Soroor Ahmed comments on the hypocrisy of the west in accusing Qatar, the host of FIFA World Cup 2022 for not giving LGBTs their ‘right’ while hundreds of LGBTs are killed, injured or arrested every year, especially in the United States. He also endorses the established fact that homosexuality is responsible for the spread of sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) and HIV-AIDS, and suggests that those championing the cause of LGBT should be tried for spreading such dreadful diseases.
When the inaugural function of the FIFA World Cup was underway in Qatar on November 20, came the news of the mass shooting in a Gay Club in Colorado, the United States. At least five people were gunned down and 18 injured when Anderson Lee Aldrich, a 22-year-old young man, fired on them.
This was not an isolated incident of massacre in the United States, where such mayhem is quite common. But the latest violence was somewhat different. Not just because the victims were homosexuals, but because it took place at the time when the entire western media as well as footballers and many of their fans were accusing the host, Qatar, of not giving LGBTs their right.
The English team captain, Harry Kane, was supposed to play the first match against Iran on November 21, wearing a rainbow arm-band to express the solidarity towards the LGBTs. He gave up this plan after FIFA had threatened to take action. Kane and many other footballers were doing so because homosexuality is unlawful in Qatar. Similar sort of protest was displayed by the US and several other western football teams.
But the moot question is if they are so sympathetic towards the Lesbians, Gays, Bisexuals and Transgenders, they should have condoled their repeated killings in not just the United States, but the entire west. The condolence for the Colorado victims would have been very timely. In 2016 at least 49 people were killed in a similar attack on Gay Club in Orlando, US.
It is the hypocrisy of the west which got exposed on the eve of the on-going World Cup. Hundreds of
LGBTs are killed, injured or arrested every year, especially in the United States.
It needs to be mentioned that homosexuality is illegal and punishable not only in Qatar or other Muslim countries. There are 69 countries in the world where it is considered an unlawful act. Till a few years back this figure was much higher. In India, too, it was de-criminalised by the Supreme Court on September 6, 2018.
Ironically, in 14 States of the United States of America, Sodomy is illegal. Most of these states are rated as strong conservative Republicans bastion and are part of the Bible Belt in the south of the country. They are Texas, Florida, Kansas, Kentucky, Minnesota, Louisiana, Michigan, Georgia, Mississippi, Maryland, Massachusetts, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Oklahoma, Those who indulge in Sodomy are harassed and arrested by authorities.
Many Christian priests are at the forefront in the movement against the homosexuality and other such perversions. They quote the Bible in this regard and consider it as a sinful act. They are not only active in the US but elsewhere too, and come from different denominations of Christianity. Yet the champions of free speech come all the way to sermonise the people of the Third World.
Homosexuality may be banned in many countries, especially in the Muslim world. The offenders undergo punishment. But they are not killed by individual shooters and seldom anyone take law into his own hands.
Those who shed tears for the cause of homosexuals need to understand that the offenders are punished under a law after due trial. They may have problems with such a law and are free to call with whatever names.
But why these footballers do not protest against the extra-judicial mass killing and lynching of LGBTs in their own backyards? Muslims may be ‘barbaric’ but not as much as so-called civilized people of the west. Can they provide how many LGBTs are killed in such a way in the Muslim countries or Third World.
Why no storm was ever raised over the hosting of Olympics, Football World Cup or any such sporting or any other events in the United States.
Besides, why only raise the issue of ‘discrimination’ of LGBTs in tiny Qatar. Isn’t it that horrible crimes of different nature are being perpetrated by the west itself all over the world. Millions have perished in the last few years. Why was the last FIFA World Cup held in Russia in 2018, not boycotted on the ground that it had captured Crimea from Ukraine way back in February-March 2014? After all, when the Communist Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan in December 1979, the west stayed away from the Moscow Olympics in the summer of 1980.
Interestingly, homosexuality was banned in Qatar even way back in 2010 too when it was allotted the World Cup by the FIFA. It was not a democratic country even then, but why were these issues not raised at that time.
If democracy is any criterion for selecting the venue, why was the World Cup allotted to Mussolini’s Italy in 1934 and Olympic to Berlin (Germany) in 1936 when Adolf Hitler was at his peak? In the name of German nationalism, one of the worst kinds of atrocities had already started in that country. Why the west remained tight-lipped at that point of time. The fact is that the US had a good relationship with Nazi Germany even months after the start of World War-II, following the invasion of Poland on September 1, 1939.
The 1978 World Cup was held in Argentina at the height of military rule in that South American nation. These are only a handful of examples and the western countries fully participated in all of them. It is only when they feel that their supremacy is being challenged that they raise the issue of human rights, LGBT, democracy, etc.
As Qatar is the first Muslim country to successfully host the World Cup, it was bound to unsettle many in the West. How can a small peninsula of three million achieve this feat when the 2026 World Cup would be jointly organised by the United States, Canada and Mexico?
If Qatar should be criticised, it should be on lavish spending on this count. Against about 11.7 billion dollars spent by Russia in 2018, Qatar has spent 220 billion dollars.
Let it see whether the football teams of other countries stage any sort of protest against the treatment meted out to LGBTs in the US or over its Supreme Court ruling overturning the 50-year-old abortion law. Or will they shed any tear for the victims of violence in Mexico, where drug cartels control one-third to one-half of the country? In the last 15 years, officially 3,60,000 people have lost their lives and 79,000 have been missing. This is just the official figure and the real toll is feared to be much higher.
So, on an average 100 people are killed every day in only drug related violence in Mexico. The figure of Brazil is almost the double. Did anybody raise the issue when the FIFA World Cup was held there in 2014?
Is it not the fact that the former US President Donald Trump has times without number accused Mexico of sending rapists, criminals and drug smugglers to his country? The 71 years long one-party rule ended in Mexico in 2000. But had US-led western powers done anything in this regard?
It is not that people elsewhere in the world do not indulge in homosexuality. But nowhere is it glorified so much as in the west. Even there many people are of the view that it is a psychological disease and should be checked.
Medically, it is an established fact that homosexuality is responsible for the spread of sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) and HIV-AIDS.
In fact, those championing the cause of LGBT should be tried for spreading such dreadful diseases.