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Politics in Sport - The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly

Like it or not, the world of politics and sport are forever intwined, and that fact isn’t changing anytime soon. What once used to be an occasional newspaper headline, sporting politics has now turned athletes from professional sportsmen and women into political advocates and activists. Now, don’t get me wrong, just like actual politics there are significant upsides to having athletes voice their political opinions and how they feel the world should work. However, this same voice can also create separation and controversy within communities and even destruction to athletes’ careers. 

 

But let’s start off on a lighter note. Some of the greatest athletes of all time have been major advocates for massive political movements. Jackie Robinson broke the baseball race barrier when he signed with the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1947. He was an instant sensation, winning Rookie of the Year in his first season, and going on to produce a Hall of Fame worthy career, including 2 MVP awards and six trips to the World Series. He was an inspiration to an entire race of African Americans and paved the way for the Civil Rights movement. 

 

Similarly, Billy Jean King was an equal advocate for gender equality in tennis and is most famous for destroying former world number one Bobby Riggs in the 1979 “Battle of the Sexes”. Her victory and creation of the women’s tennis union led to increased prize money and better recognition for professional female tennis players all over the world. 

 

Sport has also been used as a platform for some of history’s greatest ever political upsets. Adolf Hitler infamously supported the rise of the superior “Aryan” race; a superior level of being that would take over the world. This ideal was crushed on two major sporting platforms, first at the 1936 Olympic Games with Jesse Owens and then by Joe Louis in 1938. In the space of 45 minutes, Jesse Owens broke 5 world records and equalled a sixth (one of which would stand for 25 years) in front of the Fuhrer himself. His achievements were celebrated but not only his home nation but also by the people of Berlin, who heralded him a hero. In 1938, fellow American Joe “Brown Bomber” Louis knocked out portrayed German “Aryan” Max Schmeling in just 124 seconds, in a rematch that was watched by millions and put a major dent in Hitler’s ideals once again. 

 

So yes, politics in sport can do good, but as history has shown it can also cause a lot of harm. The 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich produced one of the most devastating political events in history when the Arab Commando Group “Black September”, seized and killed 11 members of the Israeli Olympic Team in the Olympic village. This was a strictly political movement, that the athletes themselves had nothing to do with, yet they paid the price just to send a message. 


Political boycotts have been a major talking point of Olympic Games throughout its history, with athlete desires being cast aside just because opposing governments aren’t seeing eye to eye. America and Russia are the nations that come to mind after their successive boycotts at the 1980 Summer Olympics in Moscow and the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles, which left thousands of athletes with their career in tatters. 

 

More recently in 2016, NFL quarterback Colin Kaepernick had his career destroyed after kneeling to the US National Anthem. This form of protest has been used to call attention to the issues of racial inequality and police brutality that has now turned into the ‘Black Lives Matter’ movement that swept every newspaper headline around the world in 2020. Due to their millions of followers, professional athletes such as LeBron James and Lewis Hamilton feel obligated to voice their opinions and have been major supporters of the ‘Black Lives Matter’ movement.  However, just like government politics, this movement has caused divide and separation, not only between athletes, but between sports fans as well. 

 

No matter the subject, everyone is going to have a different opinion on political movements. For a long time, this divide was kept to government buildings and the local town hall but at some point, politicians decided that this was not enough, they wanted to reach more people. Unfortunately, instead of visiting a city mall or contacting Jeff Bezos, the politicians decided to poison sport, the commoners last true treasure. Presendital endorsements, political agendas, and government backed boycotts. All things that the world of sport could do without. 

 

Now like I said before, politics in sport can do some truly inspiring things, but recently that inspiration has been lost. Current politics doesn’t look to build bridges and forge new relationships, but instead looks to cause divide and separation within multi-billion-dollar community of people who have bonded for centuries over an age-old tradition – sport. 




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