He said what?! FIFA World Cup 2022

 “I feel like them because I know what it means to be discriminated and bullied…As a child I was bullied because I had red hair and freckles. I was bullied for that."

The 2022 FIFA World Cup has been controversial since it was announced, and FIFA president Gianni Infantino hasn’t helped the backlash.

  

  

    Infantino seems to suggest that he can sympathise with those facing the death penalty in Qatar for being gay because he was bullied as a child for being ginger? 

Infantino went on to say that Europe should refrain from criticising Qatar because the West doesn’t have the best record when it comes to people's rights, stating “European nations should apologise for acts committed in their own histories”. I think he’s missing the key word: HISTORIES. The west still has a long way to go in regards to human rights, but, last time I checked, we didn’t murder people for loving another person.

He opened his 54 minute speech by saying “Today I feel Qatari, I feel Arab, I feel African, I feel gay, I feel disabled, I feel a migrant worker.", then later clarified “Of course I am not Qatari, Arab, African, gay, disabled or a migrant worker. But I feel like them because I know what it means to be discriminated and bullied”. Sweetheart, no one’s arresting you for your freckles.

    Today, 20th November 2022, on the UK Government website, it states: “Homosexuality is illegal in Qatar. Private life in Qatar is largely respected but any intimacy between persons in public can be considered offensive, regardless of gender, sexual orientation or intent. ”

World Cup hosts Qatar have stated that “everyone is welcome” at the World Cup. They have publicly confirmed that there will be no restrictions on non-married friends or couples (including LGBT people) staying in the same room. It’ll be interesting to see if this actually happens.

    Qatar criminalises same-sex sexual activity between men and between women. Sentences can include a possible maximum penalty of death by stoning. There is limited evidence of the law being enforced in this way in recent years, and the extent of discrimination and violence against LGBTQ+ people is not clear.

    In October 2022, in advance of the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Qatar, Human Rights Watch reported that security forces have been arbitrarily arresting LGBTQ+ people and subjecting them to ill-treatment in detention centres in the country.

In November 2022, an official ambassador for the Qatari World Cup described homosexuality as “damage in the mind”.

    And it’s not just those darn homosexuals that are in trouble, women must cover their shoulders and avoid wearing short skirts. “Female visitors and residents should take care when walking or travelling alone, and should use a reputable taxi company, particularly at night”.

    Don’t think that heteros are free as lil birds though. ANY intimacy in public between men and women (including between teenagers) can lead to arrest. Due to the laws on sex outside marriage, if you become pregnant outside marriage, both you and your partner could face imprisonment and/or deportation. Doctors will ask for proof of marriage during ante-natal checks. An unmarried woman who gives birth in Qatar may also encounter problems when registering the birth of the child in Qatar, and could be arrested, imprisoned or deported. To get a birth certificate from the Qatari authorities, you must provide a marriage certificate and the authorities may compare the date of the marriage against the estimated date of conception.

    According to the Amnesty International Report 2021_2022 ,”Women (in 2021) continued to face discrimination in law and practice. Under the guardianship system, women remained tied to their male guardian, usually their father, brother, grandfather or uncle, or for married women, to their husband. Women continued to need their guardian’s permission for key life decisions to marry, study abroad on government scholarships, work in many government jobs, travel abroad until certain ages, and receive some forms of reproductive healthcare.

In March 2021, the government disputed the findings of a Human Rights Watch report on discrimination against women in Qatar, and pledged to investigate and prosecute anyone who had breached the law. By the end of the year, no such investigations had taken place. 

Noof al-Maadeed, a 23-year-old Qatari woman who sought asylum in the UK citing family abuse, decided to return to Qatar after seeking reassurances from the authorities. She started documenting her journey on social media but was last heard from on 13 October 2021 after she reported threats from her family to the police. Despite reassurances from the authorities that she was safe, her whereabouts remained unknown, raising fears about her safety.”

    In January 2022, France 24, reported that “Noof al-Maadeed, who is in her early 20s, posted videos from an unknown location and on a new Twitter account, giving assurances she was safe and well”, al-Maadeed has since gone back to her old Twitter account and last posted today, 20th November 2022, with a Youtube video of a World Cup promo video. Not much else happening on that account, a lot of retweets…..

    Migrant workers also don’t seem to matter in Qatar. In February 2021, The Guardian said that 6,500 migrant workers from India, Pakistan, Nepal, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka had died in Qatar since its successful World Cup bid. The number is based on figures provided by the countries' embassies in Qatar.

However, the Qatar government said the total was misleading, because not all the deaths recorded were of people working on World Cup-related projects

The government said its accident records showed there were 37 deaths among labourers at World Cup stadium construction sites between 2014 and 2020, only three of which were "work-related".

However, the International Labour Organisation (ILO) said that was an underestimate.

In her visit to Qatar, 21st November - 1st December 2019, E. Tendayi Achiume, UN Special Rapporteur on Contemporary Forms of Racism, Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance, found “racism … manifested itself practically, describing how African and Asian people face challenges to accessing public spaces such as shopping centres, for example, as opposed to Arab and white people.”

    The worst atrocity to be committed by Qatar is that dancing is only allowed in the privacy of your home or at licensed clubs. Dancing in public is classed as indecent and provocative……

    This is why feminism still matters. This is why gay pride still matters. This is why human rights and racism are still an issue. In the 21st century we are still fighting the same fights our ancestors did hundreds of years ago because some countries are still living like our ancestors did. Correction: some men in some countries are using religious scripture to justify their own beliefs.