In Part 1 of this piece, the author explores the statements Mesut Özil issued regarding this retirement from the Germany national team, his relationship with Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, and past criticisms the player has faced over his heritage and his identity.
Football without politics?
As stated in Part 1, Özil’s refusal to apologize for meeting with Erdoğan is not just a stubborn stance; it is existential self-defense. He will not apologize for meeting with Erdoğan, because he will not apologize for who he is. The frustrating irony, of course, is that Özil will never be done apologizing for who he is. A child of immigrants in a country battling anti-immigrant anger on the back of years of poor integration policies. A devout Muslim in a world turning increasingly brazen in its Islamophobic stance. A man proud of his dual Turkish-German identity, in a time when Erdoğan is persona non grata in Germany.
And especially now, as the dual-heritage player who has openly accused his football federation of racism.
“It’s a hypocritical discussion, which the media is supportive of,” Thomas Müller said on August 3rd, nearly two weeks after Özil’s statement was published. “The DFB only wanted to get the quietness back…but questions were being asked again and again, blowing up the topic. For us as players it was never a massive issue like some have made out of it. We should end the discussion. There can be no talk of racism in sports and in the national team.”
A day earlier, Manuel Neuer had stated, “This is a topic that obviously is exhausting after Germany’s exit, for those that read everything. It’s now the job of the DFB to restructure the team and give it a face again. It’s about having players that are really proud to play for Germany’s national team and give everything in order to play for their own country.”
The comments echo those of Bayern CEO Karl-Heinz Rummenigge, who belittled Özil’s accusations against the DFB as a “fairytale.” A Bayern party line has clearly been drawn, and Neuer—club captain— and Müller—the longest-serving player at a single club in the Bundesliga—are toeing it: downplay events and call for order, appealing to what is likely most people’s desire to “just get back to the football.”
But not talking about racism, xenophobia, or Islamophobia doesn’t make marginalization go away. It only creates an atmosphere where people like Neuer and Müller don’t have to reckon with it, because for them, the discomfort of racism and xenophobia exist in media-driven discussions—and whatever backlash they will receive for their comments.
For Özil, on the other hand, the backlash is against his very existence. He has been used and abused by political forces for most of his life. He has been made a poster child, a scapegoat; called a hero, called a traitor. He has expressed his distaste for politics over and over again: he is not a politician, and his job is to play football. And he has spent his career chasing the security and faith of managers, directors, people who will allow him to speak with his feet rather than with words.
By doing so, Özil hoped to separate politics from football. But by doing so, Özil forfeited the narrative to those who had the words to shape views on his football, his body, his place in a team and a country.
There’s another school of thought going around that basically boils down to: Ah, but they’re just footballers. What do they know? We can’t expect more from guys like Neuer and Müller.
We should expect more.
We should assume Neuer and Müller understand social issues, for the simple fact that they are part of said society. It’s like asking every person holding a driver’s license to understand that aggressive driving is bad for everyone on the road. In the same way, we should criticise Özil for utterly failing to reckon with the politicking that went along with his Erdoğan meeting and photo. But where we make resigned excuses for Neuer and Müller —because they’re just footballers!—we demonstrate a marked failure to extend the same courtesy to Özil. And honestly, there can be no excuses made for either side. But there is a case to be made for empathy, for understanding the how and why.
In hundreds of ways—in offhand remarks and unexamined expectations—othered bodies are criticized to delegitimize them, criminalized to control them, and shamed to establish a hierarchy where difference automatically puts you down a rung.
There are valid criticisms to be made of Özil’s politics. He is unwilling to examine his own power and influence as a popular, public figure. He understands viscerally that his identity makes his very existence political, even if he pursues what he sees as an “apolitical” career in football. But he does not understand on the intellectual level. At least, he is doing his damnedest to rationalize himself into an apolitical vacuum where his football can speak for itself. The fact remains, however, that his football is incapable of speaking for itself, because of his name and his heritage. His visibility—and visible behavior like praying before matches, visiting Mecca, meeting with Erdoğan—make him a lightning rod for racist, Islamophobic sentiment.
And there are valid criticisms to be made of Özil’s football. He is ineffective when played too far forward. His prodigious, defense-unlocking passes depend on teammates seeing and running into the same spaces he sees. Despite his skill, he’s been called out multiple times for being easily and visibly frustrated when things are not going well on the pitch. During his tenure at Real Madrid, Mourinho mocked Özil for the midfielder’s lack of cojones. Mario Basler said Özil looked like “a dead frog” when Germany lost to Mexico. Even Löw and Arsène Wenger, two of Özil’s staunchest allies, have criticized the midfielder for his lackluster body language.
Dig deeper, however, and even this “valid” criticism of body language is tied to identity, and to otherness.
Bodies vs. Body Language
Özil does show his frustration when games aren’t going well, but he’s hardly a radical outlier of a stormcloud raining on everybody’s fighting spirit. If we’re going by the simple psychology of positive attitude = positive results (it’s been studied: teams that celebrate each converted penalty have a better chance of winning penalty shoot-outs)—then where are the endless criticisms of, say, Toni Kroos’ robotic demeanor?
