Pele is a fraud

Pele, born Edson Arantes do Nascimento, is a corporate shill. Four months after being attached to a dialysis machine in an intensive care unit of a Brazilian hospital, he’s going on a world tour. On behalf of his sponsors. You might have seen him recently actually; he was waving enthusiastically to fans while attending the Manchester United-Liverpool match, yellow-eyed, huge grin, with two Subway lapels adorning his suit. A perfect representation of his current persona: nothing more than a walking billboard.

Far be it for anyone to tell Pele that he can’t make money. Poverty sucks. Get paid. And when you’re done, get paid even more. The careers of athletes are generally short, and considering that Pele played when the game wasn’t remotely as profitable as it is now, no one can blame him for taking advantage of opportunities presented to him.

What we can do, though, is call him out for misrepresentation.

Pele has always been an ideal of the purity of football. As a player he was exceptional: a combination of seemingly every positive attribute a player could have, if the stories are to be believed. And his goal-scoring record, however accurate, speaks for itself. But his relevance is fortified in being a symbol, more than his on-field achievements. He received the player of the century award, over his eternal rival Diego Maradona, because of his clean image. His history has been praised relentlessly, always touting loudly his choice to stay in Brazil over chasing money in Europe.

He doesn’t do drugs, he doesn’t drink and unlike Diego, he also doesn’t hit women. He’s as inoffensive as one could be.

Except that he’s not. Pele over recent years has become a joke. And rightfully so. While his past can not be admonished and his accomplishments are simply unassailable, his present self is a contemptible creature borne of the brown-nosing of FIFA and other sponsors.

Take for example his comments made during the World Cup this summer that his home country, Brazil, hosted. As context, there was a slew of protests against the World Cup by Brazilians. The dissatisfaction was that while Brazilians suffered from high rates of poverty, lack of educational funding and basic needs, the government was willing to bow to and fund FIFA’s tournament. Sure Brazil is a football country, but it is also a country that needs hospitals, an avenue down which the billions spent on the summer project could have gone instead.

So appearing on television, Pele urged that the country should think about the national team, urging citizens to “...forget about this mess that is happening in Brazil and let’s think about the national team, which is our country, our blood.” This before one million protesters took to the streets in anti-government demonstrations a few days later.

His popularity in Brazil has almost been eradicated. And it’s all down to his value of those who pay him over those who he’s supposed to represent. He’s for the establishment in a time when Brazilian people feel undermined by those in power. His comments and opinions on the livelihood of his countrymen have become downright embarrassing and sometimes infuriating.

This is why Romario, another beloved son of Brazil and more so now because of his political acumen, called Pele a “poet when he doesn’t speak.” Pele responded to this barb by stating that Romario was ignorant and that as a Catholic, he forgives him. Of course Romario shot back, this time saying: “Aside from a poet, he’s also an imbecile.”

Another example is his view on racism. Pele’s blackness was always a key aspect of his identity; he even writes about this in his autobiography. He talks about facing other countries as part of the 1958 Brazilian World Cup team: “All the other teams had only white people, I thought it was really weird. I can remember asking my teammates: ‘Is it only in Brazil that there are blacks?’”

His story had been one of the poor black kid who rose to the top of the world through hard work, talent and dedication. And he had always stood against racism, until he became rich and classified celebrity and money as ... well, here are his words: “It is almost like a race apart -- not black, or white, but famous.”

It is why then that his comments on racism in Brazilian football were not surprising. Sad, still, but not shocking. When Aranha, the goalkeeper of Santos, the same club that Pele played for and uses still for his brand, was racially abused, he stopped the match and brought the incident to the attention of the referee. The abuser, a young woman, was caught by the cameras. And Aranha refused to meet her, stating that she should face the law.

Pele’s response? Just the opposite of what you would expect a man who had suffered racism as well:

“If I stop a match every time someone calls me monkey or creole, all matches would have to stop;” “The football fan yells anonymously;” “I think we need to curb racism but public places are no places for curbing racism;” “The more we pay attention to this, the more it is sharpened.”

If one can’t curb racism in public, what other options are left? Pele wanted victims of racism to remain silent. Not at all dissimilar from Sepp Blatter saying that the abused should shake hands with their abusers and continue with the match. It’s almost scary how friends rub off on each other.

Speaking of which: Pele is supporting Blatter’s re-election campaign. His argument is based around the fact that Blatter has been president for a long time, so he should continue, even if the FIFA president is a vile man who has made some disturbingly derogatory comments about everything. But sure, Pele is all for this man.

Fast forward to the present. Now that Neymar is an undeniable success at Barcelona, Pele is calling Neymar his “son” and saying that Messi is the best player in the world -- mere days after saying that the best player was Cristiano Ronaldo. No prizes for guessing that he also attacked Ronaldo in the not-too-distant past as well.

Whatever beauty that Pele used to represent about football and life is gone. He’s a brand, a walking ad for establishments and corporations. His blank persona means that they can insert their slogans and ideals in the canvas of his personality, and he will spew their nonsense to the general public at every chance.

One of his greatest qualities used to be the fact that he was not as mad as his compatriots. He wasn’t the drinker and wild man that Garrincha was, nor was he the stubborn and pigheaded Maradona. But those players were always true to themselves. It is why Garrincha has become the adored one of the two.

For so long, it’s been stated as fact that Pele doesn’t have vices, but he’s enjoyed the company of one of the worst ones: greed. And it’s managed to eat away anything that he was and should have been. Maybe that is why he’s so perfect for FIFA and the modern game.