Whether they helped bring down José Mourinho at Manchester United or pushed back against their club’s owner in Chelsea, these fan protest stories remind us that football fan activism is more than just a fad. It remains a powerful tool in the fight for social change, as it has been throughout history.
As Black folks fought for integration during the Civil Rights Movement, they turned their passion for sports into a nonviolent weapon. Their fandom went beyond mere interest in a game or a team; their support constituted a collective identity and sense of community. In the same vein, when clubs and stadiums segregated seating, fans took to the streets to protest. They marched and held signs that urged fans to boycott games and teams. Newspapers such as the Black press kept fans informed of the latest boycotts, and famous writers like Jim Hall, Marcel Hopson and Marion Jackson used their columns to highlight the boycotts and encourage readers to join them.
More recently, a group of LA Galaxy fans—including the Angel City Brigade, Galaxians and LA Riot Squad—walked out of the stadium during a home game against Vancouver in protest of their club’s silence over immigration raids in Southern California. Leslie Jimenez, the leader of the group, says there isn’t a day that goes by without her thinking about the raids.
Often, news media coverage of protests portrays underrepresented groups negatively. To help journalists avoid this trap, we suggest that they focus on framing stories in ways that promote positive attitudes toward underrepresented groups. This article explores how to do this by demonstrating some implementations of Activism of Care, an activist strategy that uses communication and posting formats (such as shout outs, prompts and asks) that are part of a community’s culture, for example, in Tumblr-based fan fiction communities, to destigmatize mental illness and celebrate neurodivergent participants.
