Dave Whelan in the Cross-Hairs

By Max Musson:

Dave Whelan is a former professional soccer player with Blackburn Rovers and Crewe Alexandra football clubs who was forced to give up his playing career through injury. He is something of a legend however having built up a multi-million pound sports business empire and now owns Wigan Athletic football club. He is the former owner of JJB Sports and the current owner of the DW Stadium where Wigan Athletic and Wigan Warriors RLFC play and is reputedly worth more than David Beckham.

He is therefore a man of renown who has proved himself as a ‘go-getter’ in whatever field of endeavour he turns his hand, and at the age of seventy-eight, someone whose lifetime achievements are such that any reasonable person might be prepared to overlook any small personal eccentricity or foible that might come to light during a moment of unguarded conversation. Yet despite this, Dave Whelan has surprisingly become embroiled in a very public ‘hoo-hah’ that finds him standing in the cross-hairs of organised Jewry, who are clearly ‘out for blood’.

In recent months Jewish groups have become increasingly aware that the harsh military reprisals by the Israelis against the Palestinian people, particularly in Gaza, and the willingness of diaspora Jews to turn a blind eye to these while constantly reminding everyone, at every opportunity about the atrocities they suffered during World War Two, have given rise to a public awareness of the hypocrisy of this situation and a degree of resentment towards Jews generally amongst sections of the public sympathetic to the Palestinian cause.

Groups representing organised Jewry, such as the Community Security Trust (CST), have for years now been collecting and recording details of every incident that could possibly be construed as an expression of anti-Jewish beliefs or attitudes and they routinely present these to the police and to establishment politicians as ‘evidence’ of the need to impose, maintain and strengthen our already Draconian ‘hate speech’ legislation. Naturally therefore, sensing a rising tide of public disquiet regarding the behaviour of the Israeli military – the raining down of phosphorous bombs upon defenceless Palestinian women and children — the CST and other organs of organised Jewry are currently engaged in a campaign to remind the public that while all forms of racism are of course equally evil, ‘anti-Semitism’ is the most heinous form of racism, more evil than any other, and should not be tolerated even in our most private thoughts.

This is where Dave Whelan comes in. His involvement in this affair started last month when he appointed former Cardiff City Football Club boss, Malky Mackay, as Wigan Athletic’s new manager.

At the time Mackay was still being investigated by the Football Association over claims he sent private text messages on his mobile phone, of a homophobic, racist and sexist nature while at Cardiff.

According to newspaper reports, Malky Mackay had been reported to the Football Association after a number of allegedly racist and homophobic text messages were found by police. The messages were recovered by the police after a raid on the home of Crystal Palace’s former director of football, Ian Moody, in connection with an investigation into suspected illegalities surrounding player transfers.

Referring to Jewish football agent Phil Smith, a text from Mackay’s phone apparently said: “Go on fat Phil. Nothing like a Jew that sees money slipping through his fingers”.

Mackay is also thought to have referred to Israeli club, Maccabi Tel Aviv as simply “the Jews” and has also been accused of describing in another text, Cardiff City FC owner, the Malaysian Vincent Tan, as a ‘Chink’.

It doesn’t appear as though Malky Mackay is to be prosecuted by the police for incitement to racial hatred however, the remarks made cannot therefore have been regarded by the Crown prosecution Service as sufficient to secure a criminal conviction. It appears however, that the police subsequently took it upon themselves to report the content of Mackay’s private text messages to Cardiff City Football Club, who then passed the details on to the Football Association, and along the way, someone leaked them into the public domain so that a civil action could be taken against Mackay for allegedly ‘bringing the game of football into disrepute’.

It is worth noting here, that had the content of the text messages not been leaked into the public domain, then irrespective of their alleged content, they could not have brought the game into disrepute. They were private remarks between two friends and the public would have been unaware of them and clearly therefore someone has been instrumental in creating circumstances deliberately contrived to produce a public row over the issue of alleged racism, and not just mere ‘common or garden’ racism, but anti-Semitism, its most ‘heinous’ and ‘unforgivable’ form.

