Racism, rape and death threats: One weekend of social media abuse in football | BBC News

Key Concepts

• Online Abuse: Harassment, threats, and hateful content directed at individuals via social media platforms.
• Premier League & Women's Super League: Top professional football leagues in England for men and women, respectively.
• X (formerly Twitter): A social media platform where a significant portion of online abuse was identified.
• Signify: A data science company specializing in monitoring and acting on online abuse.
• Meta: The parent company of Facebook and Instagram.
• Verified Abuse: Abuse that has been confirmed through investigation.
• Contentious Moment: An event in a football match that is likely to provoke strong reactions and potentially lead to online abuse.
• Egregious Messages: Abusive messages that are particularly severe or offensive.

BBC Analysis of Online Abuse in Football

A BBC analysis revealed a significant volume of abusive social media posts targeting managers and players in the Premier League and Women's Super League. Over a single weekend in November, more than 2,000 abusive posts were identified.

Types of Abuse:

• Death threats
• Rape threats
• Racist slurs
• Homophobic slurs

Platform Distribution:

• X (formerly Twitter): Accounted for 82% of verified abuse.
• Facebook & Instagram (Meta): Accounted for approximately 15% of the abuse.
• Other platforms like TikTok were also monitored.

Case Study: Chelsea Women and Signify

Chelsea Women's manager, Sonia Bomb Pastor, expressed shock at the severity of online abuse directed at her, stating, "How people can go on a computer and just write these words to someone they don't even know. For me, it's more like unacceptable." The abuse included homophobic slurs and threats of violence, stemming from events on the football pitch.

Chelsea's Proactive Approach:

• Chelsea Women have become clients of the data science company Signify.
• Signify monitors and acts on online abuse, identifying "massive um traffic coming into the system, death threats and um violent mentions as well."

Monitoring Process:

• Signify monitored 16 games (10 Premier League, 6 Women's Super League) for the BBC investigation.
• Abuse was observed to climb in real-time across platforms like X, Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok, particularly following "contentious moments on the pitch."
• During one instance, abuse counts rapidly increased, reaching 59 and projected to hit 100 within a minute or two.

Impact on Managers and Players

• Anna Slot (Liverpool Manager): Was mentioned in a rape threat and was one of three managers in the men's game to receive the most abuse that weekend. He commented, "that we are criticized. That's completely normal. Um even if we are winning, I think this happens. But if it starts with abuse, it's not a good thing."
• General Sentiment: Managers and players face criticism, which is considered normal, but abuse is deemed unacceptable.

Social Media Platform Accountability

• Sonia Bomb Pastor's Perspective: Believes social media companies are "not doing their job, not taking again the responsibility and the accountability for um for that." She added, "I think if we have to wait for the social media companies to hacked, I think we can be in this situation for too long."
• Meta's Response: Parent company Meta stated it has launched controls to help users limit, restrict, and block abusive comments. However, when flagged six abusive messages by Signify, Meta had only taken down one.
• Platform Priorities: It's suggested that platforms might prioritize issues like child pornography, terrorism, and disinformation over online abuse targeting athletes due to their scale and perceived severity.

Club-Level Action and Consequences

• Chelsea's Stance: Clubs like Chelsea feel they cannot wait for social media companies to act. They aim to demonstrate decisive action to their own fans.
• Fan Consequences: The intention is to impose "real life problems, real life consequences" on abusive fans. This includes the possibility of lifetime stadium bans for those identified as abusive. The aim is to ensure fans are not "bad fans or a negative fan."

Conclusion and Takeaways

The BBC investigation highlights the pervasive and severe nature of online abuse in professional football, particularly on X. While social media companies are urged to take greater responsibility, clubs are increasingly adopting proactive measures, including partnering with data science firms and implementing real-world consequences for abusive fans. The problem is perceived to be worsening, with a significant disconnect between the volume of abuse and the platforms' enforcement actions. The focus is shifting towards clubs taking direct action to protect their personnel and foster a more positive environment.