Spitting Feathers

I’m struggling to know just what goes through the minds of some of the people that inhabit the murky world of social media platforms.

What sort of a sicko do you need to be to react to a decision going against your football team by writing a death threat to the referee concerned?

What sort of a clown do you have to be to react to a defeat by hurling abuse at your own players over Instagram?

And what sort of a knuckle dragging, caveman throwback do you have to be to spew racist bile at a rival club’s player simply because he made a tackle?

I’m writing this the day after the Swans’ heroic defeat against Manchester City in the FA Cup and in the aftermath of the racist abuse that our own Yan Dhanda received after that game. Yan’s experience follows hot on the heels of Manchester United players Alex Tuanzebe, Anthony Martial and Marcus Rashford being subjected to the same vile treatment via Twitter and Instagram.

At the same time, referee Mike Dean and his family received death threats after Dean made a couple of controversial decisions that were overturned on appeal. Dean reported these to the police and subsequently requested a break from refereeing just to let the situation cool down.

Now don’t get me wrong; I am no fan of Mike Dean and I absolutely despise the way he courts controversy and attempts to turn the attention on HIM no matter how big the game he’s in charge of is. But come on…death threats? Even if there is no serious intent behind them you’ve still got to be damaged in the head to make them at all.

Dhanda found himself on the end of racist abuse from Manchester City fans simply for catching Rodri with a slide tackle  – it was a foul, it was a yellow card, it certainly didn’t deserve a red card and it sure as Hell didn’t merit the race card that a small minority of Citizens fans decided to play.

Let me make it clear here and now, all at A Touch Far Vetched stand with Yan and support him – he is a Jack, and race, colour or creed has no bearing on that whatsoever.

These recent high profile incidents have led to the football governing bodies sending a joint open letter to Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg and Twitter’s Jack Dorsey   – signed by old friend Trevor Birch on behalf of the EFL by the way – imploring them to take stronger action against online abuse on their platforms.

But the simple fact of the matter is that nothing will really change until custodial sentences are handed out for this sort of thing. It’s not just shouting a nasty phrase in the street, this is systematic abuse and bullying that will grind a person down and can lead to drastic consequences…like the tragic Caroline Flack incident.

Again don’t get me wrong, I’m no shrinking violet on Twitter – ask any of my followers! I’m as guilty as anyone for getting embroiled in the odd Twitter spat. But there’s a world of difference between going toe to toe with someone like Piers Morgan (and pointing out that he tapped a dead girl’s phone, the scumbag) and sending racist filth by private message.

I’ve certainly never done that for any reason, let alone over something as trivial as a football result or incident.

And I don’t think I really want to know what goes through the mind of someone that has…