Facebook, Instagram, Twitter Boycotted By Soccer Players, British Athletes

Social media posts from the top British sports teams and players will be nowhere to be found this weekend. Soccer, rugby and cricket leagues are boycotting Facebook, Instagram and Twitter in response to the way those platforms have handled online abuse.

The social media blackout starts at 3:00 p.m. in London Friday and concludes at 11:59 p.m. Monday. It’s a call for the tech giants to increase their efforts to prevent online discrimination against players and the general public.

“We know that a boycott alone will not eradicate this, which is why we will continue to take proactive steps to call for change,” the Premier League said in a statement.

“We will not stop challenging social media companies until discriminatory online abuse is removed from our game and wider society.”

The number of reports of discrimination in professional soccer rose from 313 to 446 last season, according to Kick it Out, English football’s equality and inclusion organization. Manchester United said it has seen a 350% increase in online abuse towards its players

Arsenal forward Thierry Henry deleted his social media accounts at the end of March because of the racist comments that have been directed toward Black soccer players, and he’s happy to see other athletes join him.

“If it [coming off social media] can make a little impact and have an impact ... for that, you need the strength of the pack,” Henry told CNN. “So when I saw that it did happen recently, I was actually happy about it, but I was thinking about all those people that have been waiting for that for a very long time. It is a great tool, as we talked about, but people use it as a weapon sometimes.”

Twitter said it’s removed more than 7,000 tweets regarding soccer in the U.K. that violated company rules in fewer than eight months, according to CNBC. The company noted that it was only a small fraction of the tweets made about soccer during that span.

“We agree with and have already made progress on many of the players’ suggestions, including taking tougher action against people breaking our rules in DMs,” a Facebook spokesperson said, via CNBC.