.

But whether black people should be allowed to use it is a more complicated matter. Some black people – including, it would seem, Clarke Carlisle, the PFA chairman – are of the view that it is a hate term, and it cannot escape its poisonous history. Others, particularly in the United States, where Hunter hails from, have attempted, as aforementioned, to reclaim it. In some parts of black culture, it is used relatively freely.

It is way beyond my pay-grade – as a white football journalist – to even attempt to express an opinion on which of those views is right. I am not qualified. But nor, more relevantly, is it for the FA, or the PFA, or any football body. It is a long-running, highly charged debate among the black community. Whether non members of a minority can adopt the language of that minority is dependent on context and is very much an individual choice. That is a debate that cannot be settled in a pithy paragraph. But what we can all agree on is that the FA is not the (now defunct) Commission for Racial Equality. It is not a moral body, and it is certainly not an arbiter of what is and is not acceptable in wider society. This should be a great relief to everyone.

So, too, should the fact that the PFA booked Hunter. Yes, of course, it is the right of any guest to find his performance distasteful. That is a personal matter, too. But – without being too curt or frivolous about it – at least it was a black comedian being controversial this time.

I have never been to a PFA do, but I have been to enough football industry events to know that the usual “comic” fare comes from a sort of budget Bernard Manning; skin-colour racism has never featured, to the best of my memory, but anti-Semitism certainly has, and sexism is almost a staple. That is no more acceptable. They are largely good fun, such events, but the awkward silence in the room as the dinosaur comedian does his turn is cringe-inducingly uneasy.

What this farrago does highlight, though, is the need for football to remain inside its boundaries. The death of Mrs Thatcher three weeks ago highlighted this perverse belief that no event has truly happened until football has acknowledged it, this perception that football has to speak for the country. That is not its job. Far from it.

Just as it would have been wrong to force football to mourn for a political – and hence politicised – figure, it is wrong to expect football to determine the rules of race relations, or deem what words are or are not acceptable. Bernstein and Taylor were too sweeping in their statements after the Suarez affair. It is not for them to decide what any of us can say, but it is particularly not for them – or any white person – to tell black people what phrases they are or are not allowed to use. That is a personal matter.

But it is also unfair to accuse them of hypocrisy in light of the Hunter incident. They made a mistake in assuming greater authority than they have. But it is pig-headed to stick to that error simply for the sake of pride. Maybe booking Hunter should not be taken as a calamitous gaffe, or proof of their anti-Suarez agenda. Maybe it is showing that they accept that theirs is not an all-consuming power. Maybe it is accepting that their authority stops at the final whistle. It does not extend into our lives.

[Arn]

The FA don't really know what racism is. They live in their own fantasy world and not in the real world.

In the real world Suarez isn't even close to be a racist but in the fantasy FA world he is.

They make racism decisions not knowing what it really is.

Every racism case should go straight to court. If they are guilty then they should also get a massive ban.

FA shouldn't decide on their own a single case that they aren't qualified to make decisions on.

Football decisions yes. Anything else, no.

[McDermotX]

Carlisle is doing a decent job of getting out of this, but that old cunt Taylor is being shown right up. He cannot and should not survive this.

He is, but ultimately both are culpable to how the PFA and its events are run, so shirking of responsibility will only go so far.
Ultimately, nowt will come of this I suspect, although it would be lovely to see this issue simmer along, and maybe, just maybe, cause long-overdue harm to the PFA.
Just hope Carlisle got a cab home last night.

[BrooklynRed]

I love how this guy is an "American-born comedian"-- that explains it. Hilarious that the PFA get to walk through the minefield of false outrage now, one they themselves sanctimoniously helped build. **** off.

[Sarb]

Rory Smith waffles. His last paragraph I don't really agree with to be honest. If Bernstein and Taylor are going to judge the likes of Suarez, who owned up to what he said and said it was widely accepted in his culture, but Bernstein and Taylor still hung him out to dry, they aren't allowed to make a mistake on this issue imo.

And Elliot was sacked for using it in a private text message. Someone at the PFA should get fired for it in my view. I'd prefer it to be Gordon Taylor

[Sarb]

I love how this guy is an "American-born comedian"-- that explains it. Hilarious that the PFA get to walk through the minefield of false outrage now, one they themselves sanctimoniously helped build. **** off.

[Arn]

Maybe it is showing that they accept that theirs is not an all-consuming power. Maybe it is accepting that their authority stops at the final whistle. It does not extend into our lives.

Yeah, right

[Tee]

I love how this guy is an "American-born comedian"-- that explains it. Hilarious that the PFA get to walk through the minefield of false outrage now, one they themselves sanctimoniously helped build. **** off.

They will probably put it down to cultural contexts....oh hang on....