Leading sports stars are often described a role models. Some welcome the responsibility this places on them. Others doubtless find it irksome. Many young sporting stars, both male and female, live in a cocoon, and this is understandable. The demands on their time and energy are such that they have little of either left for involvement in anything beyond their work and families.
The more successful they are, the more they are detached from the way that others – even people of their own age – live. Many get involved with charities. More than thirty years ago Ian Botham raised large sums by engaging in long distance sponsored walks and many have followed his example.
By shutting down all professional sport the Covid-19 pandemic has given sportsmen not only some unusual leisure but the opportunity to realise that they can use their celebrity to make a difference. Marcus Rashford’s intervention in the question of providing free school lunches for poor children throughout the summer has persuaded the Government to reverse its policy. Rashford is still a very young man but he has shown himself to have a sense of responsibility towards people less fortunate than himself. He is not only a star footballer; he is a citizen.
Professional sport , especially at the top level, consumes all one’s time and energy. Nobody should be surprised if many players and athletes have little or no inclination to look beyond it. The same may of course be said of many ambitious to succeed in other walks of life – junior doctors and City traders seldom have time for much outside work.
More people are active in public or charitable activities in middle-age and later that they were when young. Conversely, if your ambition is to win Olympic medals, Wimbledon or the Open, or to play football, cricket or rugby for your country, you are unlikely to lift your gaze much beyond your career. The Coronavirus has made this year an exceptional one by forcing all sorts of people to step back from their usual preoccupations and look at the world around them.
Nevertheless, this enforced withdrawal from the hamster wheel of professional demands may have an enduring effect, with inactivity encouraging active citizenship.
John Donne declared that “No man is an island, entire of itself, every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main..” It has been tempting , and indeed it has been common, for the young professional to live as an island, but it is better for him, and for society, to remember that he is a piece of the social continent.
Two areas in which professional sportsmen can make a difference are race relations and equality of the sexes. They have indeed already done so by the mere fact of their success, and by word and example. Footballers have taken a stand against racism. Tennis players like Andy Murray and Novak Djokovic have called themselves feminists, Murray indeed having been the first top male player to choose to have a female coach, Amelie Mauresmo. Race relations may be still far from ideal in Britain; they would surely be much worse but for the example set by sport – and especially by professional sport.
Finally, there is one respect in which professional sportsmen have opportunities and influence as never before. They all have huge social media followings, and what they say online matters to their tens – or in some cases hundreds – of thousands of followers.
Opportunity and influence confer responsibility – a responsibility for active and benevolent citizenship. There is a dark side to the internet, even if you do not come close to its dark web, but it also offers an unprecedented means of influencing attitudes, habit of thought and behaviour. Few are better placed to do this than successful professional sportsmen and sportswomen.
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Iain Martin and the team make sense of the news, providing commentary and analysis on the stories that matter in politics, geopolitics, economics and culture.