What to make of Tottenham Dele Alli’s controversial Coronavirus Snapchat video

The Daily Mirror yesterday published a controversial story showing Tottenham’s Dele Alli deriding the Coronavirus in a Snapchat video to his friends. 

Preparing to board a flight destined for Dubai, Dele was wearing a preventative mask while making light of the deadly disease.

While totally unacceptable behaviour, some perspective is needed.

Dele is a 23-year-old man with the world at his feet. Privileged, advantaged and unquestionably entitled, Dele has once again shone a light on what is unacceptable for those in society’s leadership roles.

Whether Dele likes it or not, he is looked to by millions around the world as an idol, a hero, a mentor. Famous athletes, whether they’re ready for it or not, are placed on a pedestal, their every move being watched, magnified and readied for scrutiny.

Clearly, as he has shown numerous times before, Dele is not ready for the lofty societal responsibility that accompanies being a superstar footballer. While I’m not defending his latest antics, try, for a second, to remember what life was like as a 23-year-old. Very rarely does one at that impressionable age think about the consequences of every action, the ramifications of an ill-humoured “joke”.

Of course Dele should know by now that his actions aren’t on par with an average 23 year old’s. Many young people around the globe, in jest with their friends, have made light of the Coronavirus. Not because they genuinely belittle the seriousness of the epidemic and not because of their disdain for any race but because they think a joke – regardless of how insensitive – is merely that, a joke.

But Dele is held to a higher standard. His every decision is magnified, particularly when sharks with a blood lust like the Mirror circle unrelentingly. No matter how unscrupulous, the Mirror doesn’t deserve the blame. They are merely doing their job. It is Dele that has to take accountability for his actions. He apologized earlier via Snapchat, remorseful about his impetuous, morally misguided “joke”.

Hopefully everyone can put this down as yet another accidentally malicious blunder from a comparatively immature 23-year-old.

Regardless of the inadvertent nature, his actions had malice. They have a pervading negative snowball effect in many quarters globally. But hopefully calmer heads prevail and logic supersedes other visceral emotions, as those who understand Dele know his true character embodies the antithesis of a racist.