Monday July 22nd, 2024

This is a subject that I hoped I would never have to touch upon but I suppose it cant’t be avoided. Racism in all its forms, is deplorable and yet we hear about in on nearly a daily basis. The impetus for the this blog came from leaked footage from a celebration on an Instagram feed from Argentinian and Chelsea footballer Enzo Fernandez after their Copa America victory. In the video, the players start a chant that took an ugly turn as song became racially offensive towards the France Football Team. In response, three of Fernandez’ teammates from the Chelsea Football Club, of French origin unfollowed him on Instagram and another, Wesley Fofona re-tweeted the post on X, with a comment about it. FIFA and the French Football Federation is set to get involved, and discipline within Chelsea Football Club will be determined at a later date.

The repost from Wesley Fofona with his comment (Photo property of X)

Team-mates unfollow him (Photo property of X)

It should be noted that other than wrestling, football or soccer as it’s known here in North America is my other obsession. Chalk it up to working in a very Italian part of the city for a good chunk of my life as well as coaching it at the high school level. So having the Copa America and Euro 2024 was a great start to my summer as I had games to watch in the morning/afternoon and in the evening. Following the sport is how I was made aware of this incident. Unfortunately, this isn’t the first time that racism has touched The Beautiful Game as there have been other incidents in countries like Spain, France and England at the club level. I could go on from the many transgressions from other other countries but I would be here all day. That is one of the unfortunate parts of International Football and it has no place in the game whatsoever.

Report from the BBC on the incident

So regarding the incident with Enzo Fernandez, it got me thinking about racism in wrestling. Thankfully, there hasn’t been an incident that I can think of, here or any other place that I associate with, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist. I remember an incident that sparked a lot of controversy in New Jersey where a wrestler was forced to cut his hair before a match. Hair should be secured and out of the way but I’ve never heard of someone having to cut their hair for this. Now, this issue was made all that more contentious because the athlete was an athlete of colour and the referee was not.

ABC News reported on the incident

Concerning racial tensions in wrestling, there have been other incidents at the international level in which athletes from certain countries have refused to compete against each other due to racial or political affiliations. There have also been cases in which the athletes have wrestled against each other, but tensions were elevated during the match to the point where un-necessary physical violence ensued. Wrestling by its nature is violent, but there are limits.

As coach, I’ve never experienced any form of prejudice on the mat

However, I would also like to point out when politics and ethnicity took a back seat to a common cause. Looking back to when the IOC wanted to take wrestling out of the Olympic Games, we saw a coalition formed between Russia, the United States and Iran. These countries have always had tensions amongst each other, to put it mildly. And yet, the common cause was to keep wrestling in the Olympics and they fought hard to do so. With a few changes, wrestling seems to be here to stay at the Olympic Games and I think that having these three very different countries come together and set aside their differences for a common goal played a huge part.

The makeup of Canada’s Cadet Pan Am Team was extremely diverse

Our differences stem from tribalism. Loyalties to people within our own ethnicity is a normal thing but in sports, your actions should be what defines you and not the colour of your skin or what religion you subscribe to. Now admittedly, this should be for everything but there are instances in my life where I have been judged by people of a different ethnicity because I wasn’t’t like them. The classic question “Where are you from” comes to mind and I guess in a multi-cultural society like Canada that’s normal to have that curiosity. However, I long for the day where pre-conceived notions aren’t the first thing that come to mind when meeting someone and that we’re all judged for our strength of character rather than the colour of our skin or the religion we practice. Wrestling here in Canada seems to be free of this as what you do on the mat matters more than what ethnicity you come from and I hope this never changes.