FIFA World Cup: The controversies

In this episode, we hear what women thought about the World Cup in Qatar, and how women's rights and perspectives were largely absent from the coverage it. Nearly 40 percent of football fans globally are female, yet female athletes and fans continue to face enormous barriers in the game, their households, and communities. We hear from Yousra Samir Imran (Author of 'Hijab and Red Lipstick') about her experience with the guardianship system, along with Qatari artist Ghada Al Khater, and Human Rights Watch researcher Rothna Begum

Qatar’s government and World Cup organisers have received praise from labour unions and the ILO for progress made to improve worker welfare, but many companies continue to flout labour laws, engage in wage theft, and retaliate against workers who dare to complain according to Equidem, a human rights and labour rights charity.

In this episode, we speak to a Qatari artist about her take on the ‘OneLove’ campaign, and why so many people want athletes and fans to take a stand at Qatar 2022. We also speak to Marc Owen Jones about caricatures used in the media to describe the first World Cup in the Middle East, and Abdulla Al-Arian (Editor of ‘Football in the Middle East, State, Society, and the Beautiful Game’) about the colonial legacy of the sport.

In this episode, we ask if gay fans should feel safe going to Qatar for the World Cup, in a country where sex between men is a criminal offence. There’s a lot more to this topic than you’ve probably heard before. We speak to members of Qatar’s queer community with opposing views about the rainbow flag and Western advocacy for the LGBTIQ+ community. We also hear from Rasha Younes (senior researcher with the LGBT Rights Program at Human Rights Watch), and journalist, Maryam Iqbal.

It was always a controversial choice for critics who’ve spent years saying the World Cup should’ve never been awarded to a conservative country smaller than Sydney. But whether you like it or not, the greatest show on earth is in Qatar, for the first time in the Middle East. On this podcast, we’ll tackle issues off-the-field that people can’t stop talking about, and others you may not be across.