FIFA President Sepp Blatter said Tuesday that gay people who attend the 2022 World Cup in Qatar should not engage in any sexual activities.
“I would say then that they should refrain from any sexual activities,” Blatter told an audience in Johannesburg.
The choice of Qatar has raised questions and concern among people who are worried about the limitations on fans in a country under Shariah law, where, as The Daily Caller reported, homosexuality is illegal, public drinking is illegal, and wearing shorts and a t-shirt or holding hands with a person to whom you are not married would be frowned upon.
The statement provoked some laughter among the audience, and The Guardian reported that the FIFA president was “apparently joking.”
Blatter went on to say that he did not expect discrimination to be a problem at the World Cup by 2022.
“We are living in a world of freedom, and I am sure that when the world cup will be in Qatar, and this will be in 2022, that you see that in the Middle East the opening of this culture,” he said.
“In football, we have no boundaries. We open everything to every body and I think there shall not be any discrimination against any human beings,” he continued, adding, “you may be assured that whatever people we will produce until 2022, and if they want to watch a match somewhere in Qatar in 2022, I’m sure they will be admitted to such matches.”
Blatter’s comments have been criticized as naïve, notably by former NBA player John Amaechi, now a gay rights activist.
“What kind of crazy hubris gives that man (Blatter) the idea that, in 12 years, he can drive change in the Middle East, a region that has been resistant to change in this matter under pressure from far bigger and better men?” Amaechi asked.
Amaechi added: “He’s deluded at best.”