Stick this one in the Man At His Worst file.
An incident last Saturday night in a hockey arena about 45 kilometres northwest of Montreal.
A bunch of bullies made a grown man–a tough 24-year-old hockey player–cry.
Jonathan Diaby is scheduled to play his next game for the Marquis de Jonquière on Friday night. (CBC)
He was in the penalty box at the time and pulled his jersey over his face, denying the bullies the satisfaction of celebrating their collective ignorance.
Jonathan Diaby, who is black and was once drafted in the third round by the NHL Nashville Predators, left the ice and the arena shortly afterward.
Accompanying him were his mother, father, sister, aunt, girlfriend, his girlfriend’s little brother and a few of his friends.
Like Diaby on the ice, they had suffered the indignity of racist taunts as they sat in the crowd to watch him play for the visiting Marquis de Jonquière against the Pétroliers du Nord, based in Saint-Jérôme, a city of about 70,000 residents.
Both teams are part of the semi-pro Quebec-based Ligue Nord-Américaine de Hockey that has a long-held and well-earned reputation for catering to the lowest common denominator by focusing on hockey’s ugliest aspects, a world of fights, goons and enforcers.
Jonathan Diaby said his father, Moussa Diaby, kept his cool during the scuffle in the stands. (cbc.ca)
Despite recent efforts to clean up its act, the league–and at least some of the fans it caters to–likely hit an all-time low on Saturday night.
The last straw for Diaby came when a fan climbed up onto the glass and began making monkey gestures while waving a picture of a monkey on his phone as other fans started chanting and yelling.
“People were yelling, ‘You baboon,’ and telling my dad to go back home, like we don’t belong here,” Diaby told CTV in Montreal.
Minutes later there was an altercation in the stands as Diaby’s family continued to be harassed.
Jonathan Diaby, number 3, said he was taunted by a fan while he was in the penalty box. (Ligue Nord-Américaine de Hockey)
“Security did nothing,” Diaby told CTV.
“They asked my family to just leave. They asked them to move and change places, so they could have a quiet game.”
When he left the penalty box, Diaby went to the team’s locker room, got dressed and he and his family left the arena.
“My family was not safe,” Diaby told Radio Canada.
“That’s when I decided to leave.”
Georges Laraque, who is also black and grew up in Quebec, played 695 games the National Hockey League, finishing up with the Montreal Canadiens in 2010l
Former NHL player Georges Laraque had praise for Diaby for keeping his cool. (cbc. ca)
“This is worse than a horror movie, listening to all that stuff, ” Laraque told the CBC.
“Diaby kept his cool pretty good, because if it would have been me, things would have got way worse.”
I spoke by phone about the incident with Laraque, who currently hosts a French-language radio talk show in Montreal.
ListenThe incident has shocked and horrified people across the province.
Social media has been burning and on Wednesday the incident reached the Quebec National Assembly, the provincial legislature, where politicians, including Premier Francois Legault and former NHL player Enrico Ciccone, expressed condemnation and sadness.
As well, the league had previously issued an apology.
In a video posted to Facebook following the incident, the league’s commissioner, Jean-Francois Laplante, said the spectators who hurled insults at Diaby and his family represented “a tiny part” of the league’s fan base.
Jonathan Diaby (in yellow behind the net) as a Nashville Predator during the first period of a preseason NHL hockey game Sunday, Sept. 20, 2015, in Nashville, Tenn. Diaby fell just short of having a career making the NHL. (THE CANADIAN PRESS/AP/Mark Humphrey)
“I want to apologize to Jonathan Diaby and his family,” Laplante said.
“Cheer on your teams in a civilized way and always show respect.
“Intolerance of differences is based on ignorance, and to combat it, it must be denounced and spoken about.”
The co-owner of the Saint-Jérôme team, Robert Chevrier, says the Pétroliers are trying to identify the racist fans so they can be barred from the arena.
Diaby and Jonquière play their next game Friday night.
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