Home Secretary Priti Patel, seen here personally checking the immigration papers of people of colour just hours after proclaiming racism doesn't exist in the United Kingdom
By Jakub Ivanecky
"Priti Patel visits a mPesa kiosk"by DFID - UK Department for International Development is licensed under CC BY-NC 2.0
After coming under fire for her comments on race, Home Secretary Priti Patel has reached a compromise on the debate of allowing the competitors to express themselves, so long as there is a presence of authority on the field.
Athletes of Euro 2020 have expressed solidarity by taking the knee to protest racial injustice. This has been met with criticism by some of the fans, who “are white and do not see the problem”, said a member of the booing crowd. For statements such as these, football enthusiasts have been targets of personal attacks, something which they do rather well on their own. One of such victims is the Home Secretary Priti Patel, who believes that these people have a choice whether or not to boo on “gesture politics”. After all, she is an expert on such matters, most notably the raised middle finger to the refugees crossing the English Channel being the most symbolic gesture of her career in said politics.
After backlash for her comments, she has put out a press release, stating that “fans are who make the sport possible”, but is willing to bring concessions. “To ensure that it is an expression with meaning, it must display the existence of said discrimination” said the secretary in the press release. For example, footballers can kneel at the beginning of the match, provided that a match attendee is able to hurl racial abuse at the player as they do it. This, according to the Secretary, ensures the gesture serves a purpose, providing comfort to the match attendees.
She would also like to extend these benefits mainly to the significantly marginalized groups of our day, such as police officers, politicians, and businesspeople as a form of “societal healing and transcending cultural borders”, which she is understandably very keen on. Other gestures the Home Secretary would like to replace would be the raised fist, which now must be depicted as heading downwards, ideally with handcuffs, to show how tough on crime the government is.
This new and updated approach is intended to be practiced on future England matches, with the white footballers having the “choice” to opt out of the program, if they would like to.
