Culture Corner:
FIFA Uncovered and God Forbid

Dec 5, 2022

Docuseries: FIFA Uncovered, 2022, four episodes on Netflix

This documentary mini-series premiered just days before the World Cup began in Qatar. Billions of people watch this international sporting soccer competition, but few know what goes on behind the scenes. This series carefully exposes the bribes, corruption, power struggles and more that have gone on for decades.

FIFA is theoretically a nonprofit organization, but the sport generates billions. The money is supposed to go back to the participating countries for player development, but with no oversight or accountability, it was used instead to enrich the managers of FIFA.

Host countries and FIFA presidents are chosen according to who paid the biggest bribes. Unsafe working conditions for migrant workers are business as usual. The series reveals how dozens of these corrupt managers were finally arrested and charged in 2015, but asks, has anything really changed?

Documentary Movie: God Forbid, the Sex Scandal that Brought Down a Dynasty, 2022, directed by Billy Corbin

This movie is not just about a sex scandal. It is about a famous evangelist, Jerry Falwell Jr., and his father, the equally famous Jerry Falwell Sr., and how they influenced religious and political life in the U.S. for decades. It focuses on the incredible power of Jerry Falwell Jr. while running Liberty University and how he used that position to advocate what he said were “correct moral stands,” like endorsing Donald Trump for president, or fighting to outlaw abortion.

As the film reveals, he used his position to enrich himself and to pleasure himself, a predator preaching morality all the while wallowing in wealth and lust. He convinced multitudes to follow his rules while he laughed all the way to the bank.