The Wrong Boycott

Wars have long-reaching impacts. I wrote about this last year, in The Championships, about Wimbledon banning Russian and Belarusian players because of Russia’s ongoing military assault on Ukraine.

The Ukrainian players have since demanded that all Russian and Belarusian players be banned from tennis. I feel sympathy – and I hope, empathy – toward the Ukrainians players. However, banning players because of where they come from is a dangerous idea and a slippy slope. Why not demand that U.S. players be banned because of all the war the U.S. supports?

The Ukrainian players are feeling attacked not so much by other tennis players, but a collective and sometimes personal attack on them and their families. There’s a constant demand from the Ukrainian players that Russian and Belarusian players condemn the war – some do, but for any with family in Russia (or Belarus) that can be a dangerous thing to do.

Tennis is an international sport, perhaps more than any other sport. It’s also an individual sport, where Federer represents Federer, Nadal represents Nadal, and Djokovic represents Djokovic. Federer doesn’t play for Switzerland, Nadal doesn’t play for Spain, and Djokovic doesn’t play for Serbia, except for occasional team “Cups”. However, the Ukrainians, since the war began, are playing for flag and country -they’re playing for Ukraine instead of for themselves.

Generally tennis players appear to respect one another. There’s always grumbling about not doing well enough, and sometimes handshake at the net at the end of a match is barely a handshake. But is doesn’t seem personal. That’s changed since the beginning of the Russian attack on Ukraine..

Ukrainian players have state that they’ll play Russians (and Belorussians), but won’t shake their hand at the end of a match.

The commentary on the internet isn’t quite right – “don’t mix sports with politics”. Sports are very political.

The refusal to shake hands could be considered a protest against Russian players, but by playing Russian players the polite thing to do would be to shake hands at the end of match.

If the Ukrainians players can’t respect their opponents at the end of a match the correct thing to do would be to refuse to play.