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Analogising AFL with the Anzac experience: Buyer beware

22nd April, 2015
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This Anzac Day, we will remember them. (AAP Image/Joe Castro)
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22nd April, 2015
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The commercialisation of Anzac Day is nothing new. But almost 100 years after the Anzacs landed on the Gallipoli peninsular, the moral implications of exploiting a day that forms such an intrinsic part of Australia’s historical narrative is at an all-time high.

Most notably, Woolworths came under fire for their misguided “fresh in our memory” campaign that trivialised the plight of the Anzac soldiers with the supermarket chain’s own slogan of being “The fresh food people”.

The AFL is guilty of this same exploitation, albeit to a lesser extent.

This year, five games have been scheduled on Anzac Day – that’s two more than last year – which will certainly help raise the AFL’s coffers.

But at what cost?

Anzac Day is not universally accepted as a day that defines the history of Australia. Some question whether we should relish in the belligerence of war, while others construct the Anzac experience as inherently parochial – we seldom hear stories of Indigenous soldiers, of women, or of any marginal group.

But that’s not the problem I have with the AFL’s commercialisation of Anzac Day.

In fact, I love the theatre that surrounds the traditional – if you can call a game played since 1995 traditional – Essendon versus Collingwood clash.

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It’s incredibly moving to stand shoulder-to-shoulder with 90,000-plus people and be able to hear a pin drop during that minute of silence before the game. It’s incredibly poignant to hear the bugle, bow your head, and remember the sacrifice so many young men and women have made and continue to make.

Sport is so powerful in that respect. It has the ability to transcend, to move, to foster that sense of unity among a crowd of total strangers. And sport is inextricably linked with Australia’s culture so, in many ways, playing football on Anzac Day doesn’t seem so strange or exploitative.

But what doesn’t sit right with me is the analogy so many people draw between the 22 players from Essendon and Collingwood and the Anzac soldiers.

Playing football does not equate to waging a war.

Yes, a football game is physical, bruising and played against an adversary, but the consequences of failure are trivial in comparison to torture, post-traumatic stress disorder and death.

Yes, going back with the flight of the ball is often perceived as brave, but can we really equate such acts on a football field over the course of two hours with acts of bravery in war?

The theatre of football lends itself to these hyperbolic analogies, but they undermine the suffering experienced by countless soldiers in theatres of war.

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After Collingwood lost by a mere five points to Essendon in 2009, then-coach Mick Malthouse lamented that his side had let the Anzacs down.

Let them down? How Mick? As far as I’m aware, soldiers and veterans don’t look to Essendon and Collingwood for gratification of a job well done.

What’s more, it’s questionable whether the Essendon and Collingwood players feel compelled to win to honour the memory of the men and women who have served in war. It borders on cringe-worthy to think of a player accepting the Anzac Medal – awarded to the best player afield – and equating their team’s performance with the spirit of the Anzac soldiers.

And it is cringe-worthy that a medal is awarded to the best player of the day. Is this somehow meant to mirror the medals veterans and soldiers wear during Anzac Day ceremonies? Medals awarded for real acts of bravery, such as saving someone’s life?

I know the hairs on the back of my neck will stand up when I hear The Last Post play just before 2:40 on Saturday afternoon at the MCG. It’s the sport tragic in me.

But I also know that I’ll feel inherently conflicted when the ball bounces and Essendon and Collingwood go in to battle. Because it’s not a real battle. It’s a game of football.

Just ask the veterans marching on Anzac Day.

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