Eddie Betts is ready to put last weekend’s crappy racist incident at the Showdown behind him.
ICYMI: Betts, a proud Aboriginal man, was the target of a racist attack during the game, when a Port Adelaide FC fan waved their middle fingers towards the Adelaide FC player, before throwing a banana at him and yelling ‘monkey’ at him.
Since, both clubs have condemned the action, and Port Adelaide have offered the woman a place in their Indigenous Awareness program, which she has accepted.
Betts released a video statement yesterday, expressing his sadness that racism still exists in the AFL in 2016.
Today, the forward appeared as a guest of FiveAA talkback radio in South Australia, saying that he had forgiven the woman for her actions.
“She came out and she apologised, I don’t hold grudges — I forgive her for what she’s done and I think everyone else should as well.She’s seeking help and you know, it’s never too late to learn. And a life ban, I don’t think she should get a life ban.”
He praised the efforts of Port Adelaide for how they dealt with the incident, and for offering the program to help educate the woman:
“This is all about education. Like I said, it’s never too late to learn.The way I think of it is that no-one is born racist, no-one is born with it so it’s been ingrained in her somewhere down the track or she hasn’t learnt about it.I was just disappointed because it’s still out there and it’s still in our game. I guess we’ve just got to stamp it out of the game and I guess the AFL is the perfect platform for stamping out racism.”
Betts said he hoped the woman would be able to “come back and enjoy the footy”:
“You know everyone enjoys their footy, you’ve just got to be careful what you do or what you say at the footy. You can’t do that, you can’t throw stuff on the field, you can’t say that towards players.Just let her be in peace now I guess, go on in her life with peace because I know she’s got a lot of abusing messages on social media and all that so like I said, I’ve forgiven her and so should all of you.”
Such a good bloke. Classy as hell. 
Source: ABC.
Photo: James Elsby / Getty.
