Drayton: Anarchy In The PFA

The Daily Mail was pissing its knickers earlier on this week over a black man using the N word.

The man in question was Reginald D Hunter, a comedian not known for being a stupid person. He was performing at the Professional Footballers Association Gala Awards dinner in front of many people not known for their intellect.

Throughout its article the Mail was really trying to pick up a head of steam, leveling charges of racism, offensive behaviour, anything that would get white middle England to also piss their knickers. Happily it came to naught for many of his assembled audience had already beaten him to it, often on primetime television, in front of nanas and children.

The biggest bomb shell – or ‘huge intake of breath’ – came when Hunter spoke about Luis Suarez. He called him a n******. Obviously Suarez isn’t a n*****, but some of his best friends are. He’s so at home with the term he’s used it with gay abandon, similarly cuddly-fun-store John Terry. It’s not mentioned if Suarez was present; good job too, he would’ve bitten Reg and that wouldn’t do.

The most indignant response of the night came from Kick It Out, the anti-racism campaign. They objected to the proliferation of n******s. Anyone with half a brain would realise that Hunter’s use of the word is not to hammer home a racial slur, but to reclaim it, to take the sting out of its tail. Of course, they could have been concerned that after hearing the word so often, footballers would now consider it fine for everyday use. Or the confusion caused: “Why is that black guy saying that? He’s not Kanye West. This does not compute.”

The embarrassment should really lie with the FA and the Mail, two august institutions that find racism impossible to deal with unequivocally (yes I am saying that Terry and Suarez should have been banned for life) or enjoy stirring up hatred of anyone not from Hemel Hempstead, in full time employment and with a full UK passport.

The PFA are now trying to get Hunter to repay his fee. Let’s face it, football is bankrupt, they need all the money they can get their hands on. The reason for this? “The makeup of our audience which would be widely diverse, including around 25 per cent of women and ages ranging from 18 to 80.” Yes we must protect our WAGs from anything political or contentious, they might start thinking.

Oddly, there hasn’t been any evidence from the assembled audience about the low quality of the comedy that night. Reg stuck to his guns. He’s the Johnny Rotten of UK comedy. We should salute him.

I guess from this we can assume that in the beautiful game it’s OK to be mean about n******, but footballers? Please be gentle with them, the poor, poor innocent mites.

Mr Drayton’s Record Player is at the Tyneside Cinema every Thursday. The needle drops at 7.15pm, and tickets are a fiver.  Click to buy tickets.