We're not sure how Tebas is going to come back from this one.
At the Intellectual Property Summit held in Miami, Florida — an event that examines the impact of IP awareness on innovation, creative expression, commerce and society — controverial LaLiga president Javier Tebas launched himself into a passionate critique over the normalized leniency toward piracy punishments for illegally streaming soccer matches and tournaments.
He then proceeded to make perhaps the worst comparison we’ve ever seen.
Tebas, in the worst fashion possible, made an outlandish comparison between illegally watching soccer and committing the more egregious offenses of purchasing cocaine or searching for illicit material involving minors. Yes, he really said that.
Javier Tebas compares illegal streaming to Googling 'buying cocaine' or 'child sex'
In a failed attempt of bringing up the severity of illegally watching soccer and the easy access to stream matches online, Tebas made the bizarre decision to compare Googling ‘free football’ with ‘buying cocaine’ and ‘child sex.’
"If you go to Google and type in 'I want to buy cocaine' or 'child sex' nothing appears. But if you type in 'free football' it appears... one is considered a serious crime, but the other is not, and it's the same thing,” said Tebas.
This is the president of one of the most important sports leagues in the world, ladies and gentlemen.
Tebas continued on his ‘rant’ against illegal streaming, saying applications such as Telegram, Discord and WhatsApp play a big part in the problem.
"On Telegram and Discord there are groups of 50 and 60 thousand people, of all languages, with the 'links' to view illegal content. In Spain they were going to ban Telegram for piracy, in the end the judge who was willing to do it backed down,” said the Spaniard.
“They and Discord are giving a lot of information on how you can get this content. We will also go after Meta because it is also happening in the WhatsApp communities and they are not collaborating to help clarify it,” he added.
Quite the statements from the 61-year-old.
Tebas, who has not shied away from making headlines for other controversies in the past, is serving his fourth and last term as LaLiga president, ending his soon-to-be 14-year tenure ahead of the Spanish league in 2027.
