The German 800m runner Smilla Kolbe has condemned the racist abuse of some of her teammates on social media after competing in the European Athletics Championships semi-finals.
Speaking after finishing sixth behind Keely Hodgkinson, the 24-year-old made a point of extending a trackside interview to tell German TV: “I don’t want to imagine what it would be like if I wasn’t as white as I am.”
“Can I just say one more thing?” she said at the end of the interview. “I feel that, somehow, I read so many comments and I’m really grateful for all the support we’re getting, but even so, I see some really harsh comments in the comment section of certain athletes, and I’d like us to represent Germany here and, somehow, get support from everyone watching and I’d expect a bit more respect.
“I’m really pleased that so many people are supporting me, but I don’t want to imagine what it would be like if I wasn’t as white as I am, and it was important for me to say that,” she said.
“I expect all viewers to show the necessary respect and to celebrate the fantastic performances of our athletes.”
The German Athletics Federation has a dedicated staff member in Birmingham working to combat online hate speech. It is also working with the Frankfurt Public Prosecutor’s Office to identify, delete and prosecute hate speech.
At the 2024 Olympics, the German Olympics Sports Confederation also said it would take legal action against hate speech to protect athletes, and used AI software to automatically delete nearly 4,000 messages that were threatening, abusive, racist or sexist.
Hodgkinson has herself sometimes deleted X, formerly known as Twitter, around major championships, describing the app as “awful”, and World Athletics have also made it a priority to tackle online abuse.
At the end of 2024, the World Athletics president, Sebastian Coe, concluded a study that looked at 1.4m messages sent to athletes by saying that the governing body was giving athletes tools to “proactively protect themselves against online abuse”.
“Athlete welfare is at the very top of our priority list, and we will continue to put measures in place to ensure that athletes can confidently and safely engage with social media platforms,” he added.
