Qatar's 'vagina stadium' architect creates outrage with 'unconcerned with workers' deaths' line

The architect of the infamous 2022 World Cup stadium in Qatar, which looks like a vagina, has reportedly drawn widespread criticism over her casual statement that she is not concerned by the deaths of the migrant workers in the preparations for the tournament.

Zaha Hadid, whose Al Wakrah is the most famous of the stadiums rising out of the desert for the 2022 World Cup for its weird shape, is enmeshed in a far more serious scandal: a rash of deaths in the name of building the infrastructure for the tournament.

According to the Huffington Post, an Iraqi-born British national, Hadid is believed to have completed her stadium on schedule, although it is indicated that advance construction on her site began in January.

A recent investigation by a reputed British paper found that since 2012, nearly 900 immigrant workers from India and Nepal have died from circumstances largely related to 2022 World Cup labor, although Hadid drew outrage when she said that it is not her duty as an architect to look into the deaths.

Although architect Phillip H. Gerou said that architectural ethics codes typically ascribe the 'duty' of caring for worker safety to the contractor, prior knowledge is the exception to the rule of onsite duty: if an architect has 'recognized a hazardous condition' beforehand, the ethical norm would be to address it.

In this case, the architect had reason to believe the risks for workers were dire even before the investigation, with Gerou saying that Hadid's iconic status means that she has the power to influence the Qatari government to make meaningful reforms by speaking out now.