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Forums - General - FIFA to no longer allow players to celebrate with religious shirts

FootballFan on 12 July 2009

Well i think its a good precaution to have. Do players need to pray ever time they score or win? No. Its more of a safety matter, if i was to have been a footballer i would have worn a t-shirt with "Atheism is the true path" on. I would like to see in certain countries that i was playing against if they would respect my freedom of expression/religion.

Why even bother risking the potential for religous tensions and potentially riots?

I am guessing that Brazil is a majority Christian country because otherwise i very much doubt Kaka would have taken the risk.



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marciosmg on 12 July 2009
FootballFan said:
Well i think its a good precaution to have. Do players need to pray ever time they score or win? No. Its more of a safety matter, if i was to have been a footballer i would have worn a t-shirt with "Atheism is the true path" on. I would like to see in certain countries that i was playing against if they would respect my freedom of expression/religion. (1)

Why even bother risking the potential for religous tensions and potentially riots? (2)

I am guessing that Brazil is a majority Christian country because otherwise i very much doubt Kaka would have taken the risk. (3)

(1) What does it matter if other countries dont respect people's right to free speech? That is a right and any country that doesnt recognize it is wrong.

(2) Because that is one's right to express themselves. It's easy to stick to priciples when nothing's at stake.

(3) It is mostly catholic, but evangelicals (like Kaka and Lucio) have been growing fast for the past 15-20 years.



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outlawauron on 12 July 2009
highwaystar101 said:
outlawauron said:
highwaystar101 said:

When I become a professional football player I'm going to show off my atheism.

Seriously though. Football is a secular event, it has never held a religious message in the past and I don't know why it should happen now. It's acceptable if someone wants to perform their own private ritual after scoring a goal such as offering a prayer as that is more down to personal preference. For example when Frank Lampard pointed to heaven when he scored just after his mother died.

But allowing the whole team to offer up prayers and wear Jesus T-shirts is rather silly because that has crossed the boundary of personal preference by a long way. That's in the realms of preaching and converting, which should not be allowed in secular games. let them do that on their own time if they want.

It doesn't happen with anything else such as politics in football so why this?

They aren't trying to convert anyone. They're just wearing a t-shirt. I'm sure if someone put some type of atheist themed shirt. (maybe the Darwinian fish, I dunno, it'd be perfectly fine)

High profile people using their high profile position to appear en masse preying in front of thousands of people live and probably televised live to tens of millions of people is pretty much my definition of converting and preaching in a glamourising manner.

It's exactly what scientologists do to convert people, they parade Tom Cruise, Nancy Cartwrtight and John Travolta in the public eye to get people to convert. Same thing.

It's never been allowed for anything else in football because it is a neutral sport, so why this?

-edit-

Also, I would have a problem with someone wearing an atheist T-Shirt based on the same principles, so I would have a problem with the darwinian fish.

So, it's ok to deny players all freedom of expression? That's ridicoulous. People should be allowed to express their faith.

I do understand why they don't allow political shirts, because I wouldn't be surprised if candidates pay players to wear it after for $. The church isn't paying these players to wear these. It's their prerogative, and it should stay that way.



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