Which World Cup? German pubs boycott Qatar

For 27 years, one of Cologne’s cult pubs, Lotta, has been experiencing electrifying football moments that last forever. Especially when the Cologne team, FC Köln, plays and scores the winning goal, the pub catches fire. Strangers embrace, with the local Kölsch beer flowing in abundance. The same is done with the representative football team of Germany. The owners put up a giant screen usually outside the store, where dozens of her fans celebrate collectively with cheers and plenty of beer. This year, things are different. Not only because the FIFA World Cup takes place in winter, but because Qatar is hosting it. And pub owner Peter Zimmerman, a football fan to the core, had to make one of the most difficult decisions of his life.

“We boycott Qatar”

During the World Cup the TV is turned off. From November 20 to December 18. To protest the state of human rights, the oppression of women, discrimination against homosexuals and the disastrous working conditions. “We also want with our stance to send a message against this totally corrupt FIFA system, which only cares about money and does not care about human rights and football culture.” And on Tuesday, as the France v Australia match kicks off, the pub will be discussing the situation in Qatar, FIFA policy and the boycott. There are darts and foosball tournaments, film screenings and the chance to repeat the World Cup in …. Playstation. The protest action went viral, and even a Japanese TV crew was in Cologne, in the southern part of the city, with its many restaurants, bars, discos and pubs. “The closer we got to the launch date, the more we realized that Qatar was the last straw, and we didn’t want to support that,” Zimmerman says. “So in April we went public with our boycott and put up a banner that said “We are boycotting Qatar”. The reactions were initially positive across the board, even though we were still in the minority at the time.” Something previously unthinkable, for the first time in his life Zimmerman doesn’t know the World Cup schedule inside out.

But in the meantime, one has the feeling throughout Germany that it is not a World Cup, but a local championship. Enthusiasm is noticeably limited everywhere. No cars with German flags, no exchange campaigns with players’ Panini cards, no games in the bookies. And also, due to the low temperatures, no Public Viewing. German sports retailers such as Intersport and Sport2000 are complaining that sales of World Cup jerseys are down by up to 50% compared to the World Cup four years ago in Russia. According to a recent poll by the polling institute infratest dimap, more than half of Germans are considering ignoring the World Cup completely this year. Meanwhile, at the Lotta pub, officials have consistently removed all beer bottles and the FIFA World Cup logo.

Of course, there are also critical comments via Instagram or by email, calling the owners hypocrites, because at the same time they heat their shop with natural gas from Qatar. But Zimmerman doesn’t regret his decision for a second, even though he won’t be making much money in the next 4 weeks. “Of course, the World Cup is always a welcome additional source of income, especially when Germany is playing, but we have our regulars and I hope that others will come who are interested in our alternative programme. They say they like football, but now with Qatar it’s just too much for them.”

Germany as the world champion of ethics?

So, on Tuesday night, Dietrich Schulze-Marmeling will also come to Lotta. Not as a guest, but as a speaker. The author of several football books has become something of a protest movement team leader. The die-hard Borussia Dortmund fan started the #boycottqatar2022 initiative two years ago and even wrote a book about the controversy surrounding Qatar and why the World Cup should not be held in the desert state. “I was surprised by the level and the scale of the protests in recent weeks, especially from fans in the last three Bundesliga games,” he says. with Russia. Many still say that Russia was at least a great country with a certain footballing tradition. But for many, hosting in Qatar with its 350,000 citizens is simply absurd.” “Santa Claus instead of adidas, Lebkuchen (ss Christmas sweet) instead of FIFA” is the slogan of the boycott initiative.

All who join the call should “smother” FIFA with letters of protest, not buy products with the World Cup logo and avoid Qatar and public screenings in Germany. The noble aim of Schulze-Marmeling and his “competitors” is that it should no longer be attractive to “present the World Cup in this perverted way and continue to destroy football”. He admits, however, that he can perceive people who in the end can’t bear not to turn on the TV. “I’m not criticizing anyone, I can even understand it very well. But everyone who says now that they won’t watch the games, will they bear it when Germany plays? But the most important thing is not to lose the critical eye. The debate must continue during the World Cup and the media must also know that criticism cannot be ignored. We need a debate about how we want to shape the future of football.”

Dietrich Schulze-Marmeling sees Germany in particular at the forefront of this debate, which has repeatedly highlighted racism, homophobia and the growing influence of investors. But for many fans of the World Cup, the human rights situation in Qatar and corruption in FIFA play almost no role, the “king-soccer” crushes everything. “Many are already scoffing, from a moral point of view they say Germany will become world champions. We can be proud that the issue of human rights is of particular importance in Germany,” says Schulze-Marmeling. “And I always say when they object that we live in a cut-off German enclave: Sorry, but other countries are starting to think differently. And they are more likely to look with some admiration at what is happening here. Especially from England we get a lot of questions about how we managed the protests, and if we can help them do the same.”

DW – Oliver Piper/ Irini Anastasopoulou

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