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| Sunday, 26 January 2003 |
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Features |  |
| News Business Features Editorial
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The Lehmann Incident - Gut feelings: racism, sexism in Cricket by Michael Roberts Darren Lehmann's conviction for indulging in a racial slur, namely "black c...s," (the censored word being a slang reference to the female genital organ) and thus a Category 3 offence within the code of behaviour for cricketers, has been rightly welcomed in many quarters as a step in the right direction. Indeed, the ICC, and Malcolm Speed in particular, are to be applauded for their forthright intervention in this regard. The Incident For the benefit of those who are not familiar with the particulars, the incident occurred on the 13th January during the ODI game between Australia and Sri Lanka at the Gabba in Brisbane. This was a tight match, marked by some good bowling and some slick fielding efforts. Among the latter was a neat pick-up-and-throw by Arnold that resulted in Lehmann's run-out via Third Umpire's decision at a critical moment in the game. As he went through the tunnel in front of both change-rooms, Lehmann roared "Black c...s". This shout was heard by Duleep Mendis and those Sri Lankans who were in the change rooms (Ajit Jayasekera was absent on official duty picking up Gamage at the airport). It appears that this remark was brought to the notice of the match referee, Clive Lloyd, by the Sri Lankan management. One would expect all the ICC referees to have addressed the issue as a serious infringement; but since Lloyd, a West Indian, falls within the category "black whatever," the situation was deeply ironic. Lehmann realised his error immediately and apologised to the Sri Lankans, both verbally and in writing. The latter were satisfied with this remorse and did not wish to pursue the matter further a case of damage control, no doubt. But there are larger issues at stake and Speed had the courage to pursue this matter and send a clear message to all players, whether White, Coloured and Black: ethnic remarks will not be tolerated. An important step this. But in line with my previous writings I wish that the ICC would go further and take action against demeaning obscenities and masculinist vocabulary in general. Should our modern gladiators be allowed to freely disparage women by referring to their genitalia in objectionable ways? I will leave that issue in the air however and attend to the immediate aftermath of the Lehmann obscenity. Much has been made of the fact that it was not directed at anyone specifically. But he was not speaking sotto voice to himself. It was a shout in the public realm; indeed, a public realm that embraced the Sri Lankan dressing room nearby. So how in-your-face has disparagement to be in order to be deemed "direct"? Lehmann has also contended that the expression was a product of his "frustration". His lawyer, and subsequently Dav Whatmore, have stressed that Lehmann is "not racist". Both are lines of excuse and damage control. Let me argue against these views seriatim. Frustration Speaking as a social scientist, let me emphasise that it is at moments of pressure and stress that one reveals one's innermost feelings. Hate-speech erupts when someone is drunk, angry or aroused by an alarming piece of news. Shifting the ground of illustration, let me note that during the last 40 years I have occasionally encountered revealing expressions of ethnic prejudice in the drawing rooms of middle class Sri Lankans at most unexpected moments when some news activated an instantaneous remark about an ethnic "Other". As we all know, collective identities in South Asia are not usually based on skin-colour so that ethnic prejudices are described in popular parlance as "communal". Thus, "communalist" in the Indian subcontinent is the equivalent of "racist". Off-the-cuff remarks, therefore, can be guides to popular strands of thought. Take one famous occasion during the finals of the ODI series in Australia in 1996. In the course of a cameo innings Sanath Jayasuriya hit Glenn McGrath for fours in typical, slashing-Sanath style. As he reached the bowling crease after one such stroke, the camera caught McGrath shouldering Sanath and saying something. The camera technicians with audio turned low would have heard his words and any professional lip-reader could have read the expression. The story in Lankan circles is that he called Sanath a "black monkey." McGrath's actions were not mere aberration. His words expressed gut-feeling. In the present context of disciplinary codes this may well be a Category 4 offence leading to a life-ban. It is because no such codes were in place then that players have continued to indulge in the verbal intimidation that occasionally takes a racist form. Grapevine talk around the Sri Lankan cricket team suggests that they encountered some racial vilification on the field in South Africa a few months back in late 2002. At a meeting to a Sports History group in Adelaide a few years back, Roger Wills of the ABC was moved to disclose the fact that the younger members of the West Indian team that toured Australia last had been specifically targeted with "religious abuse" that was designed to get under their skin. So we have a situation where aggressive players, mainly