The eyes have been on the nation of Qatar for the last month, since The World Cup was being hosted there. However, as the tournament began, less people were talking about soccer, and more were focused on everything going on behind the scenes in the tiny Middle Eastern country and its laws and policies, particularly regarding the LGBTQ+ community.

Qatar has very restrictive laws.An article by Sports Illustrated said “There are still reports that members of the LGBTQ community are being arrested here, where spousal rape is not illegal but things like shorts and public displays of affection are frowned upon or not allowed.” There is also a law banning alcohol that originally had been lifted for The World Cup games. Everything was set up to sell beer at the venues during the games, mainly by The FIFA World Cup’s biggest sponsor, Budweiser. 48 hours before the opening game of the tournament, Qatar made the decision to make the game non-alcoholic, and Budweiser made a tweet saying “Well, this is awkward…”

Critics have said that Qatar should not have hosted the World Cup due to its small size, lack of stadiums and facilities, as well as its treatment of migrant workers, women, and the LGBTQ+ community. To build the stadiums needed to host this event, Qatar brought in over 30,000 migrant workers from neighboring countries. If that wasn’t bad enough the way they were treated was unacceptable and raised many concerns. A migrant worker spoke up about his experience working in Qatar, “Sometimes, the company gave us rotten food. The fish would smell disgusting. It got up to 125 degrees Fahrenheit. We didn’t get the water we needed. The water we got was almost 90 percent ice. We asked why they did that and told them it was impossible to drink water like that. They said they froze it because, if they provided normal water, the workers would drink more.” The housing conditions were not much better, as people were being crammed into small living spaces, which resulted in many deaths.

Members of the LGBTQ+ community were another target of Qatar’s laws and societal norms. One Twitter post from a supporter of the World Cup team from the country of Wales read: “Our rainbow bucket hat. We are so proud of them, BUT news on the ground tonight is our Welsh female supporters wearing them in #Qatar are having them taken off them, Not the men, just Women.” Qatar has a very strict set of standards when it comes to women and the idea of homosexuality. Qatar has been getting some pretty heated backlash because of all this controversy.

Despite the quality of the games and a final game that featured two of the world’s biggest soccer stars, France’s Kylian Mbappe and Argentina’s Lionel Messi, there was a large amount of distracting chatter and controversy regarding the rich, tiny, Middle Eastern host nation. The World Cup Final was arguably one of the greatest soccer matches in history, with Messi finally earning the World Cup title for Argentina that has eluded him for so long. However, many people will unfortunately remember FIFA’s questionable choice for an event that celebrates all peoples and countries of the world taking place in a nation with many questionable practices regarding human rights.