To think that alcohol ban in Qatar shouldn’t be a shock

[Laurendelaney1987]

The Newspapers are reporting that alcohol will not be served in stadiums during the World Cup.

I don’t understand the uproar: it’s a Muslim country: if you go there you shouldn’t expect to be drinking. Visitors have a choice of whether to visit or not, and Qatar are quite right to not want lots of drunks causing mayhem.

There are many many issues with hosting the World Cup in Qatar: but I don’t think this is a big one

So they should conform to western cultural ideas of diversity?

'Conform' works perfectly here

The appalling attitude to women, their aversion to gay rights...

Very little outrage.

Restrict alcohol?! Outrageous.

Don't worry, England won't win.

Spot on

If you are so sure, then you may want to get in touch with the Qatari Royal family themselves....

“ The ban on alcohol consumption appeared to apply only to fans at stadiums. Beer and other drinks, including an official FIFA Champagne and an array of sommelier-selected wines, will still be available in luxury suites reserved for FIFA officials and other wealthy guests.”

Would you expect anything different in a highly stratified society with an enshrined ruling class and peasant class?

The erstwhile Michael Parkinson weighs in ...

www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/2022/11/18/sir-michael-parkinson-never-felt-comfortable-prince-philip/

The modern sporting landscape, he writes, “has slipped its moorings and is heading towards the edge of the known world”. There could be no starker illustration of this thesis than the impending World Cup in Qatar, a tiny desert state with no discernible football tradition but which has spent over £185 billion on trying to cleanse a dubious human rights record on a global platform. “It’s absurd,” Parkinson argues. “You think immediately of corruption and you’re quite right to think that.”

Of the 22 Fifa executive committee members who voted in 2010 for Qatar to stage the tournament, the majority have since been accused, banned or indicted over allegations of corruption. “Even Sepp Blatter was apologising for it the other day,” Parkinson says.

“You have to filter all this through an understanding of how important sport is. It does matter. It matters enough for people to make millions out of it, to become corrupt, and for us to believe that kids who grow up with access to sport have a better chance of fulfilling themselves than people who are denied it. We know that there is nothing better, in a sense, than to bellow for your team, without having to fight about it. It’s in our nature. But it’s very sad when the money disfigures it.”

Of course it's a suprise! Budweiser are sponsors! Are people just commenting because they want a dig? The whole thing is corrupt, yet this is where people take exception?

Anti lgbtq country, everyone ignores it. No alcohol, people are outraged. Sigh

For those aligning anti homosexuality with “culture”, would you say racism is also “culture “? What about the apartheid era boycotts?

(if you are just talking about beer, fine).

Oh absolutely. Prejudices are cornerstones of culture.

I've not read the thread but it's an interesting conundrum.
If I was a fan and paid to get there, i would be really pissed off by fhis last minute decision!

However I'm also interested in fan behaviour if no alcohol is involved. However I'm wondering if they're going to get tanked up before they get to the stadium or sneak alcohol in

Overall I'm aghast that quatar was ever ever given the world cup.

The erstwhile Michael Parkinson weighs in ...

i don't think "erstwhile" means what it thinks you mean

Lol - seriously, you would expect flights, tickets etc to be refunded just because you now can’t buy an £11 can of bud in the stadium perimeter?

You can still drink in the fan fests, bars and a lot of restaurants. The stadium’s themselves were never serving alcohol (other than in hospitality).

Sorry if I am missing a nuance in your reply but are you then saying it ought to be conformed to?

Woah, trippy syntax.

I think it’s the changing their mind at the last moment which is shitty. What else is going to be u-turned at the last moment. Visas to get in?

i know most are staying away, sounds like a plan. Feel sorry for the wales team and supporters who wait 64 years for a World Cup and get lumbered with Qatar. The country is getting a bad rep over the whole fiasco and with good reason

Inconceivable!

Funny how in the U.K. we are expected to be tolerant of other cultures, yet the same respect is not shown to the Brits abroad.
Yet somehow on MN the view is that the U.K. is a shit place to live.

I am not saying it should be conformed to, no. However, it should be called what it is and that is a belief in cultural superiority, and that opposition to it from the outside is cultural subversion.

But only the bits and pieces of other cultures that are palatable to our own western sensitivities. The rest...well that needs to be changed or gotten rid of so that the culture is closer to our own. Finally, colonialism we can feel good about!

Haven’t read the whole thread so this may have been mentioned already however Qatar making a u-turn decision on alcohol at the last minute would surely make you wonder if they are also going to reconsider their commitment that the LGBTQ+ community would be safe in Qatar.
Some from that community have traveled to Qatar to highlight issues and I imagine they may be nervous right now.
I hope everyone is safe and comes home safely.

But unless you think it is okay on some level to discriminate in that way, surely there’s nothing wrong with trying to subvert a culture?

I mean, going back to the apartheid point, was it wrong to have attempted to change the South African approach to racial segregation and everything that went with it? I think some of the issues being raised are as fundamentally important.

I agree that there is nothing wrong with trying to subvert a different culture, but at least need to be honest about it. It comes from a belief that ones culture is superior to another, and a belief that trying to change that culture to closer mirror your own culture is good. Evangelism of a sort.

Surely a culture that doesn't outlaw homosexuality or blame women for rape is superior to one that does.