Arsenal: Mikel Arteta reveals shocking but sadly unsurprising abuse

In the world of social media, doors have opened everywhere for healthy and constructive discourse. Parallel to that is vile and discriminatory abuse. It’s everywhere in football, and Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta has revealed he has not escaped social media’s damaging grasp.

Speaking to the media ahead of Arsenal’s Premier League clash with Leeds on Sunday, the question was posed to Arteta about whether the abuse on platforms such as Twitter and Instagram have got worse of late.

The issue has been prevalent for depressingly longer than the last few weeks, with disgusting racist comments happening on a regular basis and players, managers and referees becoming the subjects of death threats. Sadly that’s not it. Mike Dean and Steve Bruce being the two most recent cases of the latter.

Dealing with the day-to-day pressures of being in the public eye may not garner much sympathy from other working professionals who have their own stresses to deal with, but the added layer of communication in being constantly tagged, discussed and directly messaged on social media brings with it greater scope for abuse and abhorrent behaviour.

Arsenal boss Mikel Arteta reveals he and his family have been the targets of disgusting abuse on social media

As Mikel Arteta said, it happens to everyone. With even some disgraceful individuals targetting his family.

"“I’d prefer not to [speak about it] but I think we’re all exposed to that in this industry. That’s why I’d prefer not to read it because it would affect me personally much more the moment that somebody wants to [harm] my family,” he told the official Arsenal website.“Because it happened, the club was aware of it and we tried to do something about it. That’s it. We have to live with it. It’s not going to stop tomorrow, we know that, but medium or long-term can we do something about it? That’s what I am pushing for.”"

Arsenal have put many supporters through the worst season many of them will ever have experienced. The results have been atrocious and the football among the worst seen at the Emirates. That doesn’t just draw in criticism, it demands it. There are many variables to consider in why it has been allowed to happen but the bottom line is that it’s far below the standard expected.

None of which, none whatsoever, justifies the volume of racist remarks and threats of violence towards the victims of similar footballing struggles. Not in football. Not anywhere.

"Arteta added: “My only purpose is just, it’s not going to happen tomorrow, but can we do something about it in the medium to long term to protect the people that are involved in the game, and maybe in other industries it happens in the same way.”"

The Premier League and other footballing bodies have been in contact with social media platforms to express their concerns over how abuse such as that which has been growing in volume each year is allowed to take place unpunished.

It’s not even surprising anymore. Abuse in this form has become tragically normal practice. There is a void of accountability on these platforms, and while reducing that won’t eradicate the issue entirely, it’s the first step.