11-08-2023, 12:01 PM
Ahmed Twaij
Published On 8 Aug 2023
8 Aug 2023
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Eight months after their male counterparts made history in reaching the semi-finals of the men’s World Cup, the Moroccan women’s football team have shaken up the sport’s traditional hierarchy.
The first Arab and Muslim-majority nation to qualify for the ongoing Women’s World Cup, the Moroccan side has stunned football pundits, defeating Colombia and South Korea to reach the final 16.
Yet, it’s not just opposing football teams that the Atlas Lionesses, as the team is called, have had to dribble past to get where they have.
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Ahead of the World Cup, one BBC journalist felt it appropriate to pose a question, wholly unrelated to football, to the Moroccan team captain, Ghizlane Chebbak.
“In Morocco, it’s illegal to have a gay relationship. Do you have any gay players in your squad and what’s life like for them in Morocco?,” asked the BBC reporter during the pre-match press conference in Melbourne before Morocco’s clash with Germany.
Chebbak looked perplexed by the line of questioning and a FIFA official moderating the press conference immediately interjected: “Sorry, this is a very political question so we will just stick to questions relating to football.”
The BBC journalist, however, doubled down on his line of interrogation.
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the question also revealed problematic biases. The Moroccan men’s team – also targets of racism – have not been asked this question. Did the BBC journalist fall into the trap of gender stereotyping that only gay women play football, an issue which the BBC itself has previously campaigned against?
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to focus on the one Arab nation in the event and attempt to shed a negative light on the country reeks of the sense of moral superiority Western media also demonstrated when Qatar hosted the 2022 men’s World Cup.
No journalist has gone around asking Lindsey Horan or Alex Morgan, the US women’s national team co-captains, what life is like for the Black American players in their team considering the racist police brutality that persists in the US.
They haven’t been asked questions about abortion rights being overturned in the US or the illegal invasion of Iraq and its compounding consequences two decades later.
These are important political debates to have but to choose whom to ask selectively, at a sporting event, especially when the players have not campaigned on the issues themselves, suggests prejudice at best and an agenda at worst.
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It has become a pattern to show moral superiority over Arab nations. When no other nation is receiving questions about LGBTQ rights or any other political issue, to single out Morocco indicates this tendency to enforce Western perspectives worldwide.
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This sense of moral superiority is not limited to football either. Movies selected for Oscar nominations that have storylines based in the Middle East have all, in recent years, been ones that show the region either through a lens of war, terrorism or oppression.
Films like The Hurt Locker and Zero Dark Thirty, which both won the Academy Awards, showed the region as violent, without questioning the role of US wars in Afghanistan and Iraq in fuelling that violence.
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Sport, and football in particular, is supposed to be a unifying factor across the world. The World Cup is a great occasion to deliver on that promise. By using that platform to demonstrate deep-rooted biases against the Arab world, the Western media only exposes itself.
https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2023/...n-bias-too
Published On 8 Aug 2023
8 Aug 2023
......
Eight months after their male counterparts made history in reaching the semi-finals of the men’s World Cup, the Moroccan women’s football team have shaken up the sport’s traditional hierarchy.
The first Arab and Muslim-majority nation to qualify for the ongoing Women’s World Cup, the Moroccan side has stunned football pundits, defeating Colombia and South Korea to reach the final 16.
Yet, it’s not just opposing football teams that the Atlas Lionesses, as the team is called, have had to dribble past to get where they have.
......
Ahead of the World Cup, one BBC journalist felt it appropriate to pose a question, wholly unrelated to football, to the Moroccan team captain, Ghizlane Chebbak.
“In Morocco, it’s illegal to have a gay relationship. Do you have any gay players in your squad and what’s life like for them in Morocco?,” asked the BBC reporter during the pre-match press conference in Melbourne before Morocco’s clash with Germany.
Chebbak looked perplexed by the line of questioning and a FIFA official moderating the press conference immediately interjected: “Sorry, this is a very political question so we will just stick to questions relating to football.”
The BBC journalist, however, doubled down on his line of interrogation.
......
the question also revealed problematic biases. The Moroccan men’s team – also targets of racism – have not been asked this question. Did the BBC journalist fall into the trap of gender stereotyping that only gay women play football, an issue which the BBC itself has previously campaigned against?
......
to focus on the one Arab nation in the event and attempt to shed a negative light on the country reeks of the sense of moral superiority Western media also demonstrated when Qatar hosted the 2022 men’s World Cup.
No journalist has gone around asking Lindsey Horan or Alex Morgan, the US women’s national team co-captains, what life is like for the Black American players in their team considering the racist police brutality that persists in the US.
They haven’t been asked questions about abortion rights being overturned in the US or the illegal invasion of Iraq and its compounding consequences two decades later.
These are important political debates to have but to choose whom to ask selectively, at a sporting event, especially when the players have not campaigned on the issues themselves, suggests prejudice at best and an agenda at worst.
......
It has become a pattern to show moral superiority over Arab nations. When no other nation is receiving questions about LGBTQ rights or any other political issue, to single out Morocco indicates this tendency to enforce Western perspectives worldwide.
......
This sense of moral superiority is not limited to football either. Movies selected for Oscar nominations that have storylines based in the Middle East have all, in recent years, been ones that show the region either through a lens of war, terrorism or oppression.
Films like The Hurt Locker and Zero Dark Thirty, which both won the Academy Awards, showed the region as violent, without questioning the role of US wars in Afghanistan and Iraq in fuelling that violence.
.......
Sport, and football in particular, is supposed to be a unifying factor across the world. The World Cup is a great occasion to deliver on that promise. By using that platform to demonstrate deep-rooted biases against the Arab world, the Western media only exposes itself.
https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2023/...n-bias-too