French football superstar Kylian Mbappe recently landed in trouble over a meme. Discussing an image that apparently superimposed his face on Mao Zedong’s, he referred to the late Chinese leader as someone he thought was a dictator, without naming Mao. The offhand remark became an international controversy.
Chinese sponsors withdrew their support. State television suspended La Liga broadcasts. Apologies followed from Mbappe and his club, Real Madrid, while the league expressed regret over the offence caused.
Mbappe was riffing on one of the running jokes about his outsized influence over his clubs and teammates. He was not delivering a considered assessment of Chinese history. Yet the response turned a passing remark into a test of respect for an entire nation.
Mbappe is not the first athlete to discover how quickly political sensitivities become instruments of discipline. A decade ago, American football star Colin Kaepernick knelt during the United States national anthem to protest systemic racism and police killings of Black people, and was effectively frozen out of the National Football League. In May, after Spanish footballer Lamine Yamal waved a Palestinian flag during Barcelona’s title celebrations, Israel’s defence minister, Israel Katz, accused him of inciting hatred and demanded that the club distance itself from the gesture.
Kaepernick and Yamal made deliberate statements. Yet the distinction offered the latter little protection. An athlete need not deliberately enter politics to discover how tightly his speech is policed.
Mbappe’s extraordinary visibility gives him influence and makes him commercially valuable. But the commercial relationships that make him valuable also hand others the means to discipline him. In ancient Greece, victorious athletes could receive substantial rewards from their cities, including money, meals at public expense and civic honours.
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