Politics of Qatar WC

Lol to clear it up I did not follow the debate above but mostly responded to Kaladin and Rincon with no previous knowledge of what's been said above.

Have my qualms with how UAE has been built and to what cost but what has been said in its favour is undeniable.

I'll defer to RG or BC on that. Updating the banner is more their skillset than mine.

Anyone notice the outrage from Western media and people on Messi wearing the Bisht? Anything and everything representative of Arab culture pisses them off and they veil their animosity behind a wall of virtue-signalling. Meanwhile people in Argentina are ordering custom made bishts in droves.

yea noticed it as well... extreme racism
i actually thought the Bisht was a nice touch

M99 wrote:Anyone notice the outrage from Western media and people on Messi wearing the Bisht? Anything and everything representative of Arab culture pisses them off and they veil their animosity behind a wall of virtue-signalling. Meanwhile people in Argentina are ordering custom made bishts in droves.

The reddit thread on this was a mess. next time someone claims racism doesn't exist anymore I'm just gonna point them to this and the monkey cartoon by Danish TV.

Why did they allow the bisht but not the rainbow armband?

Myesyats wrote:Why did they allow the bisht but not the rainbow armband?

Because FIFA is in their pocket.

For all the racism that there is against arab peoples and islam, which there is, I do have a problem with turning the narrative 180 degrees and going all "west is evil and racist!". All nuance is removed from the conversation.

Yeah all that hate online and in the media sucks, I'm not part of it as I think most aspects of culture should be respected. I think the cape is kinda cool and I was psyched to get to know a new culture. Bought myself one of those traditional Headwear men wear at the old market too. But again, having been there, there is a shocking amount of racism and segregation against Indians, Pakistani, South Asians, etc.

Never have I felt such a divided and segregated society based on race. Nothing about respect to to being Arabic, Qatari, or Muslim can excuse that. Cultural relativism only goes so far.

Yeah thats what i mean. Pedram tries to pretend like racism only exist in the west beyond an imaginary line there’s no racism anymore !

M99 wrote:Anyone notice the outrage from Western media and people on Messi wearing the Bisht? Anything and everything representative of Arab culture pisses them off and they veil their animosity behind a wall of virtue-signalling. Meanwhile people in Argentina are ordering custom made bishts in droves.

My read is there are concerns about whether this violates FIFA's rules on gifts and why FIFA has not enforced those rules here. The answer, as rincon mentioned and I agree with, is money. Qatar paid a lot of money to host this tournament and it's not hard for me to imagine that they've likely reminded FIFA of that on several occasions, particularly when they banned rainbow merch and are now placing cultural raiment like the bisht on players.

So I don't think this is about race. That's a cop out. It's about money and how Qatar have used their wealth to bully FIFA into ignoring it's own rules.

I guess we'll find out just how strict FIFA is about this in 2026 when the winning captain gets a cowboy hat or a sombrero gifted to them and placed on their head.

Myesyats wrote:Yeah thats what i mean. Pedram tries to pretend like racism only exist in the west beyond an imaginary line there’s no racism anymore !

Did i imply it only exists in the west?

FIFA is a joke, the fact that the next WC will basically down the teams of Asia, ME, Africa, etc? so they can milk even more money from those regions since they've basically ran out of new juice from the existing n downgrading the level so much it will become a poor WC going forward... FIFA is just headed by the usual corrupt greedy bosses up top n they will do whatever needed to get as much as money they can, in this case was easy just to please the prince

Myesyats wrote:Why did they allow the bisht but not the rainbow armband?

they hosted the event... their country, their culture, their rules!

McLewis wrote:

M99 wrote:Anyone notice the outrage from Western media and people on Messi wearing the Bisht? Anything and everything representative of Arab culture pisses them off and they veil their animosity behind a wall of virtue-signalling. Meanwhile people in Argentina are ordering custom made bishts in droves.

My read is there are concerns about whether this violates FIFA's rules on gifts and why FIFA has not enforced those rules here. The answer, as rincon mentioned and I agree with, is money. Qatar paid a lot of money to host this tournament and it's not hard for me to imagine that they've likely reminded FIFA of that on several occasions, particularly when they banned rainbow merch and are now placing cultural raiment like the bisht on players.

