FIFA has banned the Iranian Women’s Football Team from competing in the Youth Olympics Games due to be held in August in Singapore for wearing headscarves. According to the laws of the game, players are not permitted to wear anything other than basic compulsory equipment: a jersey or shirt with sleeves, shorts, stockings, shin guards and footwear. In response, Iran’s National Olympic Committee Secretary General Bahram Afsharzadeh sent a letter appealing the decision to various governing bodies, including FIFA and the IOC.
Iran’s appeal was rejected. In rejecting the Iranian appeal, Jerome Valcke, FIFA’s Secretary General, cited the section of the Laws of the Game governing players’ equipment (Law 4):
“Players must not reveal undergarments showing slogans or advertising. The basic compulsory equipment must not have any political, religious statements.
A player removing his jersey or shirt to reveal slogans or advertising will be sanctioned by the competition organizer. The team of a player whose basic compulsory equipment has political, religious or personal slogans or statements will be sanctioned by the competition organizer or by FIFA.”
Some may find FIFA’s effort to eliminate political, religious or personal statements from the game somewhat admirable. However, in doing so, FIFA is being quite generous with the interpretation of its own rule. Instead of banning the headscarves based on a strict interpretation of the rules (say the scarves have slogans or statements on them), it appears that FIFA is banning them under a more liberal reading that the scarves themselves are a political, religious or personal statement of some kind. But what statement is being made by wearing headscarves? Do the head scarves tell us that the Iranian women’s team has a lot of practicing Muslims? Well, thanks, most of us reading types already know that. I don’t agree with the decision in principle, but if FIFA wants to remove religion from soccer, ban people who cross themselves (which would go over well in Latin America), or give thanks to the gods, or wear Jesus t-shirts, or talk about god in interviews. On second thought, just leave people’s practices alone.
Regulatory interpretations aside, FIFA is simply being insensitive to the cultural and religious needs of some Muslim football players. One can only go so far in reducing the association between football and such contentious and stratifying issues as culture and religion. In a perfect world, these things wouldn’t matter. But we live in a very imperfect world. For the women on the Iranian team and some others like them in the Muslim world, headscarves are compulsory. As opposed as the Western world may be to such edicts, people in Iran are entitled to their cultural and religious norms as long as they don’t infringe on the game.
Surely a workable solution to this issue could have been worked out. FIFA’s justification is problematic. To make people chose between playing a game they love and what they believe in is unfair and unnecessary. Football is a global sport. As the world’s governing body, FIFA has a responsibility to approach governing the sport from a global perspective, not just from a Western one. Religious and cultural needs should be accommodated as long as they don’t pose a physical risk to the players or substantially change the way the game is played.
