United to boycott social media

[Norman Brownbutter]

A whole weekend?! WOW! Thats social media racism sorted then. What to tackle next with a weekend of not posting nonsense propaganda?

If these clubs, the fa, the pl, etc etc were serious they would Gordon Ramsey this shit show. "shut it DOWN!". Shut it all down until the social media companies actually do something to tackle this bullshit. Im sick of reading about it, so I can only imagine how sick people of colour are of actually having to live with it. Every single player. Every single club. Every single fa. Every single broadcaster. Every single non piece of shit fan. Every single celebrity, game show host, and weather person. Shut down all your accounts and dont go near them again until something is done. If we can put a man on the moon, we can stop pricks from racially abusing people of colour every day of the fecking week on social media.

 

[Green_Red]

Would RedCafe show solidarity with players and shutdown for the time that the clubs are boycotting social media? I think it would be seen as a positive message that fans are as sick of the racism as the players are. @Niall @Damien ?

 

[Cascarino]

Call me cynical but there’s never been a better time to be off social.....

The timing is pretty funny but the social media boycott was planned pre-ESL fiasco

 

[Martial'sEmergingSmile]

Very much for acting against discrimination, but the timing of the announcement makes me feel like it's being done to put their head in the sand for the negative comments about the owners.
Hopefully it's just the cynic in me, and the genuine reason is the one they've stated.

In fairness it's been in the works for a while. Social Managers at my work have been looking forward to their weekend off.

When it was first mooted way back in January it was supposed to be a month. Then it went down to a week because too many people would be financially impacted by a month. Then it went down again...this time to a weekend, for the same reason.

Last I heard a few days ago it was going to be a 'weekend event' but individual team and player accounts would only do it for the 24 hours around their own match. Don't know if that's changed now.

It's all very silly and performative. Literally just means Tabby from Brand Management is getting a long weekend. 95% of players don't know their Twitter password, never mind actively engage in their mentions.

There were some 'demands' attached to the whole thing when it first came up...but they were silly/unworkable boomer things like ID verification for all accounts (massive privacy/profit concerns), don't allow banned accounts to sign up again (VPN/Dynamic IPs exist...shared IPs exist in colleges etc). I don't believe for a second they thought either would be implemented.

Literally the best thing you can do is block and don't engage. Again, I think they already know that though.

 

[SAFMUTD]

That'll show em.

 

[Cheimoon]

Delete the app, unfollow them, don’t interact with them on anything, you might think it’s pointless but who cares, just do it. It’s not much effort and it’s worth a try.

The downside of 'delete the app', though, is that it means letting the abusives a-holes decide what you can and cannot do. They shouldn't have that power, it should be them deleting the app.

I know that's not very helpful to say, but what it points to, I think, is that ultimately we need action from the platforms against this - as others have also said. If they won't do that voluntarily, then it's time for legislation that makes companies (to some degree) responsible for everything that's published or posted through their platforms. Let's see how quickly they develop effective moderation tools then.

 

[Waynne]

This is nowhere near long enough to make any sort of a difference.

Boycott social media UNTIL meaningful changes are made to social media policy.

Other sporting bodies need to take the same measures as well. Hit these social media platforms where it really hurts them and you'll see meaningful changes tommorow.

 

[Cast5]

The downside of 'delete the app', though, is that it means letting the abusives a-holes decide what you can and cannot do. They shouldn't have that power, it should be them deleting the app.

I know that's not very helpful to say, but what it points to, I think, is that ultimately we need action from the platforms against this - as others have also said. If they won't do that voluntarily, then it's time for legislation that makes companies (to some degree) responsible for everything that's published or posted through their platforms. Let's see how quickly they develop effective moderation tools then.

I’m not ignoring you chiemoon and I don’t disagree. I will put a coherent response to you when I’m sober and have something valuable to say.

 

[Cheimoon]

I’m not ignoring you chiemoon and I don’t disagree. I will put a coherent response to you when I’m sober and have something valuable to say.

Haha, no worries! Enjoy your Saturday night!

 

[Will Singh]

They should just start blocking the offending accounts that reply to the clubs twitter for attention. I know people can just create new accounts but surely it gets old pretty quick.

I think they want more to be done by the social media platforms especially with racism as it’s completely out of hand and like you say all they do is create a new account.

 

[calodo2003]

So, this is planned for the weekend United plays Liverpool, when the whole world will be watching and there are big protests planned? And over an issue that no one in their right mind would deny them to take a stand against? Nice move, Glazers. Nice move.

You don’t think we’re doing this unilaterally, do you?

 

[Cast5]

Do not underestimate the power of United fans.

