Spain suffered more than just a draw against Egypt on Tuesday. The real damage came from two racist and xenophobic chants that echoed through the RCDE Stadium during the match, bringing shame to Spanish football. This incident is not isolated, and according to Esteban Ibarra, president of the Movement against Intolerance, it could escalate further.
“What happened falls under legal infractions in sports, covered by both national and international law. We must condemn these acts and take proper action, because they keep recurring, which shows we are not tackling the root problem,” Ibarra told this newspaper.
He added: “What occurred at the RCDE Stadium was not spontaneous, as I’ve heard some claim. It was a coordinated effort to provoke those chants. That’s easy to verify. They didn’t come from random sections of the stadium at different times. They happened at two very specific, premeditated moments. Behind that synchronization lies a group that incites and directs it. This pattern is seen in other matches too – organized groups, known as ultras, still exist.”
Football and political institutions have swiftly condemned the incidents, but for the country, it remains a source of embarrassment in the ongoing fight for eradication. Ibarra believes the response is insufficient: “I see a lot of window dressing. There are gestures, but what we need is preventive policy. The hate speech is rooted in intolerance toward those who are different. We lack prevention – we do nothing there. And the consequences are severe, because this spreads and influences society at large.”
This intolerance problem is not an isolated case. Reports from the Anti-Violence Commission indicate a yearly increase in violent incidents in Spanish football. Ibarra agrees the trend will worsen: “Yes, because we live in an ecosystem. If you don’t see that, you won’t understand what’s happening. It’s not just in football but in other sports, culture, society, neighborhoods… There are connecting channels. In the 1990s, we talked about racism, xenophobia, anti-Semitism, and every form of intolerance, and many policies were implemented to neutralize them at the root. That meant focusing on schools and media. But those efforts have stopped. These incidents must be delegitimized in schools and society in an integrated way.”
He further explained: “Instead of racism or xenophobia, I prefer to speak of intolerance, because it is a multi-faceted issue: homophobia, anti-Semitism, Islamophobia, etc. It’s the rejection of those who are different. This can happen in football or anywhere else. What we are seeing is a growth of that attitude. That behavior against the other was specifically directed at Muslims the other day because it was a match against Egypt. But we also see territorial intolerance in Spain, as with the murder of Zabaleta. The evil is far graver than just saying ‘racism’.”
