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Make Workers’ Stadium better for fans
To be a true Beijinger, you've got to watch live soccer games at the capital's iconic Workers' Stadium, the larger-than-life home of Beijing Guo'an Soccer Club.
Loyal soccer fans have enjoyed great games there, but many have also been exposed to health hazards due to secondhand smoke. Smoking in the stadium has long been a problem, even after the city promulgated the Municipality Tobacco Control Regulation in 2014 banning all smoking indoors or within the confines of a stadium.
Fans like good games, but not health hazards. That's why I highly laud the initiative launched by the Guo'an Soccer Club on June 8, calling on all club fans to abide by the Tobacco Control Regulation and help keep the Workers' Stadium 100 percent smoke-free. Joining the initiative are the stadium operator, the municipal tobacco control association and local health regulators.
Smoking should not have been a problem at the Workers' Stadium because security checks at the entrance are supposed to block dangerous objects, including cigarette lighters from entering. However, the huge crowds often overwhelm the security staff.
What about personnel inside the stadium? Shouldn't they have stopped fans from smoking? The reality is that the limited personnel are often no match for the huge crowd.
The result? Smoking persists.
If the ban imposed by the stadium operators is not effective, the fans must pitch in. In launching the smoke-free stadium initiative, the Guo'an Soccer Club should work with the stadium operator or health regulators, but it must also mobilize its many fan groups.
A lot of fan groups are very organized, and their loyalty is true and intense. The Guo'an Soccer Club has a moral mandate to guide fan groups to regulate fan behavior. Peer pressure is a much bigger influence on smokers than stadium personnel.
I keenly look forward to the mitigation of smoking inside the stadium and hope greater effort will be made to give sports fans a truly exhilarating experience worthy of the great city of Beijing.
For one, even though nowadays littering is not a real serious problem, the stadium could be cleaner. The grass on the field could be better maintained as well although the unfavorable local weather does not help much and the maintenance team works hard all the time.
Even if the above two issues do not really hurt fan feelings too much, I have one issue with the Workers' Stadium all the time. I feel awkward hearing the famous jingma (a vulgar curse in local Beijing dialect) multiple times throughout any given game. I feel even more awkward if I'm watching the game on TV, as the background noise of jingma is concurrently heard by millions of soccer fans across China.
Let's use the smoke-free campaign as a chance to re-educate ourselves about the wholesome values of sports and re-appreciate the fun and pride a world-class stadium can offer us. As fans, let's work together to make the Workers' Stadium even better.
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