London: English football has announced a social media boycott with FA, Premier League, EFL, FA Women’s Super League all showing a united front to showcase a blackout between April 30 and May 3.
This boycott has been announced in a bid to eradicate online hate and the motive is also to educate people in the ongoing fight against discrimination.
The ongoing 2020-21 season has seen various football stars being subjected to online abuse and it is also being said that the social media giants are not doing enough to tackle online hate.
“It’s simply unacceptable that people across English football and society more broadly continue to be subjected to discriminatory abuse online on a daily basis, with no real-world consequences for perpetrators,” Edleen John, The FA’s Director of International Relations, Corporate Affairs and Co-Partner for Equality, Diversity and Inclusion said in an official statement, as reported by Goal.com.
“This needs to change quickly, and we continue to urge social media companies to act now to address this. We will not stop talking about this issue and will continue to work with the government in ensuring that the Online Safety Bill gives sufficient regulatory and supervisory powers to Ofcom. Social media companies need to be held accountable if they continue to fall short of their moral and social responsibilities to address this endemic problem,” he added.
The planned social media boycott will take place across full fixture programme in the men and women’s game, with Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram accounts being switched off.
Premier League Chief Executive Richard Masters added: “Racist behaviour of any form is unacceptable and the appalling abuse we are seeing players receive on social media platforms cannot be allowed to continue. “The Premier League and our clubs stand alongside football in staging this boycott to highlight the urgent need for social media companies to do more in eliminating racial hatred. We will not stop challenging social media companies and want to see significant improvements in their policies and processes to tackle online discriminatory abuse on their platforms,” he added.
Earlier, former Arsenal and Barcelona striker Thierry Henry announced that he will not be using social media until the companies concerned help eradicating discriminative posts.