From Russia with love?

Nation shouldn’t host soccer’s top event

When watching the World Cup, the one thing more puzzling than the Germans losing to Mexico is the fact the event is being staged in Russia.

Never mind that the Russian team is mediocre, this is a nation with a terrible record of human rights violations.

Where do we begin?

According to groups such as Amnesty International, there are reports of cruelty and neglect in Russian orphanages, prison torture at the hands of guards and police, the murder of journalists, persecution of scientists, and marginalization of ethnic minorities and the LGBTQ community. Free speech has never been alive and well in Russia.

In athletics, Russian athletes were banned from competing under the name Team Russia at this year’s Winter Olympics due to state-sponsored doping.

The government cheated and got caught, but Moscow is still hosting the World Cup.

The International Federation of Association Football (FIFA) and International Olympic Committee are not the most reputable organizations on the planet. But, through their infinite wisdom, they chose to award the world’s two biggest sporting events — the World Cup and 2014 Winter Olympics — to Russia.

Bids are secured years in advance, but these atrocities have been happening for years.

Why not choose a nice country that doesn’t torture its own citizens as the World Cup’s host nation?

For the thousands of young kids playing soccer here in Penticton, what message does it send them?

Oddly enough, no countries threatened to boycott Moscow. There were murmurs of it in 2014, but instead some athletes made political statements during the opening ceremonies.

From what we’ve seen on the news, it’s a jovial atmosphere in Moscow, in and around the soccer venues. The crowds are really into it. Like the Olympics, the Russians are proving themselves as good hosts. Soccer is called “the beautiful game.” The ideology of the World Cup and Olympic Games is peace and friendship through athletic competition.

It should begin with who they choose to host the event. —James Miller Valley editor