So I don't think this is about race. That's a cop out. It's about money and how Qatar have used their wealth to bully FIFA into ignoring it's own rules.

I guess we'll find out just how strict FIFA is about this in 2026 when the winning captain gets a cowboy hat or a sombrero gifted to them and placed on their head.

where is this rule you speak of?
source it please?

what's the difference between receiving a cultural bisht and the monarchy of England knighthooding B*ll G*tes and his wife?

If you are bothered by the bisht, you have big problems

I also heard about the gift rule on radio, it is a big joke, the guy won MVP of the world cup, what is the fuss about. An excuse on the fly to justify another round of complaining.

Pedram wrote:

Myesyats wrote:Yeah thats what i mean. Pedram tries to pretend like racism only exist in the west beyond an imaginary line there’s no racism anymore !

Did i imply it only exists in the west?

Yeah sorry i misread your last post.

As for the bisht itself I wasn’t bothered by it. Seemed like a gesture to make Messi look like royalty or sth

I just hope they asked Messi beforehand and didn’t surprise him with it lol and forced him to wear it

The bisht was cool. Felt like a coronation of the goat and gave it a unique local flavor. Epic imo.

That said he did take it off pretty quick lol

Myesyats wrote:

Pedram wrote:

Myesyats wrote:Yeah thats what i mean. Pedram tries to pretend like racism only exist in the west beyond an imaginary line there’s no racism anymore !

Did i imply it only exists in the west?

Yeah sorry i misread your last post.

As for the bisht itself I wasn’t bothered by it. Seemed like a gesture to make Messi look like royalty or sth

I just hope they asked Messi beforehand and didn’t surprise him with it lol and forced him to wear it

They made two different sized bishts before the final, one for Messi and one for Lloris. Its clear this was agreed beforehand. The winning captain was always going to wear it.

McLewis wrote:

M99 wrote:Anyone notice the outrage from Western media and people on Messi wearing the Bisht? Anything and everything representative of Arab culture pisses them off and they veil their animosity behind a wall of virtue-signalling. Meanwhile people in Argentina are ordering custom made bishts in droves.

My read is there are concerns about whether this violates FIFA's rules on gifts and why FIFA has not enforced those rules here. The answer, as rincon mentioned and I agree with, is money. Qatar paid a lot of money to host this tournament and it's not hard for me to imagine that they've likely reminded FIFA of that on several occasions, particularly when they banned rainbow merch and are now placing cultural raiment like the bisht on players.

So I don't think this is about race. That's a cop out. It's about money and how Qatar have used their wealth to bully FIFA into ignoring it's own rules.

I guess we'll find out just how strict FIFA is about this in 2026 when the winning captain gets a cowboy hat or a sombrero gifted to them and placed on their head.

Quite a common argument, the last paragraph. Because any casual/stereotypical apparel is equivalent to what was basically a royal robe for the conquering hero People are just looking for problems everywhere, it honored Messi.

And this is 100% about race. Not a single comment against it that I have seen said anything about violation of FIFA rules.

idk M99, Messi seemed surprised by it, and they were still giving him explanations on what procedure to follow... he just wanted to go up to his teammates and lift that trophy lol

they had it in mind, sure, because i also read that they made one for Lloris as well, but maybe they didn't tell the teams beforehand that they would do it

rincon wrote:

Myesyats wrote:Why did they allow the bisht but not the rainbow armband?

Because FIFA is in their pocket.

For all the racism that there is against arab peoples and islam, which there is, I do have a problem with turning the narrative 180 degrees and going all "west is evil and racist!". All nuance is removed from the conversation.

Yeah all that hate online and in the media sucks, I'm not part of it as I think most aspects of culture should be respected. I think the cape is kinda cool and I was psyched to get to know a new culture. Bought myself one of those traditional Headwear men wear at the old market too. But again, having been there, there is a shocking amount of racism and segregation against Indians, Pakistani, South Asians, etc.

