Racism Stalks the Cup

June 11, 2006
By: Dave Zirin and John Cox

The most watched tournament in the universe, the World Cup, opens today amid fears that an open and violent racism could upstage the games, humiliate its German hosts, and provide an international platform for Neo-Nazi swill. The rising number of attacks on non-whites in Germany, combined with a spate of racist sloganeering and taunting of black soccer players throughout Europe, has set the stage for an unprecedented display of racism on a global sports stage.

The most watched tournament in the universe, the World Cup, opens today amid fears that an open and violent racism could upstage the games, humiliate its German hosts, and provide an international platform for Neo-Nazi swill. The rising number of attacks on non-whites in Germany, combined with a spate of racist sloganeering and taunting of black soccer players throughout Europe, has set the stage for an unprecedented display of racism on a global sports stage. The argument here is that the German government and the EU have only themselves to blame. These are chickens coming home to roost.

The sewers where Neo-Nazis nestle, have been buzzing with using the World Cup as political platform since the day Munich was awarded the games. The German government, however, dutifully ignored the Reich rumblings, preparing instead for the corporate bonanza that accompanies the Cup. Yet the current climate could have been easily predicted if German officials had bothered to lift their face from the haystacks of Euros or recognize the repercussions of their own rhetoric. 

First there has been the growing pattern of "football racism" across the continent. In late February, Cameroonian FC Barcelona star Samuel Eto'o almost walked off the pitch after being showered by "fans" with monkey chants and peanuts. Last November, Messina's Marc Zoro picked up the ball and threatened to walk off the field because of racist chants from followers of Inter Milan. These are only the most well publicized stories. There are countless tales of players of African origin being treated, in the words of one, "worse than dogs." This has gotten even more play in the United States as US star DaMarcus Beasley has recounted tales of monkey noises and tossed banana skins that trail him every time his foot touched the ball.

This has been aggravated by the rise of anti-immigrant sentiment in Europe that has of course become de rigueur in the United States as well. Sean Harkin, who played for Coleraine FC in the Northern Irish League and captained Brown University's soccer squad to the NCAA quarterfinals, now works as an immigrant-rights activist in Chicago. He said to me, "The racist abuse players have faced across Europe is an aspect of the growing backlash against immigrants. Immigration from former European colonies has grown. As in the United States, immigration has been necessary for many European economies and a source of cheap labor-but immigrant communities have also been a convenient political scapegoat in a continent riddled with unemployment and increasingly anxious conditions for workers dealing with the repercussions of deepening neo-liberal policies." The German government wants to have it both ways: it's proper to foment anti-Muslim bigotry, tighten immigration restrictions and attack asylum seekers, but anti-black racism shouldn't be allowed to sully our reputation or diminish the grandeur of this highly profitable spectacle.

The German government's head was firmly ensconced in the sand until a man named Uwe-Karsten Heye upturned the apple car. Heye, a former spokesman for the Social Democratic-Green coalition government, said, "There are small and mid-sized towns in Brandenburg and elsewhere where I would advise anyone [in the country for the World Cup] with a different skin color not to go. They might not make it out alive." Heye, a co-founder of an anti-racist group called "Show Your Face," was slammed for his comments. In Brandenburg, State Premier Matthias Platzeck, a fellow Social Democrat, called his words an "absurd slur of a whole region that is no way justifiable." Wolfgang Bosback, a leading Christian Democrat parliamentarian, denounced Heye for singling out Brandenburg. But Bosback was at least equally alarmed by the prospect that such comments would damage the tourist industry, saying it would be "fatal" if Heye's comments kept people from Germany.

The government found, however, that people both at home and abroad were more concerned with the message than the messenger. As a columnist in Berlin's daily Die Tageszeitung wrote, "the fact that non-Germans or non-white Germans can barely move around in safety is [the real] scandal," not Heye's comments.

Spurred to action, Interior Minister Wolfgang Sch