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Arsenal player Mesut Özil celebrates his upcoming marriage by funding surgery for 1000 children in need
@mesutozil1088:
🙏🏼❤ #M1Ö https://t.co/hG72JpFhxF
🙏🏼❤ #M1Ö https://t.co/hG72JpFhxF
I've also seen news that he's supplying food for 16k persons.
IDK what to think about this, honestly. It's really offensive in Turkish culture to do this stuff publically. There is a saying that goes "what the right hand gives the left hand does not know". That he did it is great, but that he announces it in his own twitter, let alone leaking it to the media, is a bit cheesy IMHO.
Conversely, footballers have a unique opportunity to minimize anti-Muslim and immigrant hate. Recently, Research into Mo Salah's effect on hate crime shows that this really works, where other campaigns do not reach "regular people" nearly as effectively.
I'd say that's more than reason enough to do this publicly. Xenophobia, islamophobia and other discriminatory behavior are very real issues, especially considering the trends towards nationalism in politics many places.
I mean, he's not bragging about a donation, he's trying to promote a charity that he's been working with for 5 years. It's less "check out this donation" and more "please help my organization save children".
Building onto what @nacho already said I hope that this also motivates other high profile sports stars to do similar things. Yes obviously it's their money and they earned it but they can have much larger effects than most us normal people can and hopefully fans of those stars also become motivated to try and help out in which ways they can.
I know a lot of people who agree with that sentiment, but personally, it always felt off. No one is actually completely selfless, we just choose how we benefit. Good publicity is one option, a warm fuzzy feeling is another, performing one's cultural or religious duties is yet another option. You don't like the publicity mechanism, which is perfectly fine, but he does.