On Pride Day, Danubio FC in Uruguay confronted their fans with their homophobic chants and asked them to explain the meaning of the words to their children. Unable to explain to their kids why they promote homophobia in their chants, they realized it was time to change. Together with the club's most radical fans, they rewrote the words to homophobic songs and sang the modified chants during the most important game of the year against their main rival, demonstrating that hate has no place in their game or professional sports.
Change the Chants
Fans of Danubio FC unite to change how they support their team
Client
- Danubio
Office
- Uruguay
Showing fans why homophobic chants have no place in professional sports.
Football fans in Latin America, especially in countries like Uruguay, are particularly violent, with several deaths per year due to the settling of scores and often pressure clubs to obtain favors and engage in illegal business. To demonstrate their passion, teams like Danubio FC were using hate speech in their songs, promoting homophobia even among children of adult fans.
Our brief proposed taking bold action to compel fans and society to address the issue of homophobic chants that would serve as a starting point for education and eradicating the hateful chants not just with Danubio FC, but with all soccer clubs.
We identified groups of fans and their children in the most popular stands at matches and confronted them with their negative chants, asking them to explain the meaning of the lyrics to their children. Unable to explain to their own kids why they promote homophobia in their chants, they rewrote the songs.
The video was the club's most engaged with over the previous four seasons, generating massive support from Danubio fans, the club's rivals, and dozens of other teams throughout Latin America as well. Club leaders joined in singing the new chants during the most important matches of the season. Today, across the country Danubio is considered at the forefront of eradicating homophobia from Uruguayan sports.
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