As part of my piece for the Guardian – ‘Why the Paralympics won’t challenge perceptions of disability’ – I spoke about Sainsbury’s choice to use non-disabled David Beckham to front their Paralympics adverts. Justin King, Chief Executive of Sainsbury’s wrote into The Guardian to respond:
I’m no expert in PR or the general rules of capitalism, but I’d say Mr. King was doing a good (and expected) job of defending his company. It was a defence though that was, at least partly, unnecessary. Forgive me, but I had said:
The problem was never Sainsbury’s then, but the society that makes a company feel it is necessary to lean on non-disabled celebrity to make a disabled event sellable. In this society, disability is ‘other’ and marginalised. It isn’t pretty or successful and it’s not a lifestyle the customer is thought to want to buy. What Sainsbury’s did wasn’t a sign of prejudice or willful exclusion. It was a reflection of the society they are working within.
Similar can be said for Royal Mail (though I have considerably less sympathy here). Rightly or wrongly, the original decision to celebrate Paralympians less than Olympians was made because a company thought this appropriate. They thought excuses of ‘logistical and practical impossibility’ in printing a large number of stamps would satisfy the public – and symbolic and literal inequality would be accepted. (It wasn’t, and they u-turned suitably.)
I applaud Sainsbury’s efforts to make Paralympic sport more mainstream. I share Mr. King’s pleasure that more children are participating, and perhaps more, their parents are understanding the importance. But it does no one any good to cite this as evidence of a vast shift in perception, or to ignore the fact a non-disabled face isn’t just part of an ensemble but out in front.
Could Sainsbury’s have scrapped David Beckham and focused purely on disabled athletes? Yes. Would this have had the same economic or commercial success? No. If this is ever going to change, considerable measures need to be taken. The first, as they say, is admitting you’ve got a problem.
My takeaway from this was a little different. There is no “problem”. “Able-bodied” athletics is a heavily marketed (and rather more easily marketable) product and David Beckham is a very recognizable athlete product of that machinery.
And by Beckham’s presence as the “face”, the Paralympics are able to reach a far greater audience. That he happens to be able-bodied is a corollary – rather than the main thrust of decision. An argument for using Prince Harry as the face would have been only marginally less appropriate because he too is a very recognizable commodity.
The Paralympians also prefer to focus on the fact that they are athletes – not “less-than-able-bodied athletes” – and, quite frankly the “problem” is that we don’t spend nearly as much time acknowledging the effort, determination and skill of these athletes to be able to participate in the contest.
Sadly, it reminds me too much of the dismissiveness of female athletes – simply because they are perceived as less athletic (and not as marketable as) the male athletes. IMO, that myth remains even today in our society ….
I tend to agree. No one watching the Paralympics can fail to understand that these people are athletes first and disabled a distant second. The coverage showing Olympians and Paralympians together as one team sent a powerful message. I have yet to see any cameras zooming in on Olympians at the Paralympics, and would be interested to know if any are attending.
“Sainsbury’s choice to use non-disabled David Beckham to front their Paralympics adverts … ”
BZUH WHAT?!
Okay, possibly the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard of. This is like picking a white guy to star in an historical ad series about Negro League baseball!!
Insane. You blew it Sainsburys.
I’ve enjoyed the BT Ambassador interviews at the beginning of programmes on C4, but I think C4′s coverage so far has been very poor. Such a shame, it has been disjointed and with lots of desk based chatter in the main studio. They even cut away from a live Judo bout to talk.
Jim
I fully agree with David Beckham being totally inappropriate to have used in the Sainsburys advertising campaign, but thankfully I think the volume of coverage paralympic athletes have been given (due in no small part to their success) will eclipse the need to use celebrities like him to publicise the sport.
I’d love to see Ellie Simmonds become an Ennis-like figurehead for Paralympic sport. She’s so wonderful when interviewed, so professional and she’s AMAZING at what she does.
We’re crying out for someone to put a face on GB Paralympics, like South Africa have Pistorius (who is amazing, but he can’t be the only famous Paralympian face).
I believe they take their cue from our government, which could not even be bothered to give Paralympic coverage to our national TV station, and instead gave it to advert-laden Channel 4. The only possible interpretation of such an action is that in their eyes the disabled are less important. The Royal Mail followed that idea, and Sainsburys does the same. You are 100% right; they didn’t believe the disabled could “sell” the Paralympics and so they threw Beckham in to attract more attention. Granted, it’s worked, but that doesn’t make it right.