The big football game is back on- Paris Foot Gay vs Creteil Bebel

On Saturday, I did a blog posting for Lib Dem Voice titled Muslims won't play with the gays, talking about two amateur football teams, Creteil Bebel and Paris Foot Gay who were due to play each other last weekend.

The two teams are Creteil Bebel, a Muslim team and Paris Foot Gay are a gay friendly team set up to combat homophobia in the suburbs of Paris.

Well, there appears to be an update now, Creteil Bebel director Zahir Belgharbi said there had been "a misunderstanding" and said his team were now ready to play against Paris Foot Gay.

The Director said: "We had rejected playing this match not on the grounds of homophobia, as we have been accused of doing, but simply because the name of the club did not seem to us to reflect our vision of sport."

I have no idea what that means and it sounds the lamest excuse I have ever heard. Sport has nothing to do with people's religion nor their sexuality. Paris Foot Gay seems to have been around at least two and a half years and perhaps before the Muslim team announced their refusal to play the team last week their Directors should have done a wee bit of research.

"We reacted by turning down the invitation from Paris Foot Gay for fear of it leading to an instrumentalisation on the part of this club in that it was highlighting the homosexuality of its players."

Again, another load of rubbish, football teams in leagues play against each other, it never means that one team's philosophy/name/town etc is highlighted more than on the match day programme. Also, just by a quick search on the Paris Foot Gay website shows that only some of the players are gay, it is a gay friendly football team set up to combat homophobia.

The local league president Jacques Stouvenel has said that both clubs were due to attend a meeting over the incident this week and that Creteil Bebel could face disciplinary action or be kicked out of the league.

My personal view is that some formal warning is all that is needed, they have now offered to play Paris Foot Gay and that should be accepted in the spirit in which it appears to have been intended.

Kicking Creteil Bebel out of this amateur league will not serve any purpose, either short term or long term. Let us hope the directors and and players of Creteil Bebel have learnt an important lesson this week.

Homophobia won't be tolerated, the same as racism. Not in sport, not in life.

Muslims won't play with the gays!

We often see claims of racism and homophobia in sport today, more often than not though it is the fans who are accused of chants that are not as PC as they perhaps should be.

So when news of this story reached my in box from a few sources, I dug around and to be honest was appalled.

A Muslim amateur football team Creteil Bebel has pulled out of its planned game this weekend with Paris Foot Gay (PFG), saying it was against their religious beliefs to play against homosexuals.

In fact, Zahir Belgarbi, one of the team directors told Reuters: "As a Muslim, I have the right not to play against homosexuals because I don't share their ideas."

Another team member explained to a local French radio station: "We're sorry if anyone feels insulted. (But) as a Muslim I still have the right to decide not to play because I don't agree with their philosophy."

So, if it is the philosophy of being gay they have an issue with they would never play football against any other team in the world unless they were a Muslim team, or do I have that all wrong?

Paris Foot Gay was set up in 2003 in the poor suburbs of Paris to fight homophobia which was rampant in those parts of Paris and they have proved their very worth and although have had some insults over the years never on such a scale as this.

Paris Foot Gay are being supported not only by Paris authorities but also human rights groups and they have also said they make take legal action against Creteil Bebel.

For crying out loud, if the boot had been on the other foot (sorry about the pun) can you imagine the racism claims, and rightly so, so why can a team be openly homophobic and get away with it?

I write this and say this as an openly gay man - Creteil Bebel are not doing themselves or the Muslim community itself any favours, mainly because of the words they chose to use "I don't agree with their philosophy."

The reason I say this is because surely they don't agree with the philosophy of Christianity, or Catholicism and well, people who eat pork?

They have never refused to play against any of those from what I can ascertain so why is a team that is fighting homophobia and discrimination any different?

I think this is a sad day not just for sport, but for diversity itself.

As featured on Lib Dem Voice, a joint blog post.