Yan Dhanda: Swansea City shocked by Facebook response as abuser has messages blocked
- Published
Former Liverpool youngster Yan Dhanda has scored five goals in 42 games since joining Swansea in 2018
Swansea City have criticised Facebook's response after the person who racially abused Yan Dhanda on Instagram did not have their account shut down.
Dhanda, 22, was abused after Swansea's FA Cup loss to Manchester City.
Facebook has temporarily stopped the user from sending Instagram messages.
"Swansea City is shocked and surprised by the leniency shown by Facebook towards one of their users who racially abused a member of our playing squad," a club statement said.
"The abhorrent level of abuse that we have witnessed this week means that once again we seek stronger action from social media companies in order to stamp this type of toxic behaviour out and we fully back the EFL's open letter that was sent to Twitter and Facebook in light of recent events.
"It is appalling that Facebook cannot empathise more with the victim of such offensive messages and Yan Dhanda continues to have our full support at the football club as we work with South Wales Police to assist in their ongoing investigation."
Dhanda, who is of British Asian background, was sent a racist message after playing 77 minutes of Manchester City's 3-1 victory at the Liberty Stadium on Wednesday.
The matter was reported to South Wales Police, who are continuing investigations.
Facebook, which owns Instagram, said people deserve a chance to learn from their errors.
"We do not want racism and hate on our platforms," a Facebook spokesperson said.
"The person who sent this message has been restricted from sending messages on Instagram for a set period of time, and we will remove new accounts created to get around this restriction.
"We think it's important people have the opportunity to learn from their mistakes but, per the new measures put in place this week, if they continue to break our rules this account will be removed."
Facebook has not revealed how long the account concerned will be stopped from sending messages, but Swansea head coach Steve Cooper has suggested it could be for as little as a fortnight.
Speaking to BBC Radio Wales, Cooper said: "I don't think the Facebook sanction is adequate. I think it was for a couple of weeks or something.
"That can't be right. Yan is a human being that's been racially abused.
"The abuse is the main problem, but the lack of sanctions afterwards is a big part of the problem as well.
"That's the only way we are going to get close to eradicating this, not just from sport, but in general, by having proper laws in place that are put into action when somebody breaks them."
Swansea and Manchester City condemned the abuse as soon as it came to light in midweek, while Dhanda wrote on Twitter that he was "so proud of who I am and representing Asians".
In their initial statement about the abuse of Dhanda, Swansea called on social media companies to "go above and beyond to stamp out this abhorrent level of behaviour", while Manchester City said they would support police in their bid to establish whether one of their fans was involved.
On Thursday, some of football's governing bodies wrote a joint letter to Facebook and Twitter urging them to "accept responsibility for preventing abuse" and "go further than you have promised to do to date" in the wake of a number of abusive messages aimed at footballers in recent weeks.
On Wednesday, before Dhanda joined the list of players targeted, Facebook said it was "horrified" by the continued online abuse of players.
Former England Under-17s international Dhanda, who hails from the West Midlands, is one of a handful of British Asians currently playing professional football in the United Kingdom.
The ex-Liverpool youngster, whose father Jaz was born in England to Indian parents, spoke earlier this season about the racist abuse he faced as a youngster.
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