GWINNETT COUNTY, Ga. — Some parents are outraged after they say a coach made an extremely offensive racial slur to several Black players in a community football league.
The kids on the team are only 13 years old. Many of them have now quit the team in protest and Saturday’s playoff game has been canceled.
The boys play for a team called the Bulldogs in Gwinnett County at a field in George Pierce Park.
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The coach has been suspended indefinitely, but parents said they want him fired.
The incident happened last Thursday during a practice.
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A mother told Channel 2′s Tyisha Fernandes that her son was laughing and talking to another player in a huddle and it upset his coach.
What players say the coach said to them is an old slur that was used in the 1960s. The word is so offensive we are leaving the word out, but according to the boys, the coach said:
“This generation is weak, if this was 40 years ago, you &%$#, I’d slap you upside the head. And if you tried to do anything about it, the rest of the team would jump you.”
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Channel 2 is not identifying the mother and son Fernandes spoke to, because now he is getting harassed by some of his fellow football players and their parents.
“It scared my son more than we actually realized,” the mom told Fernandes. “You know racism exists, but to actually encounter it by somebody we have trusted to nurture and train our children is absolutely mortifying.”
The coach, who we are also not identifying, denied using the word. But many parents don’t buy it, because none of the young players even knew what the word meant until they heard it from the coach and told their parents.
“There’s no reason why a boy this age would ever lie about such a word,” the mother said. “It kind of escalated and the boys refused to play.”
The Black players said this has now become a Black and White thing. Many of the White players wanted them to forget about it so they could play the playoff game Saturday.
That made the Black players even more mad, and now they’ve quit the team.
They’re now demanding that the coach be fired.
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