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by djrockstar1 1640 days ago
I'm no human rights expert and nor am I trying to defend slavery. I'm just combatting the insane about of FUD that exists around basically any country in the middle east, specially on forums that are comprised of mostly western people.
2 comments
kingcharles 1640 days ago
I was one of those slurping down the KoolAid and believing all the FUD about the Middle-East. Then I started dating a Qatari woman and that helped to balance me out. She says the public health system is pretty poor, and it seems the migrants do not qualify for it anyway. That's a bad start.

People on here are totally misreading the Amnesty report though. The report does not say 15,000 immigrants died from World Cup construction. It says 15,000 migrants died over the period specified (which is a nominal figure), but it says that they do not understand what the cause of death was because Qatar is either purposefully or incompetently diagnosing this. That needs to be fixed.

I don't think Qatar is unique in mistreating its immigrant labor. Everywhere I've lived in the West does this to some degree, though not as seriously as Qatar was doing in the past.

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hluska 1640 days ago
It’s obvious you’re not a human rights expert. The thing is, the people at Amnesty International are human rights experts. They see an obvious problem and you’re doing gymnastics to convince everyone the problem doesn’t exist.

That’s a problem. You’re ignoring actual experts and spreading misinformation and now lies.

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Veen 1640 days ago
If you're going to effectively combat human rights violations and modern slavery, it's better to do it with facts and accurate statistics, rather than easily refuted figures. The Qatari government can make exactly the same (reasonable) points that commenters here are—a weak case makes it easy for guilty parties to evade responsibility.

Pointing out flaws in critical reports is not "defending human rights violations," it's highlighting weaknesses in the case, which helps people to make a stronger case.

(Plus, something isn't right and true just because Amnesty says it.)

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justinclift 1640 days ago
> You’re ignoring actual experts and spreading misinformation and now lies.

Your responses to the commenter above (across a few threads) are sounding hysterical. I'm not sure why. :(

At least they seem to be trying to work out the numbers and thing for themselves, and are looking for external sources for information to work with.

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