World Cup: Kingsley Coman and the abyss of social media

You don't even have to search for it, it jumps out at every user: Monkey emojis were posted along with the excrement symbol. France's national team player Kingsley Coman has been berated in the worst possible way on social networks such as Twitter, Facebook and Instagram since France lost the World Cup final. In the comments on his Instagram channel, the whole racist portfolio is there for all to see. Misguided users even wanted to "send him back to Africa."

Coman, who was born in Paris in 1996, had missed his penalty against Argentina's keeper Emiliano Martinez as France's second penalty taker in the shootout of the final. After another miss, the game was lost for France.

"Les Bleues made us dream,'" President Emmanuel Macron tweeted, consoling the players on the field and in the dressing room. But among the users, there were quite a few who gave free rein to their hatred.

England players were also the target of hate

Just over a year ago, England players Bukayo Saka, Jadon Sancho and Marcus Rashford experienced the same thing. All three had failed to score in the penalty shootout against Italy in the European Championship final and were subsequently the target of racist comments. Saka reacted confidently and took the operators of the platforms to task: "I knew immediately what kind of hate I would encounter. And it's a sad reality that your powerful platforms don't do enough to stop these messages," Saka wrote on Twitter.

Not much seems to have been done in this regard, however. Once again, the racist comments are not being blocked or removed by the social media companies. There is, however, another phenomenon on display: Coman as well as his teammate Aurelien Tchouameni also received a lot of encouragement.

The majority of users apparently preferred not to remain silent, but to confront hate and racism directly. "Cheer up, King!" can be read in the comments, and "No need to be ashamed.... you are our heroes, no matter what". Hearts and France's national flag were posted as a sign of support. As one user put it: "If he wins, he's French. If not he's African."

Encouragement for Coman came from elsewhere, too. Bayern Munich CEO Oliver Kahn offered a big compliment via Twitter. The French runners-up could all be "proud." Now it's a matter of "getting back up and moving on," Kahn wrote.

This article was originally published in German.