When sport chooses to take a stand, it becomes a megaphone capable of crossing borders, ideologies, and divisions. History proves it: there are moments when an athletic gesture stops being merely athletic and becomes political, human, universal. In this sense, the emblematic case is that of the two young African American sprinters Tommie Smith and John Carlos, who arrived at the Mexico City Olympics aware that their presence on that stage carried political weight as much as sporting significance. Smith was the fastest man in the world over 200 metres; Carlos his fiercest rival. After the 200-metre final — won by Smith with a world record, with Carlos finishing third — the two climbed onto the podium without knowing whether what they were about to do would destroy their lives. During the American anthem, they bowed their heads and raised their fists, each wearing a single glove because they had only one pair to share. Barefoot, wearing black socks, they highlighted the poverty affecting millions of African Americans. Smith wore a scarf to denounce lynchings. Carlos kept his tracksuit unzipped in solidarity with exploited workers. The world reacted with immediate shock. The International Olympic Committee expelled them from the Village, sent them home, and publicly condemned them. In the United States they lost jobs, sponsorships, and personal security; they received threats for years. Yet their act entered history: an act of moral courage that turned two athletes into universal symbols of the struggle for equality.
Perhaps the most surprising gesture, the one that speaks most directly to us today, is that of Peter Norman, the Australian sprinter who won silver and stood between Smith and Carlos on the podium. He had no racial wound to expose, no personal battle to fight, yet he chose to take a stand. He wore the Olympic Project for Human Rights badge, suggested that his colleagues split the gloves so they could both raise a fist, and paid for this choice with a ruined career. Norman shows that responsibility is not the prerogative of those who suffer discrimination: it is a moral duty for everyone.
This is why the loneliness that surrounded Ivorian defender Marc-André Zoro, decades later in 2005, is even more striking. When he walked off the pitch to protest racist chants, Italy had the chance to open a deep reflection on sport and human rights; it could have turned an athlete’s gesture into collective awareness. Instead, a vacuum formed around him. Zoro was right — and everyone knows it — but his truth remained isolated and failed to trigger structural change. It is a warning that still holds today: when those at the top remain silent, the space for hatred expands. And Zoro did not stop at protest. Today he is back in Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire, where he is known as “Président Zoro”: he leads the Union des Footballeurs Professionnels de Côte d’Ivoire, the Ivorian footballers’ union, and together with the International Labour Organization holds meetings in schools and sports centres to educate young athletes, parents, coaches, and agents about ethics in sport, while protecting the most vulnerable players from the risks linked to migration towards Europe.
Zoro teaches us that sport is still a place where gestures matter. Many of these gestures come from Africa, a continent where sport has never been just sport. Zoro will share the stage of the panel Beyond the Game (29 November, 3:30 pm, Magna Pars, Milan) with Eric Eugène Murangwa, survivor of the genocide against the Tutsi in Rwanda. Few embody the idea that sport is not merely a game as clearly as he does: he survived in part thanks to football, and today he uses that language to teach reconciliation and the prevention of hatred through his Ishami Foundation. But stories linking sport and human rights in Africa are countless. In the past we have often spoken about Nelson Mandela, honoured at the Garden of the Righteous in Milan for transforming rugby from a symbol of apartheid into a tool for unity — proof that a ball can help stitch a nation back together. Our online Encyclopedia of the Righteous includes Feyisa Lilesa, who crossed his wrists over his head at the finish line in Rio 2016 to denounce violence in his home country, choosing exile rather than silence. And the exhibition The Righteous in Sport (open until 2 December in Via Dante, Milan) includes images of Arthur Ashe, an African American champion in a white and hostile tennis world, who fought apartheid in South Africa despite not being South African himself: a clear example of “caring for the other” and “mending the world,” as Gariwo highlighted in last year’s Network.
In recent years, Gariwo has found in the United Nations a valuable ally in recognising the role of sport as a tool for preventing hatred and discrimination. The UN Office on Genocide Prevention works precisely in this direction: promoting human rights education, identifying early signs of violent polarization, and supporting initiatives capable of building inclusive communities. In this strategy, sport is considered a key ally because it creates bonds, breaks down stereotypes, fosters mutual respect, and can reach young people before hatred takes root. This is why partnerships with civic organisations like Gariwo are emerging — to transform sports fields, gyms, and youth teams into front-line spaces against discrimination, places where one trains not only talent but responsibility toward others.
After all, alongside the great figures known for such battles, there is a whole universe of everyday sport that works quietly and often fills the gaps left by politics. You only need to look to Northern Milan to find a story worth as much as a medal: that of PanAfrica United (see Chiara Zoppi’s excellent interview with its coordinator). Founded in an oratory in 1977, today it has 300 members, around fifty unpaid volunteers, and youth groups where 60–70% of participants have a migrant background — from the internal migrations of the 1970s to more recent communities arriving from Egypt, Latin America, and Eastern Europe. Thirty years ago, the association adopted a simple and revolutionary model: everyone has the same rights, duties, and dignity, regardless of talent, passport, or fragility. Sport as a right, not a selection. Sport as a space that includes, welcomes, and repairs. PanAfrica is not a social project disguised as sport: it is living proof that the social value of sport is intrinsic when practiced without leaving anyone behind.
Milan, which will host the 2026 Winter Olympics and Paralympics in just a few months, has a historic opportunity before it. Not only to host a major event, but to become the capital of the Righteous in Sport — a city where sport is not defined only by performance, but also by responsibility. A place where those who arrive for a competition also find a story to listen to, an example to follow, an invitation to active citizenship. This is the direction Gariwo has chosen: working to ensure that sport becomes an ally of democracy, memory, and the prevention of hatred.
For this reason, Gariwo has built a systematic programme in recent years: the Charter of Sport, signed by athletes and leading figures; the book Stories of the Righteous in Sport, which collects the lives of those who turned talent into moral responsibility; the major photographic exhibition in Via Dante, which will accompany Milan toward 2026; podcasts, videos, and testimonies brought into schools and sports associations; and a campaign endorsed by many athletes who chose to speak out at a time when silence often seems the easier path.
Because today we need exactly this: new Normans, new Ashes, new Zoros, new Murangwas. Athletes who do not settle for playing the match but choose to invest their humanity. And communities ready to listen, support, and transform these gestures into shared heritage.
Sport has never been neutral. It either takes a step toward the other or a step toward indifference. The challenge lies here: turning its immense symbolic power into responsibility. This is what Gariwo strives to do. This is what Milan can become. This is what sport, when it chooses to be righteous, does better than anything else: teaching that the dignity of the other is not a limit, but the starting point of every civil society.
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Cover picture: a basketball match in Abuja, Nigeria. Photo by Sadiq Ali. https://www.pexels.com/photo/b...
