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Comment by AndrewUnmuted | Hacker News Reader

This isn't that crazy of a concept, to me. FIFA does achieve rather stunning results, given its breadth.

Though I do hear about conspiracies involving fixed games and about FIFA corruption from time to time, I imagine that they've done a lot more good for the world recently than the UN has.

Edit:

Sports are in general associated with some meaningful global events. The Olympics recently demonstrated this fact w/r/t North Korea.

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I imagine that they've done a lot more good for the world recently than the UN has

No, they have not! I am not sure by what metric one can compare FIFA and the United Nations, but I don't think you you are familiar with the breadth of the UN's work. Selected achievements from their results page [1]:

-Every year we mobilize about $7 billion in humanitarian aid to help people affected by emergencies.

-Every year we assist over 34 million refugees and others fleeing war, famine and persecution.

-We vaccinate 40% of the world’s children, saving 2 million lives a year.

-In 2011 the UN will provide food to around 90 million people in 73 countries.

-In the past few years, the UN has expanded legal international rights to indigenous peoples, people with disabilities, migrants and their families.

FIFA is merely better at marketing...

[1]http://www.un.org/en/strengtheningtheun/results.shtml

The U.N. is way better at marketing than FIFA could ever dream of being. You’re assuming that all those things would not have been done if the UN didn’t exist. The good things done by the U.N. are a consequence of its funders. If the UN had never been founded other organisations would have been to do the jobs the UN does now. If the UN collapsed tomorrow the associated humanitarian organisations would rebrand and continue.

The UN is clearly the better marketer, because it needs to work much harder to justify its ongoing "good" for the world.

I wonder if FIFA has ever been discovered to be running hugely corrupt wings like UN's WIPA which keeps trying to stuff some form of ACTA/SOPA/PIPA down our throats.

I wonder if FIFA has been found to ever profit from the rape and sexual abuse of minors. Minors, who descend from some of the most war-torn and horrific places on Earth.

7 billion annually and look how little they get done each year. Capitalism is much more responsible for Africa's and Asia's escape from poverty than the UN is - and that's a rather low bar.

I laugh at the idea that the UN, and not the charities they force to go through them, is responsible for saving 2 million lives per year. I wonder how many millions they let die each year.

In terms of global politics, FIFA is rather benevolent and yet they foster ongoing positive international relations benefits. The UN is, at best, malevolent, and I am dubious that their positives outweigh their enormous negatives, not to mention their negative externalities.

> I wonder if FIFA has ever been discovered to be running hugely corrupt wings, like…

Surely, surely you’re joking?

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2015_FIFA_corruption_case

That is an entire Wikipedia page about a corruption case only involving tax evasion , following an investigation by the IRS.

This is the FIFA , which decided, completely non corrupt of course, that Qatar is the best place to host a World Cup. Some people follow through on this anecdote with reasons as to why that’s a worse place to do so than actual Hell, but I prefer to prompt you to sit back a moment and think about that. Qatar. Forget about Russia: Qatar. For a sporting match. In summer. Qatar.

For context, these were the final bids for 2022: South Korea, Qatar, Japan, Australia, U.S.A.

Qatar.

FIFA is not corrupt? Sepp “football is politics” Blatter’s FIFA?

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sepp_Blatter

Surely you’re joking?

I remain unconvinced that FIFA has done more damage to the world than the UN. The kind of corruption written about here is child’s play compared to what atrocities the UN have committed.

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