Have the moderators of the Guardian comments section have just had enough? The Guardian and the BBC are spear heading a campaign to revise interest in the game of ladies football. But nobody is taking it seriously. For the record because my team Lewes are about to start in tier 2 of the revamped ladies leagues, playing such luminaries as Manchester United and because I am a critic of the move, I take an interest.
Suzanne Wrack is the journalist in charge at the Guardian of helping to report on the ladies game and the recent restructuring of it. Fine writer, if somewhat uncurious to the minutiae of the new licence agreements, the hypocrisy and failings of the initiative.
It must be thoroughly depressing for the Guardian team to see any article on the ladies receive the customary mere scattering of comments, most of them ill informed or downright insulting about ladies football.
Earlier in the week an article appeared in the paper on the Manchester City Women’s team. The Guardian editorial team do little to halt the stereotypical view of women’s football being crap and unloved by having a picture of a female Man City player playing on the pitch, in the background an empty bank of seats as a solitary person watches on from the side line a la park footie
There were 81 comments, not bad for a comment section on ladies football.
Bizzarely a whopping 23 comments, 1 in 4 had been removed by the moderators. Of course there is always the odd tit who will post trite on a discussion forum but being a regular user of the Guardian comments this is a very few per cent.
I have never seen anything close to this sort of censorship ever. Absolutely disgraceful.
Clearly being unable to win readers over to the delights of ladies football and saddled with the views that a lot of readers simply think the past time is low grade, pointless and unwatchable entertainment, a view incidentally I do not hold, their views now simply seem to be removed as the moderator’s begin to censor and shape an argument they want to read.
The stuttering revolution in ladies football is a very very slow burner and is moving in the right direction. Impatiently and in frustration doctoring the debate contrary to the view of the majority of readers serves no purpose other than making the sport and the paper look ridiculous
A read of the remaining posts show the large number of opinions consistently held and normally posted belittling the sport, as is only fair in a democratic forum, are non existent, Presumably there were 23 of them
The Rights of Fans. 