There’s stoicism, and then there’s Kroos. Others might celebrate by shouting, somersaulting, sliding past the corner flag. Kroos is more likely to wave at the stands, look momentarily lost as to what he’s supposed to do next, before being mobbed by jubilant teammates. He endures the ordeal with the bemused resignation of a longsuffering cat that lives in the same house as an overexcited bunch of puppies.
Kroos’ reserved personality doesn’t change the fact he is a brilliant central midfielder. He dictates play with ruthless precision. He produces incredible goals, through traffic, from sixteen, eighteen yards out. He’s just not one for overt displays of emotion, positive or negative. Neither is Özil.
Yet one is respected for his cool rationality, while the other is slammed for being lazy, for being visibly dejected.
Özil is not a proper footballer, blogs and fans will opine. A proper midfielder should put in a tackle once in a while; Uli Hoeness claims (without a shred of data to support him) that Özil has not won a tackle in years. He is lazy (Google “Özil lazy” for 74,700 results in 0.35 seconds). He doesn’t exhibit the correct body language.
Özil’s visible frustration is not measurably worse than expressions of frustration from other players (for one, how would you even measure it?). Such criticisms become politically charged for this reason: what is visibly “wrong” in Özil’s body language is somehow less visible in other players’ body language. Or rather, in other players’ bodies.
The keyword here is visibility.
Özil does not try to pass as anything but what he is, a Muslim German man with Turkish ancestry. His body is visibly different, indisputably other. Historically, such otherness has been used to construct a national identity of stoic, rational Germanness against the foil of the feminine, deceitful Orient—in its modern incarnation, Turkey.
“Stoic” and “rational” describe players like Toni Kroos, Bastian Schweinsteiger, Thomas Müller (at a stretch). Honest German players who will put in a shift, make the tackles, fight to the last breath. Meanwhile Mesut Özil is timid and can’t tackle (feminine), a player who disappears in the middle of a match and can’t be relied upon (deceitful).
Never mind that Schweinsteiger was converted into a defensive midfielder, Kroos plays as a center midfielder, and noone has yet definitively concluded what, exactly, Müller is.
But never mind all that, because here’s the thing: you can’t actually see deceit or rationality on a body. You project these values based on what you see.
Different bodies are suspect because they don’t look the way you’ve been taught “normal” is supposed to look (thanks to genes beyond our control). Sometimes they don’t act the way you’ve been taught “normal” should act (thanks to our traditions, culture, faith). Sometimes they don’t sound the way you’ve been taught “normal” sounds (because we were raised speaking a different language, or because our parents taught us speaking up is dangerous in a world that expects us to conform and make no fuss).
In hundreds of ways—in offhand remarks and unexamined expectations—othered bodies are criticized to delegitimize them, criminalized to control them, and shamed to establish a hierarchy where difference automatically puts you down a rung.
Özil’s body drawing criticism of his body language is a stark reminder of this otherization. He is a slight, creative playmaker from tough, working-class Gelsenkirchen, where footballers are expected to play in a way that reflects the people: hard, physical, more tackling than technical. His style of play is suspect to supporters from his hometown. His body is suspect to an eye trained to see the Schweinsteigers of the world as “normal” and the Özils as “different.” In the context of German football, everything about Özil’s body marks him as other.
It’s not just Mesut Özil’s body in German football. It’s black bodies in America. It’s brown bodies in East Asia. It’s hijabis in France. It’s female bodies in workplaces. It’s disabled bodies in schools. It’s trans bodies everywhere. The bodies of the marginalized become battlegrounds for what is legitimate and what is criminal. What is “normal” and what is “good”. And what is deemed normal retains power, by being equated with good.
Not all criticism of Özil’s playing style is otherizing. But otherization is always already at play in a debate that begins with how Özil’s body is seen and judged.
Özil has won 92 caps for Germany, starting 27 of 28 possible games at major tournaments. He provided 33 assists and 23 goals, was awarded DFB Player of the Year 5 times, and won the World Cup with Germany in 2014. Yet the numbers matter not at all to those who continue questioning his very worth as a player.
This is the existential trauma of being visibly other: no matter what you do or how well you do it, your actions, your achievements, cannot erase the way your body is seen and what value you are consequently given.
Mesut Özil Will Not Apologize
Özil was ten years old the first time he was rejected at the Schalke youth team trials. In October, he will turn thirty. That’s twenty years of football running up against politics, of merit running up against prejudice. Years of being questioned and doubted on the basis of his identity and otherness, some of it brazenly racist, and almost all of it muddied by his othered existence.
As Özil learned from a young age, football is not just about technique. There are some things that are not overcome simply by merit, much as he would like them to be. There are some people who will believe what they want to believe. Wearing away at this kind of prejudice with patient, steady work has about the same net effect as a sparrow battering itself against a glass window: the window might break, eventually, but so will the bird.
For Özil, that breaking point manifested on July 22nd, 2018. He’s done playing for the national team. He’s done trying to prove himself to people who never wanted to be convinced. He’s done explaining and apologizing for who he is. Don’t expect him to start again anytime soon.
