At the 12th of October we, the organisation PRAXIS organised a football event with several matches between the refugees from town and the local football club Panserraikos, at which the games actually took place. Also, other volunteers from Latvia and Lithuania joined the games and enriched the whole event. The reason for the whole thing was fare (football against racism), to put something against racism and to offer the refugees a nice day.
All in all, we had four games of refugees against Panserraikos. The games last for 40 minutes each. First, childs and youths played, then older players and in the end the professionals of Panserraikos against not that professional players from the refugees. But even though the refugees objectively were chanceless, they never lost motivation and excitement. And finally they even scored a goal! The refugees, that were not playing at the time, enthusiastically supported the currently playing refugee team. They even had drums. Furthermore, everyone could get food and drinks from a buffet, so that nobody had to be hungry and everyone had enough to drink at this very hot day. Finally, the day found a round end with a big photo of all the participants.
Thanks to the organisers - I especially want to thank Pangiotis, who put the most work into the event – the motivated refugees, Panserraikos and also the beautiful weather, it became a very nice and successful day! Everyone had a lot of fun and it did not matter where you were from at all. Football brought us together. And I hope we could give the refugees the feeling that they are very welcome here and that they are a part of the community.

Paul Müller

The discrimination of women in Football :
From the 7th to the 13th of October the team of PRAXIS participated in the campaign of FARE – football against racism.
Sadly people are still discriminated because of their skin colour, sexual orientation or gender nowadays. Especially women are disadvantaged in sport all over the world. The discrimination of women in football was one of the topics we have discussed about in our daily broadcast during the FARE campaign. Our research for this broadcast was shocking as we found
many examples of oppression of women in football. One of them is the salary gap, the reason why the female football players of the USA went to court. While a male player receives 2000 $ after a lost match, a female player receives not a single dollar. If a game has been won, a male player
receives more than 17,000 $ while a female player receives only 1,500$ in the US. This injustice made the female national team go to court. They were protesting for their future as
athletes and their right to be treated equally as their male colleges. Suprisingly the court did not agree with the demand of the women for equality. According o the US
court women are weaker by nature. They are not able to bring the same results and therefore also not worth the same salary.
Our aim in the campaign of FARE was to show that everybody is worth equal in sport. We want to fight against injustice and prejudices like these.

​Elisa Henke

During the FARE week, specially on Thursday, we created the material for an InfoPoint and also some of our volunteers organized some activities in Alexander’s Hotel where the refugees took part, above all, the children.
In the morning two of our volunteers went to Alexander’s Hotel, where they made handmade masks, flags and medals with the children, having fun and explaining to them what FARE was. They had a great time all together, celebrating The Festival Against Racism in Europe, transmitting a message full of love and care to all of them while they teach English to them. At the same time, in the Office, the rest of the volunteers were working on the photo-call, decorating it and preparing all the materials for the Stand we put in the Central Square of Serres on Thursday afternoon. We went there around 17:00h and stayed until 19:00h. In this time we interviewed people about racism, we asked them what it was for them, what were they doing against it… In that moment, we faced the language problem, with which we saw that not everyone could answer our questions because of the lack of it. We played with children and took pictures with local people who came and asked us about the meaning of FARE. Some refugees were there supporting us, too. And all together created an amazing and lovely atmosphere. At the end, we were interviewed for a local channel from Serres, which we explained the meaning of FARE and the following activities we were going to do during that week.
It was a great day that all of us enjoyed a lot.

Ananda Antón Linares

The Praxis organization has carried out many activities for Fare is an organization that fight inequality in football, throwing a unified message against discrimination.
Fare is committed to dealing with discrimination through the power of inclusion in football, as the most popular sport in the world, it belongs to us all and can boost social cohesion.
For that reason, a workshop was held with volunteers from eight countries and other local people from Serres with the purpose of making football visible through people. Participatory activities were created. In addition, the president of the local football club “Panserraikos” gave a talk and there were interventions on personal stories about the influence of sport in their lives.
A week full of experiences and new experiences, a week that improves people's daily lives, characterizes the "Soccer against racism" week.
For me personally, it was really surprising to notice how easy it is to do something good and change the world for a moment. I hope they continue to be such events.

