On Tuesday afternoon, some fans doing their best to make Chelsea look bad decided to prevent a French commuter (Sylla Souleymane) from getting on a train because he was black. If there was any question whether or not it was because of his skin color, the fans quickly erased any doubt by chanting "We're racist, we're racist, we're racist, and that's the way we like it, we like it, we like it." We mean, you really couldn't make it any less subtle. The men on the train were reportedly on their way to a Champions League match between Chelsea and Paris Saint-Germain.
Today, three men linked to the incident/chant were suspended from Chelsea's home stadium (Stamford Bridge) for what appears to be life if there's "sufficient evidence of their involvement in the incident." The investigation is still ongoing as the club continues to look for witnesses. On top of the looming suspension from the team they apparently love enough to keep their train all white, Paris police said that if they can identify anyone that racially abused the man, they could face legal punishment (potentially even jail time).
As for Souleymane's take on the matter, the 33-year-old father-of-three didn't mix words:
"These people, these English fans, must be found, punished and must be locked up. What happened should not go unpunished."
As a guy who lives in France he speaks French (which checks out) and because of that couldn't understand what the English fans were saying. After he went home he didn't tell his wife or kids until finding out later that the confrontation was captured and picked up by news agencies. To add insult to injury an already insulting event, in the ensuing scuffle he lost his phone.
On top of the opinions he holds of the discriminating fans, Souleymane also added that he thinks both Chelsea, and PSG, should have to deal with sanctions because it was "also their fault." Even though the video is but a minute long, Souleymane said that the entire ordeal lasted somewhere between six and seven minutes.
[via Sky News/YouTube]
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