- By Guy Hedgecoe
- BBC News, Madrid
Image source, Getty Images
Real Madrid’s Vinicius Jr says in his homeland Brazil, Spain is known as a ‘country of racists’
The insults aimed at Real Madrid footballer Vinicius Jr have sparked a fierce debate about racism in sport and whether Spanish society has a problem with it.
Spanish police have arrested three people in connection with racist abuse directed at Vinicius Jr, who confronted Valencia football club supporters at the Mestalla stadium who he accused of chanting monkey chants at him. After the match, the Brazil international declared that the Spanish football league “belongs to the racists”.
Following the incident, Brazil’s President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva warned against allowing “fascism and racism” to dominate football stadiums and his government issued a statement saying that he “deeply regrets” the lack of action by the Spanish authorities to combat the problem.
As the lights illuminating the Christ the Redeemer statue in Rio de Janeiro were dimmed on Monday in a sign of solidarity with the player, the issue transcended the borders of Spain and sport.
Spain’s left-wing government and its sporting institutions have been unanimous in condemning racism in football. However, claims that Sunday’s incident reflected broader unease have proven more controversial.
“La Liga has a problem,” Real Madrid’s Italian coach Carlo Ancelotti said in an interview after the match. Vinicius Jr went further by saying that “in Brazil, Spain is known as a country of racists”.
La Liga president Javier Tebas has rejected the claims. He tweeted in Spanish, Portuguese and English: “Neither Spain nor La Liga are racist, it’s unfair to say that.”
He also said La Liga had reported nine cases of racist insults so far this season, including eight against the Brazilian.
Others have taken a similar stance, suggesting that Valencia, or even Spain, are also victims due to the reputational damage caused by this episode.
While calling racism and sport “incompatible”, the leader of the opposition Popular Party (PP), Alberto Núñez Feijóo, warned that the controversy gave “a distorted image of a city like Valencia”.
“Spain is by no means a racist country,” he said during the campaign trail ahead of Sunday’s local elections.
The socialist president of the Valencia region, Ximo Puig, insisted that Valencia fans “are not racist at all”, while attributing the extremist attitudes of a few to the far right, which is the third largest representation in the Spanish Parliament in the form of the Vox party.
But Mr Puig also appeared to blame Vinicius Jr, who, while leaving the pitch on Sunday, appeared to taunt Valencia supporters over the possibility of their team being relegated.
“Players must be good professionals and must not behave in an arrogant manner,” he said.
Others have also drawn Vinicius Jr’s character into the debate. Toni Freixa, a former board member of Barcelona football club, said the Brazilian “provoked in every game” and questioned why Real Madrid’s other black players were not the target of racist insults from the same way.
Writer and social commentator Manuel Jabois disputed this analysis, warning that blaming the victim for the abuse was part of the problem.
“Because he’s black…he has no right to misbehave, get angry or respond to provocation without being called a monkey,” he said.
The aftermath of Sunday’s match echoes events in 2004, when many Spanish fans at Real Madrid’s Bernabéu stadium launched monkey chants at black English players during a friendly match. The international outrage that followed sparked a national debate on the racism that had long been present on the terraces of Spanish football.
In an editorial, the newspaper El País noted that it took a foreign leader, Lula, to denounce the issue for it to be discussed in depth. He also called on La Liga and the Spanish Football Federation to take tougher measures to eradicate racism in the sport.
“La Liga has a problem and this problem does not come from Vinicius,” we read.