from the White nations, intimidate other players, sometimes with racial and religious vilification and are able to get away with it because of what seems to be, in effect rather than design, a "conspiracy of protection" afforded by umpires, TV technicians and media personnel. This situation need not ever have persisted. The ICC has within its powers a simple remedy that would obviate the need to have disciplinary tribunals: all they have to do is to insert a clause in all contracts with the firms that tender for TV rights stipulating that stump-audio has to be turned full-on. That would constrain the Haydens, Bouchers, Halls and Kallises of today's world of cricket from exercising their foul-mouth obscenities at the same time as they restrict racial vilification. Racist Much as I respect Dav Whatmore, I think one needs to examine the issue of how one conceptualises "racism" and "a racist". It is easy to take a neo-Nazi as a typical racist and from this typification move to the argument that anyone who is not a neo-Nazi or anyone who does not openly express vilification of others of different skin-colour is not racist. This is oversimplified reasoning. The fact remains that most of us have some prejudices as well as aesthetic preferences constituted by readings of body shape, colour et cetera. Some of these prejudices lie at depth and work in subterranean ways. Ergo, they express themselves only in specific contexts and specific moments. Such prejudices are moulded by one's environment of upbringing. Lehmann has been nurtured in the northern suburbs of Adelaide encompassing Elizabeth and Salisbury. These are among the most English suburbs of Adelaide, a location that has a sociological profile that would be described as strongly Aussie-English, that is, Anglo-Saxon, working class and lower middle class, albeit one laced with Aussie-style social mobility. One would anticipate that during Pauline Hanson's heyday she had substantial support in this sort of area. This does not mean that all its residents, or indeed Lehmann, are "racist," but points to an ambience that encourages ideas of White superiority. Cricket politics A journalist with wide experience and a heart in politics, Ted Corbett insists that cricket is one of the last institutionalised bastions of racism in the world today, albeit a racism that operates in insidious and subterranean ways - through in built assumptions as much as taken-for-granted practices. Indeed, occupying the place of supreme cricketing country today, Australians comfortably occupy the moral high ground and confidently express their own values as universal values. This attitude is rendered sharper by the massive degree of parochialism and political conservatism that permeates Australia today. This does not apply to all Australians. One has only to read the letters to The Australian on the Lehmann affair to note that there is a sturdy strand of liberal-radical opinion. But any encounter with talk-back radio would reveal the tendencies for majoritarian Australia, namely, Anglo-Saxon Australia (with a few non-English migrants among them mind you). One does not have to travel that far. Listening to the ABC commentary on the Lehmann issue during the following match at Adelaide on 17th January, Jim Maxwell, Terry Jenner and Peter Walsh indulged in all manner of intellectual gymnastics in their attempt to varnish the story. In arguing that he was not trying to justify Lehmann's punishable offence, Jenner proceeded to raise a what-if: namely, what if a Sri Lankan player mouthed racial abuse at an Indian? He then proceeded to tell us that he had just got back from UK and that policemen in Birmingham do not interfere in gang warfare between rival Black gangs. How either of these two red-herrings were pertinent to the Lehmann obscenity was not clarified. Media power The media personnel wield tremendous power however. It appears that there are personnel, both within the media and in institutional positions of influence, that are not happy with the degree of weight wielded today by India in particular. In the politics of cricket, some elements among the White nations, it would seem, are trying to defend the old citadel. As a West Indian e-mailing me from afar perceptively observed, the recent regulation of one bouncer per over into ODI bowling has now restrained Asian batsmen of the Tendulkar, Jayasuriya, Inzimam type. At the critical level of media presentation, most TV companies are Western and seem to be staffed by Western-trained personnel. Since cameramen sometimes act as prosecutors of alleged misdemeanours (e. g. the Tendulkar incident) and the Technical TV director is in a commanding position of discretion, there is some scope for manipulation of what the public sees or what is brought to light. From a response I received to an "open letter" on this subject in July 2002, the ICC does not seem disposed to impose codes of behaviour on these companies. They would do well to look at the Australian Broadcasting Authority and the regulations that it polices. One presumes that there are similar codes in UK. If racial vilification is to be policed, then, technicians and media personnel have to be "counselled" as much as the players. If they think it okay, the network of support for such beliefs and the shield of protection will continue. |
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