Never have I felt such a divided and segregated society based on race. Nothing about respect to to being Arabic, Qatari, or Muslim can excuse that. Cultural relativism only goes so far.

I'm South Asian and there is more nuance to what you saw. Its more classism than racism in my opinion. There are Indian CEOs, rich Bangladeshi executives, Pakistani diplomatic workers etc all over the Middle East and they are not treated like second-class citizens. The migrant workers are treated like shit more because of their social hierarchy than race. Does racism play a part, yes of course it does.

But guess what, these people would be treated the same in their very own countries. A rickshaw puller or a construction worker in my country does not get the same treatment as a high earning office worker or businessman. And my country is completely homogenous save for a few expat workers, hill tribes and Rohingya refugees (the latter two are subjected to HORRIBLE racism).

This is a culture shock to North Americans/Europeans where income disparity is not this high and extreme poverty does not exist. Its shitty and I'm not defending it, but like Cas said, unfortunately we don't live in a utopia. Most migrant workers go to the Middle East knowing full well of the conditions because the salaries are way higher and our government loves that because these guys send money back to their families at home. Remittances from abroad is a massive chunk of our country's balance of payments and I bet for other countries too, which is why you never saw Indian, Pakistani, Nepalese, or Bangladeshi government officials say anything about their own countrymen dying

Granted I did hear some people don't know how bad the conditions are but that is because they are uneducated, lack no information and don't know anything about UAE/Qatar other than they have friends/acquaintances there who make way more money and send it back to support their families. They are taken advantage of not by Qataris but their own countrymen. There are "agencies" which are basically middlemen, they make some false promises and these guys pay them money to process visas and get them jobs. I also know of people who came back voluntarily after they couldn't take it. Overall there has been progress, I would say by now everyone knows how bad working conditions are there but people still voluntarily go because the pay is much better there.

Myesyats wrote:Why did they allow the bisht but not the rainbow armband?

These are completely different. The bisht is an honorific on the person that receives it. The rainbow armband is a statement in advocacy of a certain group (ie a political statement). The bisht is not pro-anything except pro-messi, it's not political in the least.

McLewis wrote:I guess we'll find out just how strict FIFA is about this in 2026 when the winning captain gets a cowboy hat or a sombrero gifted to them and placed on their head.

Again I think this comparison misses the point that it's not just a garment but a distinction. It would be comparable to  the US giving the team captain a medal, not a cowboy hat.

That said I agree people are right to complain that FIFA does not uniformly apply their rules and that Qatar likely flexed their dollars by doing this, rubbing some salt on the wound. And that's valid.

Messi wearing the bisht is one of the coldest pictures in sports history.



He looks like he's being coronated as the king of football. Look at his face ffs. This is a GOAT picture. The only ones mad about this are Europeans and Americans.

El Gunner wrote:

McLewis wrote:

M99 wrote:Anyone notice the outrage from Western media and people on Messi wearing the Bisht? Anything and everything representative of Arab culture pisses them off and they veil their animosity behind a wall of virtue-signalling. Meanwhile people in Argentina are ordering custom made bishts in droves.

My read is there are concerns about whether this violates FIFA's rules on gifts and why FIFA has not enforced those rules here. The answer, as rincon mentioned and I agree with, is money. Qatar paid a lot of money to host this tournament and it's not hard for me to imagine that they've likely reminded FIFA of that on several occasions, particularly when they banned rainbow merch and are now placing cultural raiment like the bisht on players.

So I don't think this is about race. That's a cop out. It's about money and how Qatar have used their wealth to bully FIFA into ignoring it's own rules.

I guess we'll find out just how strict FIFA is about this in 2026 when the winning captain gets a cowboy hat or a sombrero gifted to them and placed on their head.

where is this rule you speak of?
source it please?

what's the difference between receiving a cultural bisht and the monarchy of England knighthooding B*ll G*tes and his wife?

Well there is this.

I saw that tossed around in various reddit threads on the subject. I would hazard an educated guess that the bisht given to the victor of the World Cup final exceeds $200 in value, which would violate this particular rule.