Just who might be responsible for this we cannot say, but it is useful in these situations to apply the principle of ‘Cui bono?’ — literally, ‘who benefits’, from this situation?

As a consequence of the action by the Football Association against Malky Mackay, pressure was then brought to bear upon Dave Whelan, urging him not to consider Mackay for the position of manager of Wigan Athletic. It was at this point that Dave Whelan is alleged to have made further ‘racist’ and ‘anti-Semitic’ comments of his own, and this was the moment the cross-hairs move from Malky Mackay, to the much bigger target and one that would attract far more publicity for someone’s campaign to draw public attention to the insidious threat of bourgeoning ‘anti-Semitism’.

Initially, on Wigan Athletic’s club website, Dave Whelan stated referring to his intended appointment of Malky Mackay, “”I know that this appointment will draw criticism in some quarters but we go into it with our eyes open and we have nothing to hide on this subject.

“Malky made a mistake, he knows that, we know that and we have discussed this issue at length face to face.

“He apologised publicly for what happened at the time and has paid for what he did, in terms of the bad publicity he has received since and will no doubt continue to suffer in the future.

“But I believe that it is now time to move on.

“Contrary to the way he has been portrayed in recent months, the Malky Mackay I met this week, and who has been vouched for by the many different people from whom we have sought advice before making this appointment, is an honourable man.”

Whelan continued: “He is a committed family man with decent values and is a professional who has worked and thrived for over 20 years in the multi-cultural world of modern football.

“There is nothing more to say about this subject. As far as I am concerned, we draw a line under it from today.”

These remarks by Dave Whelan are obviously the words of a man who is taking a broad view of an unfortunate situation in which a hitherto accomplished football manager and colleague, with a distinguished career both as a player and a manager behind him, has been embarrassed by the revelation in public of remarks that should have remained private. Dave Whelan is renowned as a plain speaking man for whom honesty and loyalty towards his friends and colleagues is a given and he clearly spoke with good intent in an attempt to spread oil over troubled waters.

Later, however, in a further attempt to explain that no offence was intended by Malky Mackay in his comments regarding Phil Smith, Dave Whelan allowed himself to be interviewed by David Conn the well known sports reporter for the Guardian newspaper. In that interview with David Conn, who is Jewish, Dave Whelan is reported to have stated when asked whether he thought what Mackay had said was not offensive, because he believes negative stereotypes about Jews loving money: “Do you think Jewish people chase money a little bit more than we do? … I think Jewish people do chase money more than everybody else. I think they are very shrewd people … the Jews don’t like losing money. Nobody likes losing money … I don’t think that’s offensive at all.”

It would appear that Dave Whelan didn’t realise he was talking to a Jew during this interview and allegedly went on to say that he did not think there was “a lot wrong” with anything Mackay had said, and there was no malice or disrespect in the statement about Smith, adding: “It’s telling the truth. Jewish people love money, English people love money; we all love money.”

Dave Whelan’s remarks reported in the Guardian newspaper were later condemned by Simon Johnson, a former Football Association and Premier League executive who also happens to be Jewish and is the chief executive at the Jewish Leadership Council.

“Unfortunately Mr Mackay and now Mr Whelan have referred to some of the worst old-fashioned tropes which have been used in the past as the basis of antisemitism and stereotyping of Jewish people,” he said. “Mackay used offensive language to insult a fellow participant in football using a tawdry racial stereotype.”

Consequently, the reporting of Dave Whelan’s remarks made in defence of Malky Mackay, have now resulted in an announcement by the Football Association that they intend to level charges against Dave Whelan too, for also bringing the game of football into disrepute.