 

[Striker10]

You got to laugh at how self important people are. You can't solve racism. It's born out of ignorance but useful to some. Racism is like an institution in and of itself. Bit like the banks 'too big to fail'. If you asked people what it was, 10 people would give you a number of different responses. This is all about social media ID. Why? Because that is the end result. To spare people the time. The thing is most people have VPNs. SO what is a VPN? Does it provide the service you imagine or are we added to some list with some form of immunity while we're spending money and while perhaps still being spied on. We don't know. But if you use some imagination - let's say VPN is legitimate....is the social media Id really some way to counter VPN software ?

Online, you could be anyone. A blue tick? Don't really matter. They can still create plausible deniability if they've no histoy of it. But I see kids taught 'social justice'.....and I see people rioting (months back) - climbing all over each other...during a pandemic...and you have to; at some point, step back.You can look at an incident and confirm it is what it claims but you do not know the people or bots even making the posts and it is humanly impossible to know if what you see is genuine. It's better to end social media. Completely. Do we need it? No wonder kids can't complete 90 mins of football and deep down want to play on their ps5

 

[Annihilate Now!]

Starts at 3pm today.

From the BBC Website:

Ahead of football's four-day social media blackout starting at 15:00 BST this afternoon, Manchester United have released some stark figures from their own research into racism on their platforms.

Amongst various statistics the club uncovered are these:

• 350% increase in abuse directed towards the club’s players.
• 3,300 posts targeting players who were playing for United at that time across the reporting period. The review found that:
• 86% of these posts were racist, while 8% were homophobic or transphobic;
• activity peaked in January 2021 with over 400 abusive player posts recorded;
• vast majority of racist posts contained either the N word (and variants on the spelling) or emojis used with racist intent.

Grim reading.

 

[Eric_the_Red99]

A four-day boycott just seems like performative activism to me. Clearly social media companies should be better at removing hateful content, banning people, etc but the nature of social media means it will always be a sewer.

I’ve heard some people suggest that the answer is to remove users’ right to anonymity, so everyone on social media can be identified, but I think that would be incredibly dangerous given what certain governments would be able to do with that information.

So I think if players, clubs and media organisations are serious about tackling this issue, what they need to do is boycott social media *permanently*. Many celebs have chosen to do that on their own initiative after experiencing abuse online, and I totally respect and understand their decision.

Call me cynical though, but I can’t see the football industry choosing to
cut itself off from a global audience of billions in this way, seeing as that audience is how they make their money ‍

 

[red thru&thru]

The fact there is little, to no comments about this subject on this forum, eludes to the fact the points I raised with the mods, that Safeguarding in this forum is next to non-existent. Troubling really.

 

[calodo2003]

Starts at 3pm today.

From the BBC Website:

Ahead of football's four-day social media blackout starting at 15:00 BST this afternoon, Manchester United have released some stark figures from their own research into racism on their platforms.

Amongst various statistics the club uncovered are these:

• 350% increase in abuse directed towards the club’s players.
• 3,300 posts targeting players who were playing for United at that time across the reporting period. The review found that:
• 86% of these posts were racist, while 8% were homophobic or transphobic;
• activity peaked in January 2021 with over 400 abusive player posts recorded;
• vast majority of racist posts contained either the N word (and variants on the spelling) or emojis used with racist intent.

Grim reading.

Actually shocked that the homo / transphobic percentage is so low.

 

[Trophy Room]

I was watching the bbc clip with Shearer and Wright. Some of the abuse Wright has had to endure is disgusting really. Unfortunately, this boycott is not going to make any difference whatsoever. Name and Shame I say.

 

[Withnail]

The fact there is little, to no comments about this subject on this forum, eludes to the fact the points I raised with the mods, that Safeguarding in this forum is next to non-existent. Troubling really.

I'm not sure I know what you mean.

Is there an abuse/racism issue on this site?

I'm my experience once you report something like that it's dealt with fairly swiftly.

 

[ClaytonBlackmoorLeftPeg]

The fact there is little, to no comments about this subject on this forum, eludes to the fact the points I raised with the mods, that Safeguarding in this forum is next to non-existent. Troubling really.

perhaps you need to elaborate rather than refer to a private conversation.

I agree with @Withnail when there are issues, things are dealt with swiftly.

 

[red thru&thru]

perhaps you need to elaborate rather than refer to a private conversation.

I agree with @Withnail when there are issues, things are dealt with swiftly.

There is no problems with dealing with something when a complaint is raised. However, depending on your complaint, action will be taken or not. I raised issues with what I felt was racist actions, but this was not taken on board and I was asked to step away from the computer, rather than take on board my concerns.

It would be interesting to understand the diversity of the running of this forum?! Mods are more welcome to contact me, as this thread isn't the place for this discussion.

But to