{"id":1500,"date":"2022-03-04T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2022-03-04T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost:3000\/its-beyond-time-to-remove-bans-on-religious-attire-from-sports-uniforms\/"},"modified":"2022-10-25T00:29:30","modified_gmt":"2022-10-25T00:29:30","slug":"its-beyond-time-to-remove-bans-on-religious-attire-from-sports-uniforms","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.interfaithamerica.org\/article\/its-beyond-time-to-remove-bans-on-religious-attire-from-sports-uniforms\/","title":{"rendered":"It’s Beyond Time to Remove Bans on Religious Attire from Sports Uniforms"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\n American Civic Life<\/span>\n

It’s Beyond Time to Remove Bans on Religious Attire from Sports Uniforms<\/h1>\n
\n By
Simran Jeet Singh<\/address>\n <\/div>\n

March 4, 2022<\/p>\n <\/div>\n

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(RNS) — This past week,I joined a virtual hearing in the state of Maryland about new legislation for inclusive religious attire in school athletics. I was the old man on the call, as I often am these days, and I listened as child after child testified about their experiences playing school sports and the undue challenges they faced. <\/p>\n

Young Muslim girls and a young Sikh boy shared heartbreaking accounts of the discrimination they encountered, not just from opposing teams and fans, but even from the very institutions that were meant to serve them. My daughter in elementary school sat with me, listening to the stories of these kids, and I realized this wasn’t just about my childhood or even the children before me; this was about my own kids, too. <\/p>\n

I felt so touched by their stories that I threw out the testimony I had prepared and decided to speak from the heart. If what these kids shared didn’t move the audience, then I didn’t know what would. Here’s an overview of what I shared from my personal experiences of discrimination in sports. <\/p>\n

My brothers and I loved sports growing up, and as kids, we dreamed of playing professional soccer and basketball. We played club and recreational, and we played for our middle school basketball teams.<\/p>\n

Imagine our surprise when our oldest brother, Harpreet, went to try out for the high school basketball team and was told the state rules didn’t allow him to play with his turban. Rather than playing the sport he loved and deserved to play, my brother spent his entire freshman season petitioning the state governing body to change their rules to allow him to play.<\/p>\n

Soccer was my primary love, and I, too, had encounters with religious discrimination. After multiple incidents where referees and opposing coaches insisted I couldn’t play while wearing a turban, I began petitioning the United States Soccer Federation to change its rules to allow religious minorities to play while maintaining their religious garb. I remember thinking how unfair it was to be asked to choose between two things I cherished most: my love for my faith and my love for sports. I also remember wondering how this could be legal. Hadn’t we learned in school that religious freedom was one of our country’s founding principles?<\/p>\n

By that point we had learned an important lesson: It wasn’t enough to seek an exception to a rule that discriminated against us; we needed to ensure better rules for everyone in our communities. With my parents’ guidance, we helped create a change in the rulebook for the United States Soccer Federation. But my parents were clear: This couldn’t just be about giving me the right to play soccer, or even just about allowing Sikhs to play with their turbans — this rule had to explicitly account for everyone, including Jews who wear kippahs and Muslims who wear hijabs. Instead of putting the onus on the player to prove their need for accommodation and attain permission to play, this rule presumed inclusion for all. <\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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