England Football Association in union with the country’s six leagues have sent a joint open letter to Facebook and Twitter in an attempt to force action on racism using social media platforms.
The FA alongside Premier League, EFL, Women Super League and Women’s Championship clubs, Professional Football Association, League Managers Association, PGMOL and Kick It Out have addressed the personal open letter to Twitter and Facebook respective owners, Jack Dorsey and Mark Zuckerberg, following recent online racial abuse of various players.
This letter comes following abuse of Swansea’s Yan Dhanda after the Swans’ FA Cup exit against Manchester City on Wednesday 10 February 2021, whilst Manchester United Women’s Lauren James is amongst other players to find themselves subjected to abhorrent racial abuse on social media.
Beginning by describing the racial abuse across Twitter and Facebook as ‘vicious, offensive abuse’, the letter goes on to urge both Dorsey and Zuckerberg to use the power of their ‘global systems’ to work to end the constant abuse aimed at players of multiethnicity.
The letter also goes on to refer to the racial abuse language as ‘debasing, often threatening and illegal’ to an extent which causes distress to victims and those who don’t condone racist behaviour, sexism or discrimination of any kind.
FA and the leagues go on to mention that many meetings have been held but to no avail with Twitter and Facebook still continuing to serve as what they call ‘havens’ for users to abuse football players, with inaction instilling belief of anonymous offenders that they ‘are beyond reach.’
Concern is also noted of how ‘relentless’ the flow of racist and discriminatory messages can be fed on and normalised as acceptable behaviour through toleration of social media platforms containing billions of users.
Praise however is handed for the reach, scale and ease of use across social media platforms despite ‘a minority’ using it as a platform to say whatever they want, all whilst disregarding the law and hounding other users off social media when they should have shared access to modern communications like all people.
FA and all parties also want to see victims of online abuse provided with ‘basic protections’ and that social media platforms accept responsibility for preventing abuse from appearing on their platforms, along with extra measures that Twitter and Facebook have previously promised to put in place.
They consequently want to see messages and posts filtered and blocked prior to being posted if contain racist or inappropriate material, with ‘robust, transparent and swift measures’ put in place to remove illegal material if released into circulation on social media.
Another request include improved verification processes that allows for accurate identification of those behind accounts, whilst procedures are set up to ensure that offenders are unable to re-register an account.
Above all, Dorsey and Zuckerberg are urged to ensure that their social media platforms ‘actively and expeditiously assist the investigating authorities’ in identification of those who originate illegal material of an offensive discriminatory nature.
Reference is also made to Oliver Dowden – Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport, who announced on Twitter that the UK Government will change the law to ensure that all social media companies are ‘more accountable’ for content on their platforms and ensure ‘duty of care’ is adhered to.
Dowden also spoke of the need for social media platforms to urgently start ‘weeding out racist abuse’ as a matter of urgency.
The letter concludes by clarifying that everyone involved in football should be able to participate in the game without the unnecessary pressure of having to ‘endure illegal abuse’, and the FA as ‘leaders of the game’ have vowed to do everything possible to ‘protect’ players, managers, match officials, coaches.
England FA however have admitted that it is impossible to ‘succeed’ until social media change the ability of offenders to remain anonymous.
To read the letter in full, please click here.
A letter to @Facebook and @Twitter: https://t.co/tH4i1XfufA
✍️ The FA
✍️ @premierleague
✍️ @EFL
✍️ @BarclaysFAWSL
✍️ @FAWomensChamp
✍️ @PFA
✍️ @LMA_Managers
✍️ PGMOL
✍️ @kickitout pic.twitter.com/QcF73DZ5qy— The FA (@FA) February 11, 2021
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