Why David Beckham may be the first to hear if Qatar makes gay sex legal

Qatar – which still has the death penalty for gay sex – is planning to relax its laws.

That’s according to unconfirmed sources in a story by UK tabloid newspaper The Sun.

But strangely the country’s rulers seem to have chosen to tell international football legend David Beckham first.

What’s Beckham got to do with LGBT+ rights in Qatar?

It all relates to new football club Inter Miami.

Beckham is one of the major backers of the club, formally known as Club Internacional de Fútbol Miami.

The team is due to start playing playing Major League Soccer this year. And fans were nervous it would start the season without a major sponsor.

But now the ruling royal family’s Qatar Foundation has apparently pledged to give the club $235 million. The Sun claims Qatar signed the deal with Inter Miami two weeks ago.

Qatar has long tried to drive international investments and to soften its image abroad. And experts say Inter Miami and the Beckham brand are a good match.

But it also puts a long controversy about Qatar’s human rights record under the spotlight.

For example, the country holds south Asian workers in poor conditions, even equivalent to slavery. And while women have the vote, Qatar jails women who become pregnant with an illegitimate child.

Meanwhile Qatar still uses flogging as a punishment. And it retains the right to execute people for a variety of reasons, including abandoning the Muslim faith and homosexuality. In practice, however, this is not used.

LGBT+ people have no legal rights and protections. And recent years have seen several cases where the authorities arrested and detained people for gay sex.

Naturally, some fans are worried about how the deal may reflect on the club, given Qatar’s record on LGBT+ rights.

But, if the rumors are true, the Qataris told Beckham personally that they were planning to relax their policies in the future.

Qatar 2022 FIFA World Cup

Any controversy around Qatar’s sponsorship of Inter Miami will merely be a prelude to Qatar hosting the FIFA World Cup in 2022.

FIFA’s decision to award the competition to Qatar has already been mired in charges of corruption.

And FIFA President Sepp Blatter made it worse. He handled LGBT+ people’s concerns by saying: ‘I would say they should refrain from any sexual activities.’

He later climbed down and said FIFA doesnt want to see any discrimination.

But unless the country radically updates its laws by 2022 – which seems unlikely – the World Cup is likely to see international protest around LGBT+ rights.

These may spill onto the pitch with some suggesting the Dutch football team could play in pink, instead of the country’s national color, orange.

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