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Comment by zarzavat | Hacker News Reader

If we are going to entertain the idea of a World Cup then we need to recognize that in this world there are many cultures with different norms. In some of those, there are strong norms against drinking alcohol, and in those countries football and alcohol is not an obvious combination like it is in Europe.

When the US hosts the World Cup does anyone expect that they are going to be willing to suspend laws that other countries find objectionable, for the duration of the World Cup? Of course not, the US doesn’t give a damn what other countries think about it’s (sometimes peculiar) morality. Neither should Qatar.

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The issue is they have done this at the very last minute, when alcohol sponsorship deals were already in place and many people have already bought tickets, hotels, etc. with clear messaging from the Qatari government and FIFA that alcohol would be sold at games. It's absolutely fine to ban alcohol, but they should have done it from the very start. They didn't because they knew they would struggle to fill seats. They have very clearly been dishonest.

They are further angering people as the ban doesn't extend to VIP's, who will be able to consume as much alcohol as they want from their VIP boxes and seats.

This decision reversal should have been announced before Budweiser paid FIFA £63m for sponsorship. And ideally more than a couple of days before the event actually starts.

Nah not really. If you're going to host the World Cup you know that you have to cater for the visiting fans, the majority of whom are from countries where alcohol is no big deal. Qatar knew this, agreed to make some concessions to allow the sale of beer ... and then reversed. To be honest it's a clever move to do this at last minute because it's not like FIFA are going to halt it.

I don't personally care what they do, I'll be watching in a Czech pub, drinking beer that's orders of magnitude better than Budweiser (likely Polička or Pilsner Urquell) and cheaper too ($12 @ World Cup vs ~$2.10-2.50) :)

You don’t like Budweiser? It’s not a bad beer.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Budweiser_Budvar_Brewery

Ha, yeah I don't mind Budvar but there aren't too many pubs in my part of the country that sell it on tap (there's one ~10 mins walk from me but I'd have to walk past about 4 better pubs to get there). And by now "Budweiser" pretty universally refers to the American beer. I should stress that I actually don't mind those US style "lite beers" - there's a time and a place for them. But that is not in Czech Republic in winter :)

I think, generally, the concern is that if the Qatari rulers are rolling back on this commitment (which is relatively minor) they will roll back on other much more serious promises that they made about personal security of visiting fans.

In any case, no one should be going to, or watching, this world cup - https://www.theguardian.com/football/2022/nov/14/stadiums-of...

> and in those countries football and alcohol is not an obvious combination like it is in Europe

And they're bad at football, maybe there's a connection.

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