There has been a concerted effort for institutions to show their virtue; their moral side. For too long have companies been all about profits. Now, they must show their values and who they support and who they don’t. Hang on, no, it’s still all about profits. Perceived morality is now a money-making exercise. And where is this most often on display in the public eye? The business of sports.
This unholy alliance of sport and politics has actually been a recent invention. It didn’t seem worth it to invest in PR firms to create rainbow graphics to already-established company art. It didn’t seem cost-effective to issue a press release on how companies really like a particular political issue at the time, or support it, or hate it. Don’t take sides, because it means people might not buy things from you who don’t agree. The market basically said “we don’t care, we’re just here to buy stuff, thanks”. Questions of morality and politics (that’s another issue) were left to politicians and, more importantly, voters.
In today’s world politics is every day. The world today has become much more volatile. One day you think that things are this way and then suddenly a major event means you have to think this way. That’s hectic and no election can keep up with that. So, rather than waiting, society started demanding things move and change with them. Business came into the spotlight and after a hilarious ‘Occupy Wall Street’ movement came and went society decided to force businesses to bend to their will on society if not on economics. The power of social media was harnessed, mobilized, and businesses came into the spotlight once more. This was a masterstroke. It worked. It’s not that businesses started going into the red, it’s just that their profit margins went down a bit. But that’s enough for some. The volatility of 2008-9 and other financial wobbles showed the corporate world that maximising profits regardless of method was not only preferable, but now advised in all senses. The hoards of PR firms descended. Now, big business would like to tell you every now and again that they support this, don’t like that and so on.
So where does sport play into this (pardon the pun)? Sport is just the daily reminder of this fact. It is business that forces sportsmen to take the knee. It’s business that forces pundits to make virtue-signalling gestures. This is by no means universal, but it is a trend that cannot be ignored. Football clubs, national teams, sports boards, must show their virtue at the behest of the sponsors that make them actual money. Fans can go to hell. Oh, and if you boo you’re a racist…
Politics should not mix with business for this very reason. Now, I don’t care when Ben and Jerrys pontificate on their anti-racism; im more of a Haagen Das man myself so I can choose a company that doesn’t indulge in something that I have no particular interest in (anti-racism being the idea that if you do not engage in rooting out racism as a full-time career you are somehow racist. I like to go traveling myself). But when you are supporting a team or nation there really isn’t a choice in the matter. Sport is the coming together of a particular talent and particular love that is unique and has good and bad bits (though thankfully replacing the more jingoistic passion of a nation). When sports clubs and national teams engage in politics they destroy the link between the individual and the club. When you add politics into sport you create potential divergence which destroys the whole point of a spectator-led sport. You remove the fan.
Therein lies the link between sport and business. Sport is no longer for the fan but for the business. We have been replaced and so long as politics continues to be in sport we will always be reminded of that. We have been replaced and will continue to be replaced until sport returns to the fan.
Now, you might say “ah but what if a majority of the fans support the political stance?” Since when did sport take sides within its own fan base? On obvious matters of some things I understand. None of us, save a tiny tiny tiny minority want to see racism of any kind in sports, but that is the case in society as a whole. When sports teams etc take a decision on a divisive issue that either splits the country in two, let alone the fan base, you are engaging in something that is abhorrent in sports. You want to just get behind a team, you just want to love a sport. It’s a question of scale and that is based on the acceptable behaviour of society at the time. We can get into the whole question of what society decides is right and wrong another time, and in another place; but not in sports.
There are pundits and sports people who engage in politics within their sport and from without and that is worrying too. We see this more as ‘celebrities’ cross disciplines and engage with politics either during or after their careers have ended. Newspapers and news stations pick up their thoughts? What authority do they have to question society? How does kicking a ball for 90 minutes every week qualify them to declare their unwavering knowledge on societal ills? Most likely they are doing pretty well for themselves. Are they as connected to society, and more importantly society’s ills, for them to comment? Well, they are free to comment, but it does not mean it is profound wisdom, and we should take it as seriously as anyone else’s.
Sports is the one thing that reaches across multiple divides, uniting people from all walks of life, creating the most unlikely of friendships and the most unique of memories, with emotion and passion streaming from every sinew. The moment you put politics into that you destroy one of the last vestiges of joy in this world. Do us all a favour; keep politics out of sports.
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