April 23 – England’s Professional Footballers’ Association wants to meet with social media platforms because of an “unacceptable” response to racist abuse received by some of its members.
Players throughout the divisions were encouraged to boycott all forms of social media between 9am last Friday and 9am the following day in response to the increased levels of racist abuse aimed at them in recent months.
But those who took part in the so-called Enough campaign, a movement launched to increase the pressure on social media companies and football authorities to take stronger action on the issue, received further insults in response to their posts.
Responding to the campaign, a number of social media platforms declared their commitment to removing racist comments online as soon as possible, but their response to the latest wave of abuse has not been good enough, according to the PFA.
“Players, members, clubs and fans involved in the #Enough campaign have sent a powerful message to social media companies and football’s sanctioning bodies worldwide – #EnoughIsEnough,” read a statement on Twitter.
“Yesterday, some members received racist abuse on their #Enough posts. When these incidents were reported, the response from social networks was – again – unacceptable.
“In the coming days, we will be inviting players to report any racist abuse they have received to us. We will collate it and share it with social platforms to demonstrate the impact of their lack of action.”
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