BOYCOTT THE WORLD CUP

[FellowTraveler]

First, I know this is mostly just a symbolic gesture.

But, I can not in good conscience watch the criminal world cup event in Brazil.

Football is a game. FIFA has turned football into a crime.

I support the reasonable demands of the majority of the Brazilian people.

100,000s, mostly forcefully, have been removed to internal gulags far away from jobs, transportation and natural community without due process.

The mobilization and resulting costs of 100,000s of military and internal security forces are massive. And they have been unleashed on their own people for the profit of the few.

There has been the suspension of the right to assemble and protest peacefully. Not to mention the broken promises of change and improvement for the people of Brazil. This is S. Africa WC II on a grander scale

Billions wasted on new statdia. The 2nd largest stadium in the world has been built in Brasilia and it has no regular team. These are the 11 billion costs that are quoted.

The costs

[goldsmithhadagoodgam]

Some interesting points; Personally i have already boycotted FIFA by no longer buying anything by their sponsors. As for FIFA 14 football games for PS3 and X-BOX I would urge people to not buy these. FIFA are stinking out football they are a decadent, corrupt and untrustworthy group of nararsistic megomaniacs if we [England] simply pulled out I would be chuffed! I would still watch though. Boycott their sponsors though, even if it means no Addidas sneakers. *******s to them.

[Burqanhair]

I don't share your view FT

If the rule is that the World Cup must be played in a country lacking inequality there would seem be very few candidates.

North Korea Zimbabwe, Myanmar are possible but I'm unsure they would have the infrastructure or be able to comply with first world labour laws.

Even if Francis of Assissi was in charge of FIFA it may not be possible to play the World Cup anywhere ever given your conditions for the tournament to take place.

[Cumbriankidus]

Did you have the same thoughts re the Olympics in Beijing? Mass movements of people for new stadia - although not generally reported due to the media blackout in that country. Also the world cup in RSA, what legacy did that leave? other than higher taxation, and unused stadia. Where does the feelgood factor start, i.e. kick to the local economy, increased tourism, showcasing the country and the demonstrations begin (As we have seen). The biggest crime (Brazil) imo was the selling off of licenses to the one major natural resource they had, "the rainforest" went to the highest bidders to help fund this. Qatar - don't get me started!

[FellowTraveler]

Hair and Kidus

I believe that permanent locations should be used for world events - with them shared by permanently selected multiple nations in each region.

Western Europe could easily do this. I don't care really.

I support local football - not some phony over hyped global crime celebration.

If they insist on exotic places and let the world trotting affluent fans sleep in mud huts - if the inhabitants have to do with that and stand on concrete terraces too. Screw them and FIFA demands. If they are not safe, have them stay at home. Don't unleash a nation's troops/gestapo on the poor of the host country for the fat arsed fans benefit.

I have no illusions about China's human or civil rights record. They are a reactionary regime IMO. That does not make what happened in Brazil any different.

I could care less if there ever was another Olympics. What a joke it has turned into.

If I had to choose - have it in Greece and western Turkey forever more. And no adds and sponsor

[TheDan]

I think FT has a point

Why, when a World Cup Tournament is awarded to a country does it have to involve a spate of building new stadiums and venues every time?

We didn't do this when we hosted the World Cup in 1966. but it happens now for Olympics, Commonwealth Games etc too all the time.

Of course the world of football has moved on a lot since 66 - although some would argue that it hasn't but has simply become money orientated.

I am certainly not going to boycott watching the World Cup on telly but will be intrigued as to what happens with Quatar. If they are proved to be corrupt and lose the World Cup then they will have built a lot of new Stadiums destined to become nothing but white elephants.

If this happens I will feel sorry for those contractors and their workers involved in building all these new "non venues" but if they are corrupt there would be no other option

I just hope we can find a better way of doing this in the future

[FellowTraveler]

Dan: It is called neoliberalism. Making the people pay for the rich to get richer.

It is national blood sucking for the profit of the few on a global scale. It is the new age version of the enclosures of the common lands. It is going on all over the world and quietly in the West, the most - where there was the most to take.

Who is paying for all the wars? Where have the jobs gone? And on and on?????????? The only ones benefiting from it all are those few in a world without borders - the off shore crowd.

Now they are selling you "Austerity". And blaming the poor, after they have taken everything they could without you noticing. That is how they plan on taking more.

The World Cup is just an extension of this process.

BOYCOTT THE WORLD CUP! I SUPPORT THE PEOPLE OF BRAZIL. SCREW GLOBALISM!

[moorlad]

I honestly don't care about the people of Brazil, or the people of any other country where the World Cup might be held. They, and their plight, make not the slightest difference to me. Generally their governments would be making them suffer some way or another anyway.

What I care about is football, and FIFA are destroying it. The corruption within FIFA is endemic and has been for decades. Bribery and corruption are normal for the whole organisation. The representatives of FIFA spend their entire lives roaming round the globe, living it up in top class hotels, paid for out of bribes given to them by potential host countries. The problem is we (England) have allowed a load of filthy foreigners to run OUR game.

There is now nothing to be done about it, the whole thing is knackered. The only way to solve it is for some of the major European nations (because the rest of the world is busy kissing Blatter's arse and get out of FIFA. They could start their own go

[Voodoo_Chile]

I agree with moorlad, but perhaps not quite in an non-egalitarian manner.

But I'm also torn in quite who to be cross at 'cause on the one hand, it is definitely Brazil's government approving and enforcing all the demolitions of people's homes and that. I have a friend in Brazil and she'd been long telling me about **** average living conditions are as is and now many haven't even got that. And how the average citizen needs basic services that allegedly there was no funding for and they somehow were able to scrape up millions to get all these stadiums up. Though does the host nation get direct funding from these sponsors?

I also wonder does FIFA really have a say in the measures a country takes to suffice? Is it in their rights really to withdraw because of this kind of corruption?

[moorlad]

Obviously FIFA has no say, except for handing over the rights to host the competition to the bidder that pays the biggest bribes. I would have thought there would be stipulations about infrastructure, crowd and player safety and such like. It seems not, because although the Brazilians managed to complete the stadia, the surrounding areas, by all accounts, are nowhere near.

Anyhow FIFA don't care, rather the FIFA delegates who make the choice don't care. They've received their bungs and can live happily ever after. Meanwhile football gets dragged through the mud pandering to huge sponsors and corporate arseholes who will be adding to the bribes already paid.

We (England) need to stand apart from it all, this is our game, we gave this to the world, and look what the world has done. There comes a time when somebody has to stand up and say enough. The time was 20 years ago, and FIFA as an organisation can't be sorted, but a new organisation filled with former football