Christian Losa Moreno 

Since Praxis organized events in cooperation with the Fare Network to counter racism in football in October 2019, it is also important to shed some light on the topic of extremism in this sport. Football clubs have many different fans, but then there are “ultras” and “hooligans” that go beyond what it means to be a follower of something and illustrate the word’s original meaning of what it really means to be a fanatic.

Ultras are football fans known for their fanatical support. The term originated in Italy but is now used worldwide to describe football fans that are not as chaotic as hooligans. Ultras groups use flares, provide loud vocal support and display banners at football stadiums, in order to create an atmosphere which encourages their own team and intimidates the opposing one. Their actions can be influenced by political ideologies such as conservatism, socialism or views on racism, ranging from nationalists to anti-fascists. The loyal support of the team might become secondary to the theoretical ideology. They proudly wear the scarves and colors of their team and don’t get as violent as hooligans that disguise themselves in casual clothes so as not to get in trouble with the police.

Football hooliganism, however, goes further than that, and involves conflict between gangs (called “football firms” from British slang) which are formed to intimidate and physically attack the supporters of the opposing teams. Hooliganism often happens outside of the stadium to avoid arrest by the police. In extreme cases, people have gotten hurt and even been killed. Hooligans wear scarves to hide their faces and casual clothing instead of wearing the colors of the football teams.

In the English media, the label “football hooliganism” first appeared in the 1960s, which lead to increased media interest in the subject. It might be that the frequent reporting of the acts of disorder created a moral panic that is not in proportion with the scale of the actual problem. However, this kind of behavior is certainly a problem and I am sure many people have firsthand experience with it on the streets. As an Estonian, I have not noticed or thought about this kind of extreme support for football locally, as it does not seem to be such a big thing there (perhaps because we do not win a lot), so as I lived abroad, I saw with disturbed wonder how riled up men could get from just – in my humble opinion –  football. To someone not having followed or cared about the games or the culture, the streets filled with crazy drunk football fans can be a dangerous picture. These days, any kind of extreme fandom or stan-culture tends to be unhealthy, while creating too much opposition, and seems to be an excuse to be violent or cause trouble.

As for the reasons behind such behavior, there can be many. Football hooliganism has been called “ritualized male violence,”[1] which succinctly sums up the phenomenon. Scholars Paul Gow and Joel Rookwood at Liverpool Hope University found in a 2008 study that “football violence can be explained in relation to a number of factors, relating to interaction, identity, legitimacy and power. Football violence is also thought to reflect expressions of strong emotional ties to a football team, which may help to reinforce a supporter’s sense of identity.”[2] It can often happen that people without a sense of identity fall “victim” to extremist groups that give them a purpose and a meaning to life. It is exhilarating and freeing to be a part of something, to feel like you belong. This is not a good and healthy way of going about it though. Hopefully, in the future, people will find better ways to search for their identity and to feel like they belong, and there will be less need for senseless violence and tiring rivalry, and everyone can exist beside each other in peace.

Jaanika Malla


[1] Ramón Spaaij, Understanding Football Hooliganism: A Comparison of Six Western European Countries.

[2] https://web.archive.org/web/20141031101939/http://www.joelrookwood.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/Paper-6-Gow-and-Rookwood-Vol-2-2009.pdf
 

Most of you probably think there are many sports that are individuals, such as athletics, swimming, bicycle… However, they are a team sports to me.
I practiced athletics for 6 years in the local team in my village, in Spain. I didn´t know I liked running, in fact, I took part in the swimming team until I realized of that.
I decided to sign up in the team when I was 12, but I didn´t know I will find one of my best friends in there. I will introduce you to my friend Raquel. She is my neighbor and I know her since we are children. But we just played before take part in the same team of athletics. When she became a member of the club, it joined us a lot. We trained together, we went out together, we traveled to the races together… we were partners but also friends. In addition, we were with another two friends, Saray and Vanessa, and we made a very good team in which we support each other’s. In fact, I went with them to my first national competition. If I had been alone, I would never have achieved it, for sure.
We are still friends and I really appreciate the athletics gave this to me, especially about Raquel, who is one of my best friends and I feel that our relationship will be forever.
This story is just my own experience, but there is many stories of connection through sports. I believe in the power of sports to connect and to join people, and I think it is one of the best opportunities to know people similar to you, who probably will became in your friends for a long time.

​Diana Martínez Rincón