Bogus trends in the NYT: Racism in soccer

A few months ago, Jack Shafer wrote a story whose subhed ("Spotting a bogus trend story on Page One of today's New York Times") could probably appear quite a few times on his Slate columns. So I'd like to get in on the act as well: It can't just be Shafer and Radosh spotting bogus trends. Let the bogus-trendspotters multiply!

Anyway, here's the story. The headline is this:

Surge in Racist Mood Raises Concerns on Eve of World Cup

The story is 1,875 words long, which is surely enough space to actually adduce some evidence that the "surge" of the headline exists. But I'm sure it will come as no surprise to Shafer that the author, Jere Longman, never quite gets around to that.

He's good at following the standard bogus-trend template, though. He starts off with two anecdotes, showing the problem. Then comes the nut graf:

International soccer has been plagued for years by violence among fans, including racial incidents. But FIFA, soccer's Zurich-based world governing body, said there has been a recent surge in discriminatory behavior toward blacks by fans and other players, an escalation that has dovetailed with the signing of more players from Africa and Latin America by elite European clubs.

Did FIFA really talk about "a recent surge in discriminatory behavior"? Did it, perhaps, characterise the extent of that "surge"? Has there, in fact, been a marked increase in Latin and African players in European leagues of late? Longman has no time for such practicalities, since according to the hard and fast rules of bogus trend stories, the next graf is where he needs to put his news hook:

This "deplorable trend," as FIFA has called it, now threatens to embarrass the sport on its grandest stage, the World Cup, which opens June 9 for a monthlong run in 12 cities around Germany. More than 30 billion cumulative television viewers are expected to watch part of the competition...

I'll leave it to Radosh to debunk the "30 billion" figure, since he did such a good job with the Oscars. But even Longman feels the need to backpedal on the World Cup aspect of his story just a couple of paragraphs later (although after the jump to an entirely different section of the newspaper):

Experts and players also said they believed the racist behavior would be more constrained at the World Cup than it was during play in various domestic leagues around Europe, because of increased security, the international makeup of the crowds, higher ticket prices and a sense that spectators would be generally well behaved on soccer's grandest stage.

So which is it to be, Jere? A surge of racism which threatens to embarrass the sport of soccer, or a sense that spectators will be generally well behaved?

Of course, this is a bogus trend story, so we need to get anonymous "experts" in it, preferably saying the blindingly obvious:

Racist behavior at soccer matches is primarily displayed by men and is fueled by several factors, according to experts...

But Longman fails the bogus-trend template in that he doesn't manage to quote even a single anonymous "expert" in support of his main thesis, that racism in soccer is getting worse.

He quotes Kurt Wachter of Football Against Racism in Europe saying that "we will see some things we're used to seeing". He talks a lot about the extent of racism in Germany more generally, and what politicians are doing about it. And of course he mentions the war, with a very weird verb formation:

The German government has intended to confront its Nazi past while preaching openness and tolerance.

No, I have no idea what this means, or what it has to do with racism in soccer. In fact, most of second two-thirds of the article seems very confused, to the extent that one wonders if Longman himself actually believes in his own bogus trend:

The Bundesliga in Germany is one of the world's top professional soccer leagues, and has not experienced widespread racism.

So if there's no widespread racism in the Bundesliga, why is Longman so worried it will turn up during the World Cup? Remember that earlier on in the article he was predicting all manner of horrors:

Players and antiracism experts said they expected offensive behavior during the tournament, including monkey-like chanting; derisive singing; the hanging of banners that reflect neofascist and racist beliefs; and perhaps the tossing of bananas or banana peels, all familiar occurrences during matches in Spain, Italy, eastern Germany and eastern Europe.

But when he gets around to quoting a black member of the German team, he ends up going back a decade to support his thesis. Even then, the match in question was not an international match, but a club match about as deep into the former East Germany as it is possible to get:

Gerald Asamoah, a forward on Germany's World Cup team and a native of Ghana, has been recounting an incident in the 1990's when he was pelted with bananas before a club match in Cottbus.

In fact, in the entire article, Longman comes up with not a single example of racist behaviour during an international match, although that doesn't prevent him from speculating at length on the sanctions that FIFA may or may not apply should such behaviour occur this year.

The New York Times, like the rest of the world's media, is only just starting on its World Cup coverage, so we have no idea whether this story is a harbinger of how future reporting is going to turn out. But it's pretty horrible that the first World Cup story to hit the front page should be an ill-sourced bogus trend story about a "surge" in racism which almost certainly doesn't exist.

There's one thing we can all take comfort in, however: the New York Times will never pass up an opportunity to demonstrate that it knows nothing about soccer. This in the second paragraph:

Then, as he went to throw the ball inbounds, Onyewu said a fan of the opposing team reached over a barrier and punched him in the face.

As he went to throw the ball inbounds? Sigh. That's basketball, Jere.

Posted by Felix at 9:13 EST

Comments

International matches aside, you'd be hard pressed to find the same number of local or minor league sports incidents where fans threw bananas at black players here in America (well, in the past 20 years).

To do a mini report report report, you do gloss over that the article provides a good half dozen incidents of pretty deplorable behavior for a sporting event held at any venue of any scale in modern day Europe, whether it was 10 years ago or not (I was alive then; I seem to remember that bigoted behavior wasn't any more acceptable)

I think it is interesting that the standard of apologia in Europe is typically "well, you know the fringy aspect of Germany still has a bunch of Nazis" with sort of a gallic shrug. We don't allow excuses like that for, say, Broad Channel or Howard Beach.

Perhaps the angle on the article should have been how amazing it is that there are any incidents like this happening in football matches at all.

And it's really rather unoriginal. Given the abundance of bad behavior by sporting figures, there are plenty of better ways to noodle them (taunting Kidd with 'wife beater' chants, throwing car keys on the floor before a basketball game featuring a college player who had be caught riding in a stolen car, etc.).

Posted by: 99 at 11:47 EST, June 04, 2006

99, there's no doubt that racism is a problem in football. There are lots of organisations devoted to trying to kick it out. My point is that there's no evidence that racism in football is on the rise, as the headline and the article assert.

Posted by: Felix at 11:54 EST, June 04, 2006