Europe Supports Harsh Consequences for Sterling

While the U.S. is buzzing about the lifetime ban of Clippers owner Donald Sterling, Europe is also weighing in. European citizens supported the ban and are calling the NBA to force him to sell the team. They are also encouraging the well loved sport, football (or soccer in America) to take similar measures against racism.

The leaders in football, Sepp Blatter, who is the president of international governing body FIFA and the European counterpart, Michel Latini both condemned Sterling’s comments and applauded the NBA for taking swift, decisive, and harsh action. Blatter wrote a tweet that read, “Sport says no to racism. I fully support @NBA’s decision to ban @LACLippers owner for life after his racist words.” Platini told the Associated Press, “It is a great decision and I support it completely.” A French player for the 1998 World Cup winning team, Partick Vieira tweeted, “Well done to @NBA, another organization dealing with racism in exactly the right way. I say again- zero tolerance.” There have been some racism issues in European football for a few decades. Just a week ago, a season ticket holder was at a Villarreal game threw a banana at black Barcelona defender, Dani Alves. The Spanish police arrested the man and banned him from the stadium for life. Alves defiantly picked up the banana and took a bite. His actions swirled around social media as a campaign against racism, in support of the Brazilian player.

Even though Villarreal acted quickly against the actions of the fan, others have been critical of the ability of football leadership to deal with racism quickly. Some have looked at the NBA and Silver quickly condemning and banning Sterling and thought, why can’t football do that? Retired British NBA player, John Amaechi said of the NBA, “if they can do that to respond to a hateful private utterance, why the hell can’t football do that to respond to repeated instances of hate-mongering?”