In the United States, politics is sometimes intertwined in the sports world.
But in one particular Eastern country, sports actually play a common role in their political system.
In this case, a soccer team is outright campaigning for a particular political change.
The Turkish Football Federation (TFF) is letting its executive members and players campaign, not for a person, but for a constitutional change.
The Huffington Post reports:
Turkish soccer executives campaigned this month for major constitutional change that would grant President Recep Tayyip Erdogan far reaching executive powers.
Strangely enough, the TFF was not denied the direct influence they may have in the political process by using their celebrity sports status to influence the country’s political climate.
The Huffington Post reports:
The Turkish Football Federation’s (TFF) backing of Mr. Erdogan’s effort to accumulate more power put to bed any notion of a separation between politics and soccer. So did the failure of world soccer body FIFA and UEFA, its European affiliate, to condemn the TFF’s violation of a cardinal principle of international sports governance.
But in a later press conference, the political leader in question, President Erdogan, addressed the issue of politics in the sports world.
The Huffington Post reports:
Speaking at a TFF conference, Mr. Erdogan punctured the fiction upheld by sports officials and politicians of a Chinese Wall that separates sports and politics. “I believe politics and football share many common aspects at the core. Just like sports, the essence of politics is competition, race… Just as a team, playing without any plan, tactic or strategy, have zero chance of winning the cup, politicians, political parties that have nothing to tell the people have no chance of success. Just like football, politics cannot be done without passion, love and dedication. You have to dedicate yourself,” Mr. Erdogan said.
The Turkish Football Federation has a specific set of regulations against what their players and members can and cannot publicize.
The Huffington Post reports:
Turkish soccer’s partisan alignment with politics with no sanctioning by international and regional sports associations responsible for policing maintenance of the fiction of separation of politics and sports goes however further than simple endorsements. It involves sanctioning soccer officials, players, and club members for holding potentially dissenting political views.
Politics has a small place to play in their regulations, but a large one in their players and officiant’s lives.
While the Turkish Football Federation tries to keep the biases in check, it seems the players and leaders have their own political agendas to follow.
In comparison, political biases have become increasingly more evident in the United States sports world as well.
Most infamously are the “silent protests” of football players such as Colin Kaepernick, who took a knee during the National Anthem in order to protest his political views.
Do you think there should be stricter regulations against political influences in the United States sports world?
Leave us your thoughts in the comments section below.
