In this turning point in the ‘war on woke’ may be the seeds of a new revolution, says Jonathan Lis
The problem with waging an endless ‘culture war’ on behalf of the people is that eventually you run into the people themselves.
Following England’s defeat in the Euro 2020 final, members of the team lined up to condemn – explicitly or implicitly – both the behaviour of some of the fans and the Government which encouraged them.
England captain Harry Kane criticised the “vile racist abuse” and told the perpetrators “we don’t want you”. Manager Gareth Southgate described it as “unforgivable”. But more poignant were the responses from the three black footballers who missed their penalties and found themselves subject to the barrage of hate.
Jadon Sancho wrote that the abuse was “nothing new” and that “as a society we need to do better, and hold these people accountable”. Bukayo Saka said he “knew instantly the kind of hate that I was about to receive”. Marcus Rashford declared that “I will never apologise for who I am”.
These players form a new class of athletes – incisive writers, emotionally literate, socially engaged. And something else too: they are powerful political actors.
When the Home Secretary tweeted that she was “disgusted that England players who have given so much for our country… have been subject to vile racist abuse”, squad member Tyrone Mings replied: “You don’t get to stoke the fire at the beginning of the tournament by labelling our anti-racism message as ‘Gesture Politics’ and then pretend to be disgusted when the very thing we’re campaigning against, happens”. His tweet was shared 90 times more than Priti Patel’s.
This time in its culture war, the Government has picked the wrong enemy.
A Pitched Battle Johnson and Patel’s Culture War Flaw Finally Exposed
Peter Jukes and Hardeep Matharu
A Gesture of Importance
Downing Street faced three predicaments. The first was that England did not win Euro 2020 and so Boris Johnson could not capitalise on the team’s achievement for his own political gain. No triumphant parade or bombastic national address, no orgy of flag-waving for the Prime Minister to boast about Brexit. The feel-good summer would not kick-off as planned.
That, in turn, led to the second problem. As the England footballer Reece James shrewdly noted on Twitter, “we learn more about the society when we lose, far more than we learn when we win”. What we learnt was what we already in fact knew: that England is a deeply racist country, in which a sizeable minority only welcomes black people when they are succeeding.
If the team had won, the players would have been greeted with adulation. Johnson could have pretended that the country had no problem with racism and that he had no part in whipping it up. As it happened, both propositions became impossible to sustain.
All of which led to Downing Street’s third and most serious predicament: its previous opposition to taking the knee and failure to condemn those who had booed the players for doing so. For weeks, England’s players had made this anti-racist gesture before every match. But in their stupidity and hubris, ministers had attempted to co-opt it as another front in the culture war.
Last year, Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab described the gesture as a “symbol of subjugation and subordination”. Shortly afterwards, Johnson said that he didn’t “want people to be bullied” into it. Then, last month, the Prime Minister went further – pointedly refusing, through his spokesman, to condemn the booing. Priti Patel followed up days later by saying that the booing a “choice” for fans.
The subtext was clear: taking the knee was a meaningless, left-wing act. So confident were they in their unassailable power, that Johnson and Patel never appeared to question whether England’s team might fight back, better.
After the squad’s defeat by Italy on penalties, it became glaringly obvious to millions of people why taking the knee mattered. Those who had previously dismissed it as a stunt could see what the black players had to face. Even before the match, an Opinium poll showed that 56% of people supported England footballers taking the knee – an increase of 6% since the start of the tournament. Less than one-third opposed it.
Gestures form part of every historical movement. It is not that speeches, symbols or acts of defiance directly reduce oppression, but that they help to produce the political conditions which can. It is this which politicians cannot or refuse to understand.
In a profoundly divided country, one of the few symbols of unity is the England football team. Like football itself, its popularity transcends age, class and politics. That makes its players potentially formidable opponents.
Taking the knee is no longer something that those in power laugh at or dismiss, but fear. This is because it goes to the root of the culture war itself.