Popular YouTube collective Dude Perfect have come under fire from fans and critics alike after posting a sponsored video from Qatar, facing accusations of choosing money over “morals“.
Since Qatar was announced to be hosting the 2022 FIFA World Cup in 2010, questions have been raised around whether the country is fit to host such an event, with many critics sharing their disappointment that the biggest sporting event in the world will be hosted in the Middle Eastern country, raising concerns over their human rights records.
This was exacerbated by reports of huge numbers of migrant workers dying while helping to build stadiums and the right infrastructure for Qatar to put on the tournament. In February 2021, it was revealed that 6500 migrant workers had died since work had started.
With the World Cup now right around the corner, though, there has been a huge number of influencers both from within and outside of the football world headed to Qatar to take part in promotional activities, including Dude Perfect — but they’ve quickly faced criticism for it.
One Twitter user told them that “It never hurts to do some research on the potential bucket list location,” adding that next time they should “pick somewhere less controversial.”
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It never hurts to do some research on the potential bucket list location. A few minutes on Google should've created some red flags. There's plenty of locations you can pick, next time please pick somewhere less controversial.
— Jordan Kendall (@jordankendall54) July 16, 2022
Some also questioned Dude Perfect’s decision to do this after rejecting an alcohol sponsorship.
“From a channel that rejected a sponsorship from an alcohol company I thought they had better morals but I guess I was wrong,” they said.
So it is okay for them to show off a country that has participated in slavery just because they got money from them. From a channel that rejected a sponsorship from an alcohol company I thought they had better morals but I guess I was wrong.
— James White #StandWithUkraine #StandWithIsrael (@Emzac77) July 16, 2022
The YouTube comments reflect a similar sentiment, also accusing Dude Perfect of changing the name of the video from ‘Qatar World Cup’ to simply ‘Desert’, as well as suggesting that they had actually been deleting comments questioning the decision to support Qatar.
Dude Perfect have not publicly addressed the criticism, but they’ve also received a lot of supportive comments on the video saying how great it looks, so they may not address it at all.
