“Bring the Cup to Reason”. It is around this slogan, borrowed from a petition from the NGO Amnesty International, that a group of young people from Lille decided to launch, next week, a website responsible for identifying the bars and pubs that will boycott the FIFA World Cup in Qatar in November and December.
The host country has indeed been under fire from critics for several months. And calls for a boycott have increased since the radical position taken in early August by the former captain of the German team, Philipp Lahm, world champion in 2014. The footballer had announced that he would not go to the Qatar.
Highlight “alternative events to the world”
“We liked the formula, in the form of a play on words, and we intend to use it to mobilize establishments that wish to get involved,” explains Antonin Lefebvre, leader of the “Bring the Cup to Reason” project. The objective is not to openly call for a boycott, but to highlight “alternative events to the world, organized by those who have chosen that our values must be respected”, he says.
On the ground, the movement has already begun. In the North, for example, a café-restaurant in Marcq-en-Barœul, near Lille, has already taken the plunge. No World Cup matches will be broadcast. A revolution in this bistro renowned precisely for these evenings around sport, whether football or rugby.
“It is an aberration to rejoice in a sporting event which has caused thousands of deaths on the construction sites of stadiums, and which flouts human rights, assumes the manager, Justine Chambrillon, on BFM-TV . And what’s more, the ecological impact is disastrous, at a time when we are being asked to save energy. »
Also in Belgium and Germany
In Redon, in Ille-et-Vilaine, it is a Dutch manager who displays her convictions. On a blackboard installed at the counter of the Nautic, is written in blue, white, red, in chalk “Soon here the boycott of the FIFA World Cup in Qatar”. “I love watching football, and this event was also very good for bringing in customers, but not in this situation”, explains Dorine Brouwer at West France.
In Belgium, La Maison du Peuple, one of the largest cafés in Brussels, has also taken a stand to boycott the broadcast of matches. “We sit on a big recipe but we could not have looked in the mirror”, says Thomas Kok, one of the managers in The Free Belgium. The same line of conduct for some pubs in Bonnin Germany.
According to Antonin Lefebvre, a dozen Lille bars are ready to follow suit. As well as two Marseille bars and two others in Bordeaux. “Watching football and drinking shots, we love that, but there, we ask ourselves questions, he relates. We don’t necessarily want to be part of it, but we don’t want to feel alone either, because resisting the call of friends on match nights is going to be complicated. »