Q Toon: Red Card Warning

Russia is hosting the 2018 World Cup, and let me just say at the outset that I know "futbol" is the Spanish name for the sport we Americans call "soccer." The rest of the world calls it "football," but we Americans use that word to refer to a game in which only one member of each team ever kicks a ball.

My readers are mostly Americans (Buon giorno, however, to my frequent Italian visitors here), but the characters in this cartoon would not call it "soccer." Anyway, "futbol" is a faithful enough transliteration of "футбол." So there.

Second of all, this idea would have worked better if there were no "penalty box" in soccer / futbol / футбол / calcio / whatever you want to call it. In the Beautiful Game, the area from which a player is entitled to make a direct free kick because of a foul by the opposing team is sometimes called a penalty box.

But on to today's actual topic: as the rest of the world gathers in Russia for the 2018 World Cup, LGBTQ fans have been warned that the Cossacks are on the march to punish public displays of same-sex affection.  Yes, Cossacks.

[I]n the city of Rostov, members of the religious and traditionalist Cossack communities  enlisted to help authorities secure the stadiums say they will will also be on the lookout for acts of same-sex affection.
"If two men are kissing each other at the World Cup, we will tip off the police, drawing their attention to it and the rest is a police matter,” Oleg Barannikov, a head coordinator of the Cossack volunteers with the police told Radio Free Europe-affiliate Current Time. “To us, values mean the (Christian) Orthodox faith and the family come first.”

Barnnikov did not elaborate on what Cossacks hope police will do upon learning about the kissing men. Homosexuality in Russia is not illegal, but recent legislation has banned many materials for public awareness of non-heterosexual relationships and  LGBT pride symbols from public display, equating them to adult content inappropriate for children.

The British Football Supporters’ Federation (FSF), in partnership with the Football Association and Foreign and Commonwealth Office, warned its LGBTQ fans that public displays of affection at the Russia games could be hazardous to one's health. Indeed, a French couple was attacked and seriously injured before the games. Two Dagestani men have been arrested for the attack; OperSlil Telegram's account of the crime granted that “Even though the injured are homosexuals, it does not justify the monsters who beat him.”

Well, that's nice to know. I don't suppose, however, that the OperSlil Telegram people recommended a level of violence more acceptable against homosexuals.