China signals cultural shift with tattoo ban in football as the game – and modern society – continues to embrace ink
- Football has long embraced tattoos, dating back to England’s David Beckham bringing the art into the cultural mainstream
- However China appears to want to stop this movement, with the debate acting as a microcosm for its societal changes
When it comes to football players in 2022, the question isn’t how many have tattoos, it’s who doesn’t.
Cristiano Ronaldo is the most famous holdout, however the likes of Lionel Messi, Neymar, Sergio Ramos, Zlatan Ibrahimovic and Kylian Mbappé – just to name a few – all have serious ink.
“The tattoo ban is mostly about national image,” Christopher Rea, who works in the department of Asian Studies at the University of British Columbia, said. “The Chinese government wants a clean, wholesome, uniform look for the team that will be representing the nation.”
Rea added this announcement fits into the Communist Party’s recent common prosperity push and cultural crackdown led by President Xi Jinping which stretches across multiple sectors, industries and facets of mainland society.
“Expressions of individuality and personality are not welcome,” he said, “unless they have to do with bending a ball into a goal. Emulation is the government’s other worry, that every impressionable young man in China will want to get cool tattoos like Zhang Linpeng.”
