I've been watching this whole boycott circus unfold, and honestly? It's driving me mad. Every time there's a conflict somewhere in the world, the first response seems to be: "Let's ban their athletes!" As if preventing someone from swimming laps or kicking a football is going to solve centuries-old geopolitical tensions.
Let me share something that really got under my skin recently. When Gattuso simply said "we deal with sport," the backlash was immediate and fierce. Suddenly, everyone expected a football coach to become a diplomatic mediator. But here's my question: since when did athletic competence become synonymous with foreign policy expertise?
The Absurdity of Forced Activism
Here's what really bothers me about this whole "sensitisation" obsession—and yes, I hate that word too. We've created this bizarre expectation that every single person in the public eye must become an activist, regardless of their actual field of expertise.
If we're asking Gattuso to mediate Middle Eastern conflicts, shouldn't we also ask the Foreign Minister to organise defensive formations? The logic is equally sound, which is to say: it makes no sense whatsoever.
This forced activism is nothing more than "yet another belated attempt at self-redemption" . It makes us feel better about ourselves without actually addressing the root causes of these conflicts.
The Historical Failure of Sports Boycotts
Let's talk facts for a moment. What exactly was the utility of forcing Russian athletes to compete at the Olympics without their flag and anthem? Did it end the war in Ukraine? Did it change Putin's strategy? The answer is painfully obvious.
The first recorded sports sanction was against Sparta in 420 BC for breaking the Olympic truce. That's 2,400 years of this approach, and we're still asking the same fundamental question: what's the proper distance between political guilt and sporting response?
Israel's experience is particularly telling. The country has been systematically excluded from Asian competitions since 1974, forced to compete in European leagues despite having "nothing geographically European about it". Has this decades-long sporting isolation brought peace to the Middle East? Has it changed a single policy?
The Real Victims of Boycott Culture
Here's what really gets to me: these boycotts often punish the wrong people entirely. When Egyptian judoka Islam El Shehaby refused to shake hands with Israeli Or Sasson at the 2016 Rio Olympics, or when Qatar obscured the Israeli flag during swimming world championships they weren't making a political statement—they were being unsporting.
And here's the kicker: both Sasson and swimmer Amit Ivry went on to win bronze medals. As they say in Hebrew: "stiff-necked people" irony is that Israel's national teams include athletes from all religions competing side by side. Arab-Israeli footballers like Abbas Suan and Walid Badir, boxer Johar Abu Lashin—they're all representing the same flag So when we boycott Israeli sport, we're not just punishing Jewish athletes; we're punishing Arab-Israeli athletes too.
The Dangerous Precedent We're Setting
If we're going to boycott every country with questionable human rights records, where does it end? As journalist Ronny Blaschke pointed out, "anyone calling for a boycott of the World Cup in Qatar should then boycott the entire football industry" death penalty in the US—doesn't that violate human rights? Turning away immigrant boats at European ports—what's that if not a human rights violation? Once we start down this path, sport becomes impossible.
What Sport Actually Achieves
Let them play football, let them swim, let them climb the mountains of the Vuelta . Yes, they might be Israeli or Russian athletes. Some might even support their governments' positions. But in that moment, they're dedicating themselves body and soul to something else entirely—and I believe that's extremely positive.
Sport has always been intertwined with politics, from the Cold War Olympics to Maradona's "Hand of God" against England after the Falklands War But as George Orwell wrote in 1945, sport is "war without shooting" it's the only kind of war that can actually defeat real war.
When Arthur Ashe wrote about South African apartheid in 1990, he understood something crucial: sporting isolation worked there because it was part of a comprehensive, decades-long global campaign with clear political demands and massive internal opposition But even then, it took "more than three decades of work."
The Aha Moment
Here's what hit me while researching this piece: we're using 21st-century social media outrage to solve problems that require 20th-century diplomatic patience. We want instant gratification, immediate moral satisfaction. Boycotts give us that—they make us feel like we're "doing something" without the messy, slow work of actual diplomacy.
But sport's real power isn't in exclusion—it's in inclusion. It's in showing that people can compete fairly regardless of their background. It's in demonstrating that excellence transcends nationality.
A Better Way Forward
Instead of asking "What's the goal when we boycott Israeli biscuit companies?" , maybe we should ask: what bridges are we burning? What conversations are we ending before they start?
As one commentator noted, expecting "a group of footballers to miss the biggest tournament of their lives, going beyond any other politician or cultural leader in the country, is unrealistic" And frankly, it's unfair.
The WTA's decision to pull out of China over Peng Shuai was different—it was targeted, specific, and directly related to their sport But blanket boycotts of entire nations? That's just lazy activism.
The Bottom Line
Look, I'm not defending any government's actions here. I'm defending the principle that sport should unite, not divide. That athletes shouldn't pay for their politicians' sins. That a tennis player's backhand shouldn't be judged by their passport.
Every time we exclude athletes based on nationality, we betray the very values we claim to defend. We become the thing we're supposedly fighting against.
So next time you hear calls for sporting boycotts, ask yourself: are we solving the problem, or are we just giving ourselves a pat on the back? Because here at FreeAstroScience, we believe the world's complexity deserves smarter solutions than simple exclusion.
The real victory isn't in keeping people out—it's in bringing them together on a level playing field and letting excellence speak for itself.
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