Like a lot of people on here, I tell myself that the world is a pretty messed up place and i justify the fact that i still love watching city on the basis that just by going about my daily business I buy into and support corrupt business practices and exploitation every single day. As does everyone else in this country. That's my defence if anyone else brings it up too.
I do however draw the line at pretending our owners are awesome people, hero worshipping them and singing sheikh mansour's name. It's shameful that anyone would put concern about the club's image ahead of this guy's welfare. People might well ask the question "well what if he was a spy" but I can guarantee that hardly anyone on here would be asking that question if our owners owned United and/or it turned out the guy in prison was a city season ticket holder.
Some fans want to believe he's done something wrong or somehow deserves this disgusting treatment. Personally, when Abu Dhabi are long gone I don't think their presence will have tainted the club forever. People understand that owners come and go. What could taint the club forever is how we as fans react to stuff like this. Mindlessly defending the owners and human rights abusers purely cos they own our football team is not a good look.
City ARE part of a sportwashing policy whether you like it or not so we are going to be brought into the conversation when stuff like this happens. Our foreign secretary directly mentioned the crown prince in his criticism of the imprisonment. The crown prince is the guy bankrolling this operation and it's his people, not Mansour's running the club. Fans might want to pretend the football is separate but other people aren't going to do that.
I also think fans of other teams also deserve criticism. The ones whose sudden interest in human rights begins and ends with matters surrounding city. Their hypocrisy and lack of consistency is a joke.
I like to think that our owners might be progressives and things are slowly improving in UAE. I also appreciate it's a very complex situation in that part of the world. Maybe sportwashing does at least shine a light on these kind of regimes and make them do better. It's also worth mentioning that anyone I know who has had to deal with or work with the club since the takeover (including a mate who is United supporting journalist) will tell you what a great set up we have and how well looked after we've been. We can't be complicit as fans though in letting them use the club to detract from what's going on at home. When this kind of thing comes up we shouldn't defend them just because we're worried about the club.
