The English Football Association handed Edison Cavani a three-match ban and fined him £100,000 for using the term “Gracias negrito” in the social media post he had made in response to a message of congratulations after a match-winning display against Southampton in November.
Apparently the term, which literally translates as “Thank you little black person” and does not have any derogatory connotations but instead conveys a well-intended wish as a term of endearment in Cavani’s home country, Uruguay.
Evidently the football authorities in England are not privy to the special cultural significance latent in the term, interpreting instead it as being “insulting, abusive, improper” which subsequently got the star footballer fined for racism in England despite the Uruguay and Manchester United striker having swiftly deleted the social media post and issued a hasty apology insisting he was “completely opposed to racism” the moment he was told that what he had posted could easily be misconstrued as a racial slur.
Surprisingly, the FA’s sanction and castigation of Cavani gave rise to much incredulity in the Uruguayan’s home country.
“Touch one Uruguayan, touch us all,” Silvina Rosas grumbled as she adorned wine bottles with labels bearing the controversial phrase “Gracias Negrito” in her wine distribution outlet, saying the news “outraged” her and as an act of protest, promptly designed a label with the contested phrase sprawled over a blue and white background reminiscent of the Uruguayan flag.
She subsequently posted a photo montage of some of the newly-dressed wine bottles on social media and was immediately surprised by an avalanche of orders leading her to create a new line of the wine product with that special label design, and she has not stopped shipping deliveries since then.
“The reaction was divine madness,” Rosas told AFP. “People understood that this (the label design) was done with love. The price also represents that because there is not much profit.”
The bottles of Uruguay’s flagship tannat red wine, sell for 340 pesos (about $8) apiece.
Rosas’s reaction is but just one example of Uruguayan indignation the FA had ignited in their ignorance of Uruguayan culture.
Uruguay’s Spanish language academy, among others, issued a statement in which accusing the English FA of “ignorance”, saying it was common for the phrase, and others that may appear offensive to an outsider, to be used affectionately as a term of endearment among friends or family members.
Salaciously, the Uruguayan Football Players’ Association also issued their own statement that the English FA itself had been “racist”, while the Uruguayan Football Association (AUF) said Cavani had been the victim of a “flagrant injustice”.
“In our Spanish, which differs greatly from the Spanish spoken in other regions of the world, the nicknames negro/a or negrito/a are used… as an expression of friendship, affection, closeness and trust, and is in no way derogatory or discriminatory to the race or skin color” of the recipient.
It also highlighted that Cavani’s message had been addressed to a close friend, a fellow Uruguayan, who “knows and shares his way of speaking”.
Besides the institutional ranks closing in around Cavani to assuage the affront he suffered, individuals, too, rushed to his defense.
Twitter was besieged with the hashtag #GraciasNegrito and a plane displaying a banner flew over a stretch of beach east of Uruguay’s capital Montevideo in a show of support, while small businesses sensing the opportunity to make a quick buck immediately jumped on the bandwagon and started telling T-shirts emblazoned with the phrase.
While most have flocked to Cavani’s defence to the extent of even accusing the English FA of suffering a colonial hangover, some in the Afro-Uruguayan community say it could well be high time for a total language review.
Black player Mathias Acuna, 28, believes the FA sanction was unjust and that people should be more circumspect, but he does not rule out that racism isn’t a problem.
“There are times that it (the word ‘negro’ or its diminutive ‘negrito’) is used affectionately, as a compliment. It depends who it is from,” he told AFP.
“It is a pity that it is him (Cavani), who used it affectionately” who is being made an example of, said Acuna. But “racism in Uruguay and in football exists.”
“We are not blacks nor whites, we are people, nothing more.”
According to a recent report of the World Bank, Uruguay is distinctive in Latin America for being an egalitarian society with a low level of inequality, though members of its afro-descendant population are more likely to be living below the national poverty line.
Martin Rorra of the Afro Youth organization is inclined to believe that the controversy should have sparked more national reflection and is worthy of critical analysis.
Instead, “we refuse to see these customs as problematic or to become aware of the racism,” he told AFP.
The use of slurs is a common, old problem in football. It aids the discussion at this juncture to recall Cavani’s compatriot Luis Suarez controversially calling Patrice Evra a “negro” in an on-field argument in their incendiary Manchester United-Liverpool match, with the Uruguayan striker also insisting at the time that the word’s Uruguayan use is not racially charged. Of course, in the case of hot-headed ‘El Pistolero’, one may beg to differ where his intentions then are concerned.
In December, an official’s use of the word “negru” (Romanian for “black”) caused a player walk-off in a Champions League match.
Rorra opines that some of the reaction to the Cavani case, including the “Gracias negrito” wine label, only served to trivialize an important issue instead of confronting it, a sentiment that equality activist Alicia Esquivel is in agreement with. She said she felt “hurt” that such a product could actually emerge out of the fractious incident.
“It shows that people are not aware of what we are asking: It is a phrase that we must delete from our vocabulary,” she told Canal 12 television.
The final conclusion came from Rorra.
“If we really want to commit ourselves to the issue (of non-racism) we have to make some unpleasant decisions, which may lead to the rejection of elements of our culture.”
Credit: Football Tribe Malaysia
