'Feed the monkey' gaffe shows a British media stuck in a rut

 

The common version of events around monkey-gate is that during the half time break he made a remark about the Tottenham player Andros Townsend that included the word monkey. Initially it was suggested this was a joke that had been misinterpreted and Hodgson was drawing on a NASA gag about a monkey in space where the hapless astronaut is advised to ‘feed the monkey’ to survive. Hodgson’s remark was interpreted as the manager instructing other players to feed the ball to Townsend.

 

The social reaction to the Hodgson-Townsend case could have become ‘monkey-gate’. Ever since the Watergate scandal of the 1970s, the use of the suffix ‘gate’ has been appended to incidents thought to contain an element of scandal or outrage, or to incidents that have been exaggerated beyond their ‘real’ significance.  Both these aspects – a scandal or an insignificant matter taken out of context – are evident in 'monkey-gate'. For some, the over reaction to it is symptomatic of political correctness – another instance where people are too readily and easily offended and see ‘racial’ meaning where none was intended. For others, it speaks to a wider and neglected issue of casual and unconscious racism in the UK and the failure of authorities (the Football Association in this case) to take racism seriously.   

 

As this indicates, one of the major problems with talking about race is the common trend to dichotomise discussion about it sharply in ways that suggest it is all or nothing.  There is a disagreement between those who, on one hand, maintain that this incident is trivial, while others argue it speaks to a wider issue about racism which is being ‘swept under the carpet’.  The first of these is not a denial of racism, rather it is a narrative of progress that acknowledges that racism exists but maintains that substantial progress has been made over a period of time. The second view is a narrative of continuity or of no-progress. This suggests that changes that have occurred are superficial and racism in its deeper form remains unchallenged. 

 

In the narrative of progress the use of the term monkey was merely a joke, or part of an anecdote derived from NASA that can only be understood in context.  The word itself was entirely incidental and unrelated to the fact that Townsend is black. Indeed when the story broke, Townsend himself immediately tweeted to say that no offence had been intended by Hodgson and none taken by him personally. Thus the FA and many media commentators saw the reaction to this remark as a joke being blown out of proportion and stressed that Townsend himself had not been offended. 

 

This affirms a mindset that a causal remark should not be taken out of context and what matters are the intention of the speaker and the view of the recipient.  ‘Good’ people may say the wrong thing but as long as they don’t mean it, it should not be taken too seriously, is a shorthand way of summing up this view. Racism, once so prevalent and commonplace in football, especially in the crowd, has largely been eliminated and there are official anti-racist campaigns, such as Kick it out and Respect, that football clubs have signed up to. Racist ‘banter’ has declined or virtually disappeared and the censure of instances of inappropriate language – such as the BBC TV pundit Alan Hansen calling a black player ‘coloured’, and the more egregious cases of John Terry and Luis Suarez in the past year – shows the action the FA will take on racial language. 

 

This outlook largely individualises the issue of race as a matter of inter-personal communication, even if that means miscommunication sometimes; it treats cases such as the Hansen, Terry and Suarez ones as exceptional and occasional.  It removes the wider social context in which words have histories and meanings, so the intention of the speaker is not the only criterion. Not just the intended recipient, but also others present may ‘hear’ words differently from their intended meaning. Indeed one of the unresolved issues in the Hodgson story is that it was revealed to the media by someone else, perhaps another player, in the dressing room who presumably did feel there was something inappropriate about referring to Townsend as a monkey.

 

On the other hand, various people take the opposite view: that such remarks speak to a deep seated and perhaps institutionalised racism within football and in society. While the use of the term monkey in this case is an individual instance, it is connected to a range of other examples – other cases of racism, the lack of representation of black people in the upper reaches of football, and racial discrimination and inequality in society. So a single instance is indicative of a much bigger picture. This viewpoint is expressed by Peter Herbert of the Society of Black Lawyers who called for stronger action to be taken by the FA.

 

In direct contrast to the narrative of progress, this viewpoint says there has been either no or very little progress in tackling racism. Instead of ‘individualising’ the event, it ‘collectivises’ or ‘totalises’ it, stressing that the historical and social context of racism is more important than the intention of one person. Racism can be expressed in unconscious and unintended ways.

 

A further and intriguing aspect to this outlook is expressed in a Guardian comment piece by Joseph Harker. Harker argues that the (over-) reaction to the incident reveals the gap between ‘real’ racism and ‘celebrity’ arguments about wealthy footballers. The media find it easy to talk about racism or non-racism in relation to the monkey comment, and cases involving wealthy footballers, Harker suggests. But this obscures more serious forms of racism, hence the coverage of the Hodgson incident reveals the gap between ‘real’ racism and ‘celebrity’ cases.  Harker’s argument draws on the findings of a BBC investigation that came out in the same week in October. This revealed continuing and stark discrimination against black and Asian people in housing. Interestingly, other commentators read his piece as a sign that nothing has changed in Britain, for instance this tweet by The Independent columnist Yasmin Alibhai-Brown: ‘Joseph Harker, Guardian on stupid gaffes and real, deliberate race discrimination in housing etc. Nothing's changed from 30, 20 yrs back.’ 

 

This ‘nothing’s changed’ viewpoint speaks to a powerful sense of despair. But in bald terms it unhelpfully makes racism into an all or nothing matter. Both narratives of progress and of no-progress offer an either/or approach to racism. While, to an extent, these may reflect societal debates it is important to note that, to a significant extent, that polarisation is due to the playing out of the arguments in various forms of media that tend to flatten out nuances.  

 

'Monkey-gate', even as one  incident, therefore tells us something about the nature of racial debates. Not necessarily because it in itself is highly significant – though nor is it insignificant. Rather, the reactions to follow some well established patterns that demarcate and delineate race debate – which can be crudely summed up as either ‘political correctness gone mad’ or ‘institutionalised racism obscured’. Looking for both continuity and change and not flattening out single cases or over-stating them is the real challenge for social scientists.

 

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The views expressed in this post, as in all posts on Society Matters, are the views of the author, not The Open University.

Karim Murji is Senior Lecturer in Sociology in the Faculty of Social Sciences, Open University .