As a means of personally combatting antisemitism amongst their fans, the powerful Chelsea football club in England will be offering their fans an alternative to being banned from home games.
Perviously, if a fan had displayed racist behavior towards the Jewish demographic of the fanbase, the club would confiscate their season tickets and bar them from the games for up to three years.
But now, Roman Abramovich, the Jewish owner of the Stamford Bridge stadium in Fulham, London, is spearheading an initiative that will offer the supporters an option: they can either accept the 3-year ban or they can participate in the educational courses that are taught at Auschwitz.
Furthermore, Chelsea is so intent on curbing racist behavior, they will be covering all of the costs of the courses.
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“If you just ban people, you will never change their behavior,” said Chelsea chairman Bruce Buck, according to The Sun. “This policy gives them the chance to realize what they have done, to make them want to behave better.
“In the past, we would take them from the crowd and ban them, for up to three years. Now we say ‘You did something wrong. You have the option. We can ban you or you can spend some time with our diversity officers, understanding what you did wrong’.”
The initiative has reportedly been backed by the World Jewish Congress and the Holocaust Education Trust.
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It’s nice of Chelsea to fund educational courses for their anti-Semitic fans at Auschwitz it’s a worthwhile action by Chelsea Football Club.