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German soccer fans turned on a racist heckler, punctuating his exit with an anti-Nazi chant

This is how it's done, folks.

Muhammad Lila/Twitter

The Preussen Munster square off against the Würzburger Kickers

As a soccer match between German teams Preussen Munster and Würzburger Kickers went into its final minutes, a defender from the Kickers, 23-year-old Leroy Kwadwo, stopped to point out a problem in the stands.

A Munster fan was making monkey noises at Kwadwo, a black player of Ghanaian descent. It was a clearly racist heckling—an issue that has publicly plagued the international sport in various venues, even as recently as last week. But this time, the response from the crowd far outshined the racist in the stands.


First, the man was quickly identified by his fellow Munster fans and ejected from the game. While stewards escorted him from the stadium, the crowd chanted, "Nazis out! Nazis out!"

Some fans also stood and applauded Kwadwo and the player received supportive pats on the back from opposing team members as well.

This is how it's done, folks.

Kwadwo thanked fans via social media the next day for their "exemplary" reaction, the Associated Press reported:

"I was racially abused by one single spectator. It just makes me sad. I indeed have a different skin color, but I was born here in this wonderful land that has given my family and I so much and made so much possible. I am one of you. I live here and can live my calling as a professional with the Würzburger Kickers.

Something like yesterday just makes me sad and angry because everyone has to know, racism does not belong in OUR world. We all have the opportunity to oppose it and stop it if it happens."

Munster said it would seek to ban the racist fan from all German stadiums for three years, which is the toughest sanction the sport itself can implement. However, the man also faces legal consequences and is being charged with incitement.

"As repulsive as the monkey noises against the player were, the subsequent response from the rest of the spectators were so impressive," the Preussen team said in a statement.

According to CNN, Preussen Munster president Christoph Strasser said of the heckling: "It is not something that belongs on the soccer field and certainly not in our stadium. We don't want and need people like that here. We clearly distance ourselves from such statements and I apologized to the Würzburgers immediately after the game."

If we have to live with nasty racists in our midst, it's at least encouraging to see a huge crowd reject it with such immediacy and fervor. Nazis out, indeed.


This article originally appeared on 3.1.23

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The reason Japanese fans clean up after World Cup matches boils down to one word—'atarimae'

Imagine if the whole world adopted this concept.

Photo by Jaleel Akbash on Unsplash

Japanese soccer fans explain why they clean the stadium after a match.

Japanese fans at the World Cup tournament have been receiving praise for their admirable habit of cleaning up the stadium after their team's matches. It's commonplace to see Japanese fans, blue garbage sacks in hand, hanging back after the game to pick up the trash everyone has left behind in the stadium.

It's not the first time Japanese cleanliness has made headlines. Some schools in Japan don't even hire janitorial staff, as the students clean their schools themselves. Other than in specific educational programs such as Montessori (where practical skills and habits like cleaning and organizing the environment are incorporated into the pedagogy), that idea is practically unheard of in the U.S. But watching the Japanese fans picking up after a game, the automatic assumption that someone else is going to clean up after us feels like a mistake.

So what is it that compels Japanese fans to clean the stadium at the World Cup, despite the fact that there are people hired to do it already?

It generally comes down to one word: "atarimae."

Atarimae isn't easy to directly translate into English, but it basically means "natural" or "obvious" or "the norm." Japanese fans may be getting a lot of attention for their cleaning habits, but they're not trying to make some grand statement or gesture—for them, it's simply a matter of course that one would clean up mess wherever they are.

Al Jazeera's Sandra Gathmann interviewed several Japanese fans after their team's 2-1 victory over Germany to ask them about their stadium clean-ups. It was explained that the idea of cleaning and tidying up is ingrained as a part of Japanese culture from a young age and that it's atarimae—obvious, natural, the norm—to leave a place cleaner than they found it.

Watch:

@aljazeeraontiktok

Why do Japanese football fans clean up after a match? @Sandra Gathmann asks the fans #QatarWorldCup2022 #FIFA #WorldCup #Qatar #Football #Qatar2022 #WorldCup2022 #Japan #cleaning #fans

Imagine if everyone thought of cleaning up as atarimae. Wouldn't that be something?

Having lived in Japan myself, I can attest to how clean Japanese cities there are—despite being densely packed with people—due to this concept. The contrast between an average Japanese city and an average American city in terms of cleanliness is quite remarkable.

But being an American raising kids in the U.S., I can also attest to the fact that it's much easier to ingrain those automatic cleaning habits into kids when the entire society is living this concept. Parents in the U.S. are in an uphill battle trying to train kids to take responsibility for cleaning up in a someone-else-will-do-it society, and it would take a major cultural shift to make automatic cleaning a matter of course for Americans. I would certainly love to see it, though.

In Qatar, the Japanese are showing what's possible when a habit is culturally embraced and are setting a wonderful example the whole world can follow. Perhaps before the World Cup is finished we'll see people from all nations taking trash bags into the stadium and running with the idea that cleaning up after an event without being asked is simply … atarimae.

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Recently unearthed '90s ESPN clip magnificently celebrates the greatest sports moments of the 20th century

From Lou Gehrig's farewell to Muhammad Ali's declaration of being a "bad man," there are so many gems.

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Michael Jordan features heavily in the compilation.

Sports moments tend to live on forever, thanks to highlight reels and the emotions they can evoke in their fans. Recently, a video has been making the rounds that reminds people of some of those moments. In December 1999, sports channel ESPN compiled some of the greatest sports moments of the 20th century to air on New Year's Eve.

