THE KIT AND THE MESSAGE
Denmark and Hummel’s stand against the World Cup in Qatar
To have a social conscience is important, and using it cleverly can help really make a difference. But when marketing is involved we also need our wits about us to examine the authenticity of the message.
Step forward Denmark, everyone’s second favourite international team, and Hummel, a kit company who have decided to stitch in an ethical stance. Their kit launch sent a powerful, impactful message. But one that needs examining, because we are not used to integrity from football marketers and clothing companies.
This is the Instagram message sent by Hummel, to explain why their red shirts for the World Cup in Qatar will have a ‘toned down’, monochrome effect without conventionally identifiable design features:
Strong words:
“We don’t wish to be visible for a tournament that has cost thousands of people their lives. We support the national team all the way, but that isn’t the same as supporting Qatar as a host nation. We believe that sport should bring people together and when it doesn’t we want to make a statement.”
A follow-up message launching a ‘third shirt’ rammed home the message. Black, flagged up by Hummel as ‘the colour of mourning’.
Should Hummel be trusted as having genuine integrity, rather than using the type of virtue signalling we’ve seen from many companies over societal issues, like racism and LGBTQ rights? (sponsors are never slow to market human rights as if they are never part of a problem).
This isn’t straightforward, it rarely is with ethics and moral stances from businesses. I usually think back to comedian Stewart Lee’s peerless dismantling of a mobile phone company who withdrew sponsorship of a reality TV show because an alleged racist incident didn’t fit with their ‘morals and values ‘. He skilfully mocked the notion that actual morals were so important to such an organisation, rather than reputation.
Qatar’s ‘Supreme Committee’, the World Cup organisers, defended themselves against Hummel’s stance by pointing to the progress they have made on human rights, saying they have worked ‘diligently’ alongside the Qatari Government to improve the rights of workers and living conditions, and adding that Hummel’s move has ‘trivialised’ the issue.
Over 30 per cent of Hummel’s clothing distribution comes from China according to its own website, a country whose human rights including its treatment of the Uighur Muslim minorities was described in a European parliament this month, the Netherlands, as a “genocide”. Hummel will need to explain what gives it the right to take the moral high ground - human rights are human rights, whether in China, Qatar or anywhere. You can’t, or shouldn’t, pick and choose.
Hummel are also being challenged over alleged double-standards on social media, and have now put a target on their shirts – any ethical failings may be seized on. But the Danish Football Union (who would have needed to sanction this) deserve the benefit of any doubt. Denmark, and other parts of Scandinavia, have been as vocal about Qatar’s human rights as any part of the planet. (Norway’s failure to qualify saved the hosts a big problem, as its football system openly disapproves of the hosts).
As early as last year Denmark’s squad vowed to wear human rights messages on their training tops, and minimise any trips to Qatar in the build-up. What’s been said and done here is that they understand the importance of the actual football to the Danish people and all fans across the globe. But the event, the hosts? No thanks.
The cleverness of Hummel’s campaign is that political messages and protest is not approved by FIFA (collective campaigns sanctioned by them are fine), and so any conventional messaging on kits would not be allowed. But if you say nothing on the kit itself, while marketing your disapproval around a blank kit, well can that be stopped? And what’s next by way of protest, and from who?
Qatar, FIFA and football politics have been central to my work and one question I’ve wrestled with all along is does soft power actually work for them? There are times the organisers continue to seem haunted by the 12 years of negativity. But it is right, it is proper that we focus on human rights, and don’t allow a festival of football to push it into the background.
It’s not just the fate of construction workers in the unforgiving heat. This is a country where homosexuality is against the law. Is this acceptable to you? Does any goal, any game, make that alright? By the way, Are none of the players from the 32 countries gay? Get real. It remains a quiet tragedy that players can’t be themselves, can’t be ‘out’.
The message of Hummel and the Danish team is clear. England? Not so much.
Their (Nike) Kit, according to the bombardment of marketing on my timeline, is inspired by the “young squad’s desire to stand up for what’s right” - though they don’t explain clearly what they are standing up for.
The England squad, who reflect their manager Gareth Southgate’s humanity (more important than results to me) have spoken with refreshing boldness and fairness on social issues for years, not least racism. LGBTQ rights, and a desire to stand against discrimination, are clearly important to the players and the people around them. But I can’t let this week pass without mentioning the irritating own goal with their own red World Cup kit.
They wore it for a home game with Germany (well done the marketing lot). Wear your home colours at home and respect tradition and the point of international football for goodness sake. Unless there’s a very good reason. Which there wasn’t.
Wearing ‘away’ kits at home is usually a transparent ploy to sell shirts - please tell me who in England can afford to spend £60 or 70 pounds on football kit at the moment, with our economy in turmoil? I trust the England players and staff, but I don’t trust everyone around the fringes. There’s a thin ‘kit trim’ between raising social issues and making money through selling merch. The red England kit by the way, is awful. Sickly with random blue trim and looks like a shade of pink under lights. It’s ghastly.
Teams neglecting to wear their real kit is the least important thing in sport that bothers me. But what Denmark and Hummel have done? It’s important that the reason this has happened are openly discussed and analysed. The message has landed, and whether or not they had the right to send it, it’s certainly put the human rights questions for Qatar right back in the spotlight.
World Cups and winning games are as big as sport gets, changing lives, raising national moods and causing great joy. But what we see on the pitch is only part of it. We must never accept the any human rights issues because the ‘football has started’. Enjoy the games, yes, but don’t sanitise the event.
In Denmark and throughout Scandinavia they are making sure we don’t forget the background and reality of Qatar hosting a World Cup. We don’t have to compromise our social conscience because we love football’s most important competition. There’s a place for ethics in sport, always. It matters.
Lee Wellings is a UK-based author, broadcaster and film maker specialising in sport ethics and an expert on the Qatar 2022 World Cup. He has worked on and off screen at the BBC, ITN, Sky News and Al Jazeera, covering major sports news stories across the globe for three decades.
Media enquiries for analysis on sport and ethics, including TV, podcasts and public speaking direct to leewellings@hotmail.com
His first book on sport and society, The Dilly Dong Bell (a wake up call for sport) is available from www.ProjectisPublishing.com.
Good post. Thanks for writing something I had no idea is happening. Thanks to Substack too for sending me an email that led me here.
Thanks for writing this! Great to raise more awareness around these issues!