Several days ago, an U21 football match between Serbia and England ended in an all out brawl. There were shoves, punches, slaps involving all 22 players, plus back ups and coaches. Yet the most horrendous thing that happened was racism. English player, Danny Rose (a black guy obviously) was, according to him anyway, been subject to racial abuse "every time he touched the ball". It garnered such attention that even British PM and sports minister got involved, demanding draconian punishment against Serbian football, including several years ban for clubs and national team.

What's gonna happen doesn't concern me really, I'd welcome such a ban for different reasons, but I'm somewhat curious about whole racism issue.

I'm going to put forth a theory - there is no racism in Serbia. It may sound controversial, as eastern European countries are often labelled as being extremely racist, but bear with me. For proof, I'm gonna point out that in Serbia, a 100 years ago, a black guy could get a job in a circus, just sitting there with people paying to see him. They never saw a black man before, it was as much of a curiosity as bearded lady. It's hard to talk about racism when the people and the country as a whole had virtually no contact with black people before few decades ago. Another curiosity is that just about every black footballer who ever played for a Serbian team didn't mention it, and some indeed chose to live in Serbia after their careers ended. Most of them, in fact, decided to speak out after this and say there is no racism in Serbia. Sure, there are idiots, just like there are idiots anywhere else, but on the whole, I'm pretty certain there's more real racist among Chelsea fans than in entire Serbia.

Now, onto the case itself. According to the player in question, there were monkey chants every time he touched the ball. Unfortunately, that's not true. In fact, he was doing everything he can to anger the crowd. England was defending a 1:0 lead from the first game and decided to employ time wasting rather early. Danny Rose was the worst, his antics included good ole dropping the ball "accidentally" during a throw-in, or deciding that another play should take a free kick or a throw after he wasted some time by holding the ball among other things, things considered unsportsmanlike. Of course, while it is considered unsportsmanlike, it is not forbidden and English players and Danny Rose had all the right to do it. It's a part of football ever since it was invented. Equally true, it's extremely unpopular with the opposing fans. There's gonna be whistles, boos and jeers when you do it, every time. This match was no exception, and after doing it one time too many, Mr. Rose was subject to them, just like any other player would be. Thing is, his statement was that he was subject to them because he was black. Sorry mate, but if you can't stand the heat, stay out of the kitchen. This is football, not theater, and the crowd will always, always try to spur their team on and unnerve the opposition. If you can't stand that, go play tennis.
It culminated when the match ended and Danny Rose went to the crowd and made a rude gesture, could have been a middle finger, could have been something else but crowd literally exploded, and not in a good way. Later he kicked the ball at them angrily which was the last straw for the crowd. Only then monkey chanting started. Racism, one could say. True, monkey chanting is definitely racism but the fact is that the crowd was pissed specifically at him, and for how he acted the entire match. It didn't have nothing to do with the fact that he's black, he would have gotten the same treatment were he white or Asian. They just would have tried to insult him in a different way. It was ad hominem, not ad race.

Now, we come to the issue, or issues as the case may be:

1) why do racist insults trump all other insults? People can be insulted based on their nationality, their looks, their intelligence, their hairstyle or lack of hair, especially on a football pitch where culture of the attendance isn't that high and it further brought down by the "herd mentality". We may frown upon it, but we won't punish anyone because of it. The crowd could have called a player an "English cu**" for example. Rude, but no case for punishment. "Black cu**" would have been. Who decided that one is considered rude and the other is a breach of rules or even a crime?

2) are punishments for racism getting out hand? Let's look at the facts - 35+ people who are supposed to act like sportsmen ended up in a brawl. Shouldn't that be much bigger issue? Or when John Terry and Luis Sanchez got 4 and 8 matches ban respectively for racial insults, while Mario Balotelli, who purposefully stepped on opposing player hand and broke his finger got two matches ban. Isn't that much worse?

Now, I'm 100% against racism, but I'm talking institutional racism, real racism, like denying someone schooling or job opportunities, denying someone freedom of movement, of speech, full protection within the legal system etc... When you act like a prick and get insulted because of it, is it really racism? Especially when you would have gotten a similar, but differently worded insult, involving your ancestors, your hair colour, your height, weight or any other distinguishing feature that first caught the eye.

Fire away.