So, the Qatar World Cup is finally over, we have learned a few things. Argentina are the best team in the world, England as ever disappointed and the woke brigade could not organise a piss up in Qatar.
Yes, the vote was rigged
Such has been the evidence since the World Cup was awarded to Qatar that it was corrupt, journalists no longer need to say “Qatar allegedly brought the World Cup”, we can simply say “did” and not fear being sued for slander.
We though should not be shocked, FIFA is a hugely corrupt organisation and Qatar had shitloads of money, it surely was marriage made in heaven. And a hilarious one at that, with it taking almost a year for FIFA to realise that Qatar is “hot” and that technology to cool whole stadiums simply did not exist. And thus we were to have not only a winter World Cup, but domestic competitions the world over would be buggered for years.
The Plight of Migrant Workers
One of the most half-arsed areas of faux-outrage has been that of the migrant workers and their deaths. Since the start of the tournament estimates range from 6500 – 10,000 migrant workers predominantly from South Asia dying during construction of the stadiums.
And while we do not know the specifics of each death, construction is a dangerous industry after all, the numbers are still an absolute disgrace. A few points though do need to be remembered. South Asians, Filipinos and Indonesians being paid a pittance and treated like shit in the Middle-East is nothing new, nor is South Asians moving to the region for work.
These people do it because the alternative tends to be working in the sweetshops that make the clothes the woke protestors wear. Quite how many of the people up in arms also make sure to source where their clothes are made probably amounts to next to none.
And it is here that the sad, but true fact remains. Qatar hosting the World Cup provided more employment for some of the poorest people in the world that had it been hosted in a western country.
Sadly though it is here where the left and pseudo-new-left diverge. Anyone with an ounce of socialism in them will see that the problem is not Qatar, but the whole rotten system. And now the World Cup is over the plight of these migrant won’t just suddenly go away, the only thing will go away is the half-hearted protestors who will move onto their cause, be it pronouns, or what defines a woman.
The Qatar World Cup and same sex relations
I am a firm advocate of gay rights and do not think any government anywhere has the right to tell people who they sleep with, but this is another area where the pseudo-left and western hypocrisy.
The same woke people that cry rivers over the treatment of Muslims in western countries, or shout to the rooftops about Islam being a religion pf peace have hit the woke conundrum here. They will fight against any slight on Islam, but have now been presented with the fact that Islam as whole do not like gay people, with pretty much every country in the Middle-East making it a criminal offence.
With one notable exception being Lebanon, which is currently a complete mess.
The fact is if you are a true leftist you should indeed be against Islam, whose core tenets include subjugation of women and the aforementioned hatred of homosexuals. These are values completely at odds with those of socialism. Now this is not to single out Islam, all fundamentalist religions should be treated with equal contempt, but simply study any report on freedom of the press, women rights, or equality for gay people and see where these Middle-Eastern countries rank, for it does not make good reading.
Another reason why the pseudo-left cry rivers when countries like Hungary refuse to take in hordes of Muslim refugees. Sometimes you need authoritarianism to protect liberal values, a point Pim Fortuyn was executed in Holland for trying to protect.
The lamest World Cup Protest in History
And this is another area where the new and old left again diverge, when the old left protested they really protested, often to violent means, with these means being a means to an end. Look at the things like the Battle of Cable Street, to even the anti-Vietnam War protests, people stood up and were counted.
To read about the Battle of Cable Street click here.
In contrast the the protests for this World Cup mainly focussed on Wokeist publications like The Guardian interviewing people, often with a them, or they pronoun say they would be boycotting the World Cup. Civil activism right up there with putting a Ukrainian flag on your profile picture, something most people can’t even be bothered to do anymore.
And finally the absolute icing on the cake for how not to do a protest, the rainbow armbands that the captains of the major European nations were supposed to wear, but bottled it at the end for fear of getting a yellow card. FIFA, assholes that they are do not allow political symbols and no matter how well intentioned it was a hollow gesture that everyone simply bottled at the end. And much like the “taking of the knee” was mere tokenism and PR then having any actual meaning.
Put quite simply you cannot preach respecting other cultures, while simultaneously trying to ram your views down the throats of other people with different beliefs, for it is not only destined to failure, but is neo-colonialism at its very worst.
And people not only watched, but did so in their billions, with the final alone drawing an estimated ………….
Life of course will now go back to normal and the activists will go back to talking peace while cheering the deaths of Russian soldiers, shouting black lives matter, while ignoring the atrocities done to black people by Arabs in Africa and most importantly trying to define what a woman is.
Qatar though and their issues with gay rights and the treatment of migrant workers will be a distant memory……