The Football Association had been criticised for three long months of silence during its investigation into Malky Mackay’s racist texts and emails but football’s governing body was not slow in reacting to the comments made by Mackay’s new employer at Wigan Athletic, Dave Whelan, about Jewish and Chinese people. By 2.15pm on the day the Guardian reported in the newspaper Whelan’s views that “Jewish people chase money more than everybody else” and that “chink” is not offensive to a “Chinaman”, the FA said it had already begun an investigation.

That investigation will examine whether Whelan’s remarks, and presumably others he made in a series of interviews throughout two days after appointing Mackay as Wigan’s manager on Wednesday, amount to discriminatory language and he should therefore be charged with misconduct. The FA said in its statement that it was “very concerned” to read the comments “attributed to” Whelan, and added: “We take all forms of discrimination seriously.” Whelan had already been written to by early afternoon and has three working days to respond and explain himself.

There is a recognition around football that the FA does largely mean this now, after a dire history not so long ago of turning a blind eye to racism in the game, then torrid criticism for mixed messages particularly over the handling of Chelsea’s John Terry abusing the Queens Park Rangers defender Anton Ferdinand, for which Terry ultimately received a four-match ban. The FA was challenged by the government to improve its procedures, and overhauls followed, of the rules and structures for seeing them upheld. The nonexecutive director Heather Rabbatts was appointed to the main board while also chairing the FA’s inclusion advisory board, whose brief is solely to advise on progress and anti-discrimination.

So all of this: Mackay’s foul, racist text exchanges while at Cardiff City with the club’s then head of recruitment, Iain Moody, then Dave Whelan’s appointment of Mackay, his justifications that Mackay had “not done a lot wrong,” then his further explanations of that view to the Guardian, have dropped into an FA culture that has changed substantially.

While there is some frustration with how long the FA has taken to decide whether it can charge Mackay and Moody, and with the lack of an update – which was rectified this week – there appears to be a confidence within the FA that the investigation is being done thoroughly. That indeed is part of the reason why it has taken so long, the FA stated on Thursday.

Whelan had been quite casual when appointing Mackay, with the FA’s investigators still working, waving away the gravity of Mackay’s slurs. Yet this has all been played out in a sport enjoying a higher profile than ever before, with vastly more money and celebrity, and more of an insistence that in return for this central status in national life it should reflect a nation’s decent values.

The FA finally made its statement about the Mackay investigation, to counter Whelan’s comment to the Guardian that he had been advised by two influential senior figures at the FA that nothing much will come of it. The FA was also responding to criticism from the anti‑discrimination campaign Kick It Out, which argued that the long silence from Wembley since Mackay and Moody’s texts were first reported in the Daily Mail in August had encouraged Whelan’s belief.

The significant point in the FA’s statement, besides emphasising that no assurances had been given to Whelan, is the news that it is investigating whether the texts and emails exchanged between Mackay and Moody “indicate a culture in which other acts of a discriminatory nature may have taken place”.

This suggests that the FA is looking into how Mackay actually behaved at Cardiff, and whether people of all ethnicities were treated equally, given his reference to the owner, Vincent Tan, as “the chink”, the suggestion, referring to the agent Phil Smith, that there is “nothing like a Jew that sees money slipping through his fingers”, the one about the South Korean player Kim Bo-kyung and dogs, and reportedly four other offensive texts.

The fact that these texts and emails were between Mackay and Moody and could be considered private is clearly a factor in the case, tempering the likelihood of a charge sticking. There appears to be divided opinion about whether the FA needs to have a firm view on the privacy issue, or should charge them for clearly discriminatory language, then have the argument about privacy as the case proceeds.

Lord Ouseley, Kick It Out’s chairman, believes this should change, because in his view senior leaders in football and public life should be held accountable for prejudicial views, however they were exposed.

That was all going on before Whelan demonstrated his view of it all by appointing Mackay as Wigan’s manager and defending his language. Whelan has now made himself the focus of an investigation and potential FA charge, perhaps covering his assertion, after the Guardian reported his comments, that he had been misquoted – which he had not.

Whelan acknowledged in a BBC interview, at least, that he did say “Jews chase money”, but claimed he went no further than saying: “Jewish people chase money just like we, the English people, chase money.” Yet it was not lost on many that he made that distinction, repeatedly, between “Jewish people” and “English people”, as if Jewish people cannot be English. He also protested rather a lot about how “hard-working” and “honest” he, Dave Whelan, the owner of Wigan Athletic football club, considers Jewish people to be.

His remarks – which the FA may, after due investigation, decide constitute discriminatory language – have to be seen in their context: explanations for appointing a manager currently being investigated himself for potentially serious racial discrimination. That makes it a more serious issue for the FA than just the comments of a senior club owner who many people admire for his remarkable business achievements following the adversity of a broken leg suffered playing for Blackburn Rovers against Wolverhampton Wanderers in the 1960 FA Cup final.

It should not have to be stated, but apparently is worth making clear in response to people seeing the media and FA reaction as excessive: nobody sensible believes Malky Mackay should not work as a manager again, or that the book should be thrown at Whelan. Only that, in this area where it is so vital for football to make progress and set an example at the highest, most public level of sporting life, decent behaviour must be insisted on, due process completed, and the importance of anti‑racism and anti-discrimination efforts accorded proper respect.{jcomments on}