FIFA Women World Cup 2019: FIFA breaks societal norms with thought provoking video

FIFA Women World Cup 2019: FIFA breaks gender stereotypes ahead of much awaited FIFA Women’s World Cup 2019 in France.

Women football is on a rise, with massive crowd heading to stadiums, while recognizing the quality game-play posed by Women on the football pitch. It is a no-brainier that Women football was neglected due to the inherited stereotypes in the minds of the people.

However, there is a gradual shift, as the expected viewership of the Women’s World cup is going to surpass 750 million people who watched the event four years ago.

Still, there is a long way to go for the World to perceive the Women’s football at par with the men’s game. Thus, to break the prejudices, FIFA has released a video to honour the footballers, who fight with several orthodox mindsets before they clash with their opponents on the pitch.

The video with the hashtag #DareToShine challenges several norms related to the game. It is trying to motivate the young aspiring female footballers to pursue their dreams and not to listen what society says to them.

The video includes several heroes from the Women football fraternity, who inspired the world while playing this beautiful game. The video has already skyrocketed the charts with positive responses throughout the globe.

Watch the video

It is a refreshing video in a sport dominated by Men, the shift of focus towards Women football seems positive, as the hype around the grandest event seems revolutionary.

However, Women football is left far behind from the men’s game in terms of turnover and wages – the highest-paid female footballer, Norway’s Ada Hegerberg, earns about $450,000 (£354,000) a year.

That is 325 times less than Barcelona and Argentina forward Lionel Messi earns, according to an annual survey published by France Football magazine.

Meanwhile, the Women football is still not respected as it should be, as the 2019 tournament will have a record $30 million in prize money pool- double to the 2015 reward – the winner’s $4 million share is just 50% of the amount each of the 16 teams eliminated at the group stages of the last men’s tournament in took home. Reason behind Hegerberg to boycott the World Cup.

Seeing such disparity, World’s best female footballer Hegerberg decided to walk off from the Norwegian national team , after growing increasingly frustrated with its set-up and what she felt as a lack of respect for female players.

“The more people give attention to equal pay, the easier it gets. I think we should look at ourselves and what we can do to develop the sport to increase the level and obviously that’s to perform, to increase the level. That’s our biggest job,” she told the BBC in May.

Whilst, the discrimination in pay is prevalent, many people are excited about the biggest footballing event of this year, as growing popularity of Women on field is propelling 30 million women and girls play football worldwide.

Therefore, it seems that Women of the footballing fraternity are breaking barriers to enjoy the game. The steps are gradual but at the right direction.

How twitter reacted

https://twitter.com/EilidhBarbour/status/1136889900404477955