Football has many values but they are not in the offices, the boxes or the luxurious restaurants where deals are closed or, simply, where you eat well in a hat. The few or many values of football appear on the pitch and in the stands, day in and day out. Only from a certain childish ingenuity can we hope that it is football and not philosophy, chairs or public office that transmits values to humanity.
Plato is lazy, agreed, but it would be absurd to seek his teachings in, for example, the World Cup in Qatar. Plato was a philosopher, the election of the Qatar World Cup was a business, a great business, hatched in the dark, whose inspirers profited and, in many cases, paid for their audacity.
The choice is made. Qatar wanted the World Cup, like the United States, and they won it. They didn't put a knife to anyone's neck. They didn't threaten to drop a nuclear bomb if they lost. Nor did they promise that they would be a Western democracy in 2022. Nowhere is it stipulated that only democratic states can organize a World Cup.
The Qataris raised their voices yesterday to complain about the critical and contemptuous buzz with which the West is treating them, in the manner of the very serious mistake made by FC Barcelona in its day. Qatar "has been subjected to an unprecedented campaign that no other organizing country has faced," Sheikh Tamim Al Thani, de facto president, complained yesterday in a solemn speech. Well, the barracks Argentina of 1978 was not short on criticism either, although it emanated from outside the football world, not from it.
Qatar has relaxed its lifestyle and certain rules to welcome the world with good vibes, which assumes the moral right to stick a finger in their eyes, give them lessons and spare their lives. And all to cover the bad conscience. That World Cup should never have been held in Qatar but in the US for a host of reasons – including sports – but once FIFA awarded it, it's also not coherent to start slapping them with one hand and putting the saucepan with the other.
The Persian Gulf is not the cradle of democracy but, on the other hand, they are very football fans. And they have invested in this sport, which allows a few European clubs to enjoy squads and coaches of the highest level. It may be a pact with the devil but it is a free pact between two parties, in which neither forces the other to sign it. That unions, NGOs or feminist associations criticize Qatar has its logic. That the world of football does it is arrogance, hypocrisy and even prevarication, if they rush me. No wonder Qatar complains...