With a new millennium approaching, the network wanted to remind sports fans (die-hard and casual alike) of just how far most sports had come in the 1900s. Football helmets used to be leather! Jackie Robinson integrating Major League Baseball! Babe Ruth! Even by 1999, a lot of those moments were being forgotten by younger generations. The video is a beautiful mash-up of the awesome wins and moments that made people hold their breath, mostly set to the song "Dream On" by Aerosmith.

Arguably one of the best basketball players of the 20th century (and beyond), Michael Jordan gets a lot of face time. He had an absolute chokehold on 1990s culture; from his partnership with Nike to his McDonald's commercials, everyone wanted to be "like Mike."

Muhammad Ali also gets a lot of attention, given that he was a formidable figure in the boxing world for 20+ years. From his early days as Cassius Clay to the moment he lit the Olympic torch in 1996 (his hands shaking due to Parkinson's), it's impossible to talk about great sports moments of the 20th century without highlighting his contribution.

There are some moments that you may not remember if you're a certain age. The Chicago Bears performing the "Superbowl Shuffle" is one of them, but it is iconic.
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The Chicago Bears perform the "Superbowl Shuffle" in 1985.

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Noticeably missing was Kerri Strug's winning vault in 1996 after she had severely injured her ankle. If you were a young woman in the '90s, that is one of the sports moments that would stick out to you vividly. But they do show gymnasts Mary Lou Retton and Nadia Comăneci. We also get flashes of track and field star Florence Griffith Joyner, aka FloJo, tennis star Martina Navratilova, and the iconic moment soccer star Brandi Chastain ripped her shirt off after scoring the World Cup winning penalty kick. We also see Nancy Kerrigan holding her knee after being ambushed at the '94 Olympics.

Comments on the video are full of nostalgia, many people remembering watching the clip for the first time.

"Remember exactly where I was when I first saw this back on December 31st, 1999...with my late father getting ready to start celebrating New Year's Eve. He watched the whole thing without comment and then just said, "Wow". We both had chills...maybe ESPN's finest moment."

"I'm not even a sports fan, but damn if this video doesn't give you a sense of the achievement and dedication that these athletes have. Such an epic video."

"Arguably the Greatest Sports Journalism Montage Ever Produced... PERIOD. I saw it live in 1999 and it brought tears to my eyes then. It's now 2020 and we just celebrated Kobe yesterday. It STILL brings me to tears 20 years later! Bravo ESPN and Thank You!"

Watch the video below:


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US men's and women's soccer teams finally have equal pay. Here's what that means.

Photo by Emilio Garcia on Unsplash, Tim Ream/Twitter

U.S. men's and women's soccer teams will now receive equal pay.

The U.S. women's national soccer team (USWNT) is the winningest women's soccer team on Earth, holding four FIFA World Cup titles, four Olympic gold medals and eight CONCACAF Gold Cups. In the three years following their 2015 World Cup win, the women's team also generated more game revenue than the U.S. men's national soccer team (USMNT).

The U.S. men's national soccer team team, on the other hand, has never won a World Cup and has brought in less game revenue than the women's team in recent years. And yet, players on the women's team have continued to get paid thousands of dollars less than their male counterparts. This pay discrepancy resulted in two major lawsuits against the U.S. Soccer Federation, one by five women's players in 2016 and one by 28 players in 2019.

In February 2022, a settlement was reached, which has the U.S. Soccer Federation paying $22 million in back pay to the women's team players. And on May 18, U.S. Soccer Federation announced a deal that will have players for the USMNT and USWNT being paid equally until at least 2028.

One of the realities some people used to justify the gap in pay between the men's and women's players is that prize money for the men's World Cup is higher. And not just a little higher—the winner of the men's World Cup receives a payout nearly 10 times higher than the women's. That's not a function of the U.S. soccer program itself, but of the international sport.

There has also been some confusion over pay inequity as the two teams had different collective bargaining agreements that had their pay structures set up differently.

However, the new collective bargaining agreements will close the compensation gap for U.S. players by splitting appearance fees, winnings and bonuses equally between both squads. The U.S Soccer Federation is the first in the world to equalize World Cup prize money between the men's and women's teams.


"This is a truly historic moment," U.S. Soccer President Cindy Parlow Cone said in a statement. "These agreements have changed the game forever here in the United States and have the potential to change the game around the world."

One interesting element in the dispute over equal pay is that the men's team has supported the women's team in advocating for it. In fact, in 2021, the USMNT players union argued that the women's team should be paid more than the men's team.

So perhaps it's no surprise to see USMNT defender Tim Ream applauding the equal pay agreement on Twitter, writing, "Been a long process for all sides but proud of everyone involved for reaching and achieving this. It now truly is One Nation, One Team."

After players spent years advocating for pay equity, USWNT Players Association President Becky Sauerbrunn issued a statement acknowledging the work that went into achieving it.

"The accomplishments in this CBA are a testament to the incredible efforts of WNT Players on and off the field. The gains we have been able to achieve are both because of the strong foundation laid by the generations of WNT Players that came before the current team and through our union's recent collaboration with our counterparts at the USNSTPA [United States National Soccer Team Players Assocation] and leadership at USSF," she wrote.

"We hope that this Agreement and its historic achievements in not only providing for equal pay but also in improving the training and playing environment for national team players will similarly serve as the foundation for continued growth of women's soccer both in the United States and abroad."

Time will tell how the U.S. agreements impact the sport in the rest of the world, but the U.S. women's team is leading the way for equal pay for equal work. One more important win for this extraordinary team.

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