More than installed at Betis, as a key element in Pellegrini’s plans already in his third season at Heliópolis, Héctor Bellerín is not just a footballer. And in recent years, the full-back has become the visible face of a masculinity very different from what we usually see in the world of football: “There is a group of men who are really trying to finding space to feel comfortable outside of traditional hegemonic masculinity“.
“I am simply what I have always been,” said the Catalan in a long interview with The worldin which he admits to having quickly realized that, “no matter how much he played football and everything was marked by rules”he “liked something different and dressing differently” after “growing up with sewing machines”, which also sparked his interest.
In this sense, Bellerín says he understands “the stereotypes and memes of performative masculine (performative man)”but also that he considers them “a double-edged sword”. “There’s a group of men who are really trying to find a space where they feel comfortable outside of traditional hegemonic masculinity, mockery can be frightening“, he adds, while warning that “there are children in very vulnerable situations who go to the other side”.
The Betic defender, who admitted to feeling like “the footballer who reads books, the environmentalist, the fashion player”, emphasizes that even if we put “labels” on him, he prefers not to pigeonhole himself. “I am a person who changes and learns”he emphasizes, even if, in his opinion, “we are at the mercy of these black hands of the networks which create their forms”. Furthermore, the former Arsenal man took the opportunity to criticize the use of these platforms: “When you enter and see the barbarities of this hellyou say ‘damn, is this really what people think of me, or not?’. But the reality is different. »
“There are a lot of people who talk about the different examples that Borja Iglesias, Aitor Ruibal or myself give, and we receive a lot of affection, but They came to say real atrocities“, he admits, revealing that he received “death threats, a lot”. And, for Bellerín, football “has become the Roman theater”, because he understands “that there are people with precarious and stressed lifestyles and that the football field becomes a moment to empty themselves”.
Regarding the atmosphere generated, the green and white winger emphasizes that it seems that “in the stadium we can do things that we could never do in the street”, which, in his opinion, “is allowed for historical reasons”. Citing as an example that “this doesn’t happen in tennis”, the Catalan affirms that “Only in football are spaces created where certain groups feel supported”even if for him, that’s not really what football means.
“There are people who come to have a good time with their family. It’s a universal language, but a stadium does not accept just anyone to enter. There are groups who do not feel accepted“, criticizes the Betis player, who gives the “Gaza genocide” as an example: “Football has enormous power at levels that we did not even imagine and nothing has been done”, he laments, insisting on the fact that “There are enormous capacities which are only used for purely economic interests”.
In this sense, Bellerín recognizes that the feeling of wanting to raise one’s voice for certain causes does not exist behind closed doors either. “This type of union does not exist in men’s football because there is no awareness necessary to have social responsibility. We are a very privileged group of people and many do not question reality outside their own,” he explains, recalling that “there is a lot of distance between the footballer and the ordinary citizen.”
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