Unwisely, Dave Whelan has subsequently allowed himself to be interviewed by the BBC’s David Ornstein, who would also appear to be Jewish, and in that interview Whelan attempts to apologise for any offence caused by his remarks defending Malky Mackay, but Ornstein prolongs the interview, interpreting everything that Whelan says in such a way that Whelan is induced to apologise repeatedly and in an increasingly profuse and imploring manner. The full text of this interview can be found on the BBC website.

When one considers that the allegedly offensive words used by both Malky Mackay and Dave Whelan are rather mild, falling well short of what might be regarded as either insulting or an incitement to racial hatred, one might have assumed that Jewish commentators and Jewish spokespeople would have regarded both Mackay’s and Whelan’s profuse apologies as more than enough redress for any affront to their feelings, but no!

Despite all the apologies it is becoming increasingly apparent that organised Jewry and others are looking to ‘take a scalp’, if not two, and a chorus of Jewish spokespeople, and Jewish individuals have been encouraged or induced to line-up to take ‘pot shots’ at Dave Whelan over an issue that ostensibly is really not a big deal, and which should never have been made public.

Anti-racism campaign group ‘Kick It Out’ has questioned whether Whelan is a “fit and proper person” to run a football club, stating: “The remarks act as another example of the culture which continues to exist within football and further proves that some in positions of power seem comfortable sharing those views either privately or publicly. These comments must not go unchallenged and have to be investigated by the Football Association.”

West Ham Football Club owner David Gold, who is Jewish, has been quoted in the press complaining about the remarks made. He apparently said he has known Mr Whelan for several years and was “saddened” by his remarks. “I’m struggling to accept it and there it is in black and white. It’s undeniable”.

Labour MP Ivan Lewis, who is Jewish, and also the ex-chief executive of the Manchester Jewish Federation, has also called for the Football Association to take the “toughest possible action” against the ‘Latics’ chairman. He told the BBC: “What we discovered yesterday was that Dave Whelan shares Malky Mackay’s abhorrent anti-Semitic and racist views. In my view, the FA has to now take the toughest possible action against Dave Whelan.”

The Jewish ‘Community Security Trust’ (CST) has accused Dave Whelan of reflecting “the persistence of dinosaur attitudes in football”. They said the remarks had showed that further efforts must be made to combat racism in the sport.

A CST spokesman said: “Dave Whelan’s comments invoked anti-Semitic stereotypes about Jews and money and his apology suggests that he still doesn’t understand why his comments were offensive.

“It is an indication of how widespread such outdated attitudes still are within football, and how much work needs to be done to eradicate this way of thinking.”

The Board of Deputies of British Jews vice-chairman, Jonathan Arkush, said Mr Whelan had brought the game into disrepute with “outrageous and offensive” comments. “You cannot insult a whole group of people, and then say, ‘I would never insult them’, and hope that’s ok”. Furthermore, the Jewish Chronicle newspaper has revealed they have conducted widespread telephoning of Jews in the Manchester and Wigan area in order to discuss this issue.

The Football Association has now charged Dave Whelan with breaching its rules on racism and an investigation is under way. The FA’s governance division has written to the former footballer turned businessman. In a statement the FA said: “We take all forms of discrimination seriously. As with all such cases, this will be dealt with as a priority”.

The FA have charged Dave Whelan with an aggravated breach of its rule against improper conduct and bringing the game into disrepute, just one day after receiving the Wigan Athletic owner’s “observations” about his comments. Football’s governing body said it is alleged Whelan breached the relevant rule, E3(1) of the FA handbook, because his comments were “abusive and/or insulting and/or constitute improper conduct and/or bring the game into disrepute”.

The charge alleges this breach was “aggravated”, according to the FA’s rule E3(2), because “it included a reference to ethnic origin and/or race and/or nationality and/or religion or belief”.

In a television interview Dave Whelan has stated he will quit if he was found guilty of racism.

He said: “Should they even suggest I’m guilty I would immediately resign from my position as chairman of Wigan Athletic. I hope they don’t and I don’t see anything like that happening because I’m absolutely anti-racist, always have been, always will be.”

