Imagine you go to an airport to receive your younger sibling, make a post on Instagram about it and to your surprise instead of people calling it ‘cute sibling love’ it has unexpectedly turned into an epicenter of public discourse.
Don’t understand what I am talking about ? The fuss is all about the Instagram post shown below.
The incident involves Leah Williamson, the English National Women’s team captain and Arsenal women’s football team superstar and her younger brother Jacob Williamson.
The seemingly innocent welcome embrace from the sister to her younger sibling has been been turned into a site for some nasty comments with people making vile remarks about the hug.
Some have deemed the hug ‘too weird’ while some others have tried to paint it in a sexual light. One person claims “wrapping your legs around your brother like that is weird as hell.. I don’t care what anyone says” while another one expresses his surprise through a plain statement “Her brother?”.
It’s not all the bad elements popping up though as people have come to defend the innocent sibling bond.
Some have credited the deranged behavior of the negative people to not being mentally stable or watching too much sexual content while others have reaffirmed that siblings with close relationships tend to greet each other in such ways all the time, specially if they are meeting after a long time.
Leah is a football legend in terms of her skills and her career. She has youth player of the year, PFA player of the year awards under her name along with a prestigious UEFA Euro win for her country.
With awards aplenty for both club and country, the player has made a name for herself and has worked hard to get where she is. She started playing for Arsenal at a very young age of nine and over the year has switched from a midfield role to a more defensive center back role.
The family although closely knit, isn’t all eye to eye on all matters. Her brother and her father are avid supporters of rival club Tottenham Hotspur. Williamson’s mother, Amanda, was a gifted football player who represented Milton Keynes and contributed to a giant-killing FA Cup victory over Arsenal.
Nothing much is known about Jacob as his life has been kept private for the most part but Leah has mentioned in an interview that her baby brother lives in Sydney, Australia and she likes to visit him from time to time. It is possible that he has signed for a club in Australia and was returning home to England where her elder sister surprised him.
In an interview with The Guardian she proclaimed, “Apart from my brother, I’ve never held anything so precious in my life.” referring to the Euro trophy that England managed to ‘bring home’ after 56 year long drought. In the interview she even mentioned the gender disparities and the differences she had to face so this incident is nothing new to her.
Its understandable that not everybody has the same level of love amongst two siblings but to frame it this weirdly seems too far fetched even for the internet. All this becomes even more so questionable when you get to know that the national icon is currently in a committed relationship with her teammate and defensive partner, Jordan Nobbs.
This side of the internet always makes you wonder about the responsibilities of public discourse over the internet and to think about a person in totality and not just about the sensationalized moments captured in public.