The FIFA World Cup is over, that wonderful sporting event that breaks people’s often dreary everyday life, if only for a moment. The championship has ended, which, rightly or wrongly, in our country is starting numerous irrelevant debates and divisions.
These arguments, polemics, debates, criticisms, and sometimes quarrels are essentially a reflection of the domestic general situation, dissatisfaction, and essentially an echo of a society poisoned by politics. And if we hypothetically put ”why by politics” under the question mark, the answer does not need to be searched deeply.
When the Sarajevo Film Festival (SFF) opened last summer, and on the night of the official opening, photojournalists lined up to record the arrival of guests, actors, directors, and film and art workers in general, there was a miracle. There were actors, but they were nowhere near as dominant as the politicians who grabbed all the attention of the public who commented on them.
Politics and sports
Why is that so? Why are our ”stars” politicians? The answer to that is difficult to sublimate, but it is the closest in the fact that we have become a society that likes to engage in politics because politics is everything around us. Politics is to blame for the collapse of sports. Politics is to blame for the lack of adequate conditions for athletes.
Politics is to blame because almost before every major competition, the harsh reality surfaces that there is no money to travel to a championship. Then certain levels donate money and the public is supplemented with some kind of infusion until a new problem is revealed.
Whom someone will support at the World Cup should not be the subject of a discussion that will lead to a serious discussion, especially not colored by politics. However, it is often not so in our case.
”Our” Saudis
If Argentina plays against Saudi Arabia, you will hear the truth and basic sports arguments, such as preferences for Lionel Messi as the best soccer player or for Saudi Arabia because it is a weaker opponent, so it is somehow expected to cheer for the weaker one.
However, in our case, arguments leading to discussions such as the fact that the Saudis are Muslims are crucial. And it would be justified if such discussions did not lead to other and larger political connotations.
Our Moroccan Brothers
When the media in Serbia asked President Aleksandar Vucic on the eve of the match for third place at the World Cup between Morocco and Croatia, whom he would support in the final, he said that he did not know, but that he would support ”our Moroccan brothers” in the match for third place. And the answer to why Moroccans are ”brothers” to Vucic is hidden in politics.
Although it might be more natural for him to say that he will cheer for neighboring Croatia, politics and the past do not allow it, so Vucic emphasizes that he is cheering for Morocco. Because Morocco did not recognize Kosovo’s independence.
And even in a geographically totally neutral match between France and Argentina, those who support Argentina justify it by the fact that Messi once took a photo with Benjamin Netanyahu, the former prime minister of Israel, so this should probably mean that Messi is on the side of Israel and against Palestine.
Those who cheer against France will say that it is because of the French colonization policy.
And all of this would be understandable to some extent if it did not dominate in some of our Bosnian and Herzegovinian (BiH)and even regional discourses and completely divert the point from a central issue such as sport, which is also an object of viewing and enjoyment, Klix.ba reports.
E.Dz.