Dave Whelan is of course what most reasonable people would describe as ‘a plain speaking northerner’, and in his interview with David Ornstein attempts to explain that all nationalities are given ‘nick names’ and have stereotypical qualities attributed to them as part of everyday ‘banter’ and without any malice intended.

Jews are often portrayed stereotypically as ‘tight-fisted’, ‘lacking generosity’ and ‘pre-occupied with money matters’, in much the same way that such qualities are also light-heartedly attributed to the Scots.

In this respect I am reminded of a long running marketing campaign by one of my former employers, the Scottish Provident Life Assurance Society, who for many years sponsored a regular and very successful cartoon strip in the prestigious financial magazine ‘Money Management’, featuring the humorous antics of caricatured cartoon characters who were portrayed as ‘canny Scots’, careful with their money. The cartoon strip was published under the title, ‘Clan McCanny Chronicles’. This was an example of Scots using an unfortunate national stereotype in a positive way, and with humour, turning it to their advantage.

One might say that this is an example that Jews could learn a lot from, except that such an assertion makes the naive assumption that the campaign against Dave Whelan and Malky Mackay really is merely a spontaneous attempt by an array of Jewish individuals to combat anti-Jewish hatred, rather than a thinly veiled attempt by Jewish supremacists, influential within organised Jewry, to use trumped up charges as a means of intimidating those who might be inclined to criticise Jews generally or for their often unquestioning support for Israel and the Israeli military.

The former assumption of course requires one to believe that an assertion that ‘Jews are more concerned with money matters than non-Jews’, or equating the term ‘Chink’, when used in connection with an Oriental person, with terms such as ‘Brit’ or ‘Limey’ when used in connection with a Briton, are manifestations of racial hatred, so serious they warrant destroying the careers of two distinguished sporting personalities.

Not all of the Jewish individuals mentioned in this article will of course be a party to the machinations of Jewish supremacists, some will themselves be dupes of the hype, but there is clearly an orchestrated campaign against Dave Whelan and Malky Mackay which reflects badly upon organised Jewry as a whole and which is attempting to instil within the public, fear of Jewish influence as a means of indirectly suppressing criticism of Jews and Israel.

I very much hope that Dave Whelan sticks to his guns and refuses to resign irrespective of what the Football Association may decide. The words he and Malky Mackay have used regarding Jews and Vincent Tan are not complementary, they are less than flattering, but they are not evidence of racial hatred, nor indeed would they qualify as insulting. Other than the few unflattering words reported, the careers of both Dave Whelan and Malky Mackay have been exemplary and provide no evidence that either man has ever acted malevolently towards people of a different race and it is unacceptable that they should be pilloried in the press in the way they have and that they should face the kind of charges levelled at them by the Football Association.

One thing is for sure, if these two men are forced to resign their positions over a matter so trivial, this affair will have entirely the opposite effect intended by those who ostensibly claim to be campaigning against anti-Semitism. It will be seen as an entirely unwarranted, spiteful and needlessly gratuitous display of Jewish power, and while it may make people more careful about what they say in public, it will serve to provoke strong private feelings of antipathy towards Jews.

If Jewish groups sincerely wish to make Jews more popular, the way to do this is for Jews to stop doing the things that make Jews unpopular and to use their influence for the benefit of the host community among whom they live. For individual Jews this is not such a major issue, but for Jewish organisations that owe their very existence to the perpetuation of a separate Jewish identity and the perpetuation of a minority culture built upon a strong in-group/out-group mentality towards others, such a proposition is of course, highly problematic.

In any event, it is unacceptable that minority groups should be able to target and for their own ends, publicly pillory through the media, distinguished sporting and business personalities in the way that Dave Whelan and Malky Mackay have been pilloried in recent weeks. A culture of tyranny has been created by the race relations  industry which now bears down upon our people and under which even the most private of conversations are not safe from inquisitors who seek to persecute anyone who holds views deemed politically incorrect. This is an intolerable situation and it must end!

By Max Musson © 2014

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