Highlighting the problems of homophobia in sport has never been so clear, as today the Premier League used Rainbow Laces to show solidarity with the LGBT+ community – making some people very very very angry.
A number of football clubs have decided to use rainbow laces to shed light on homophobia in sports. It is a Stonewall and Premier League collaboration and it’s seemingly triggered some fans spectacularly. Homophobic fans have been showing off their inability to be accepting left, right and centre.
One of the worst threads on social media was from Manchester United’s Twitter and Facebook feeds. The club, which is supporting the campaign, tweeted that they were proud to show their support of the rainbow laces campaign and said that sport was for everyone.
They also changed their Facebook profile picture to include the rainbow laces and it made over 8,600 people use the angry emoji. Thankfully 177,000 people managed to find their “like” button.
Some fans on Twitter and Facebook were having none of it with at least one suggesting that all gay should be killed.
The majority of those examples appeared to be from Muslims. Just as not all Christians are anti-LGBT I don’t think all Muslims are either. They do not help themselves though with these displays of hate. Religion being used as an excuse for hate is simply backward. Also the “I’m alright Jack” attitude of “I’ll let you do what you like as long as you don’t rub it in my face” really shows selfishness and a lack of education. “I’m white, male and heterosexual. Sorry you’re not on my level but them’s the breaks”. Still so much to do.