International Online Tournament for Kids highlights "Red against Racism"

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In March 2020 the FC Bayern Munich started the "Red against Racism" initiative, with which players, leadership and fans - the whole "FC Bayern Familiy" - took a strong position against any form of violence and racism. There was an overwhelming response in social media and on the internet, with photos and videos being shared thousends of times. Since then "Red against Racism" has become a core part of the club's identity and is proactively supported throughout the whole FC Bayern organisation.

One year after starting the initiative the club is now taking further steps in its continued efforts against discimination and racism in our society. A series of events organised around the "International Day against Racism" (which is the 21st of March) will highlight this important topic.

Obviously, the chess department is also participating in this initiative. And it was in fact rather easy to think of a suitable way to do this, as the booming online chess community offers a perfect stage to promote "Red against Racism" in the world of chess. And this is exactly the idea behind the international team tournement for children, to which the FC Bayern has invited a number of clubs and organisations, which are particularly engaged in supporting youngsters by teaching them chess.

On Sunday, the 21st of March, this tournement will now take place on lichess.org with the following participating teams:

• SV Werder Bremen (Germany)
• Schachklub Dornbirn (Austria)
• Hamburger SK (Germany)
• Limhamns SK (Sweden)
• FC Bayern München (Germany)
• Orcher La Tour (France)
• Die Schulschachprofis (Switzerland)
• Overseas Family School Singapore (Singapore)
• Suffolk Junior Chess (England)
• Wasa SK (Sweden)

While playing the tournament, the kids and their parents have the opprtunity to join a zoom session, enabling them to see each other and chat with kids from all teams. This format using lichess and zoom in parallel has been successfully used in the past and provides an exciting tournament atmosphere. It is also an easy way to cross boarders in a "virtual" environment and get directly in touch with kids from other cities and countries. This certainly adds to the excitement and there is for sure quite a language mix to be expected! But no matter if they speak German, English, Swedish, Chinese or whatever language: On the chess board they all speak a common language and understand each other!

And this will be by far the most important aspect, since the tournement on Sunday is not intended to be a one-off event. Utilising our international network to establish a sustained cooperation in the interest of children is a common objective for all participating clubs and organisations. In this sense next Sunday may only be a starting point for much more to come! (Jörg Wengler)