MARK Hateley was as angry when he saw the racist abuse aimed at Scott Sinclair at Ibrox last month as he was when he saw the National Front board an England flight to South America back in the 1980s only to single out the team’s black players for insults. The 55-year-old former Rangers striker was recently inducted into Show Racism the Red Card’s Hall of Fame at a ceremony in Westminster in recognition of the time he has spent over the last 15 years spreading an anti-racism message. He was appalled when he saw a Rangers supporter making monkey gestures towards the Celtic striker and feels it is high time that the minority who still feel this kind of behaviour is acceptable are stamped out. As for that England trip. it only serves to highlight the absurdity of the NF’s behaviour that one of the team’s black players, John Barnes, would use it to take a Hateley pass and slalom past at least six Brazilian defenders as England recorded one of the most famous results in their history in the Maracana.
“It was a great honour to get the award because I have been working within this organisation for about 15 years, and this has been one of the mainstays for as long as I can remember, when it comes to working against racism in football,” said Hateley. “I remember on one of my first England trips, the National Front travelled on our plane, up the back of the plane, with the press and all that lot. We went to South America and they were like a guard of honour, clapping all the white players through. And then you had Viv Anderson - the first black player to play for England - John Barnes and Mark Chamberlain getting absolute dogs’ abuse. How did I feel? Angry, I just felt angry about it.
“You just shake your head, because they are morons, uneducated morons as far as I am concerned,” he added. “Don’t get me wrong, I grew up in that post-war period, where grandparents and parents could be uneducated but you get through that.
“How did I feel when I saw the abuse towards Scott Sinclair?” he added. “I was angry again. It is a situation where the guy got caught and all that stuff, and it was a season ticket holder passing on his ticket. To a certain extent he is to blame for doing that because these people have children around them. The community which surrounds this club is so diverse, and without that community we don’t have a football club. It is the minority again that have spoiled it. All clubs have minorities but it is they who have to be stamped on. Social media is brilliant to embarrass people and help the police get to the bottom of the virus which is racism.”
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel