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Let Us Now Consider
The Genocide Olympics
of TheColumnists.com
And now on the docket: The Olympic Games in Beijing this summer. Aren’t we lucky?
When the International Olympic Committee (IOC) awarded the 2008 Olympic Games to Beijing over Toronto, one Chinese executive bidding for the Games promised it would ”enhance” human rights. And a few years ago when doubts arose about China’s tolerance for dissent, IOC Pres. Jacques Rogge told the Beijing people, “The values of the IOC are full respect for human rights. We ask you to do the best efforts so that leading up to the Games, during the Games, and after the Games, you would have the best possible human rights record.”
Any such high-blown thoughts about the Olympics invariably earn a high place in the annals of Pollyanna. China’s recent actions underscore the original doubts about awarding the Games to a country whose policies hardly fit the so-called Olympic democratic ideals.
China’s stubborn economic support
of the Sudan regime responsible for the shame of Darfur, the
killing of millions of innocents in that region, has earned its
Games the label “The Genocide Olympics,” the term coined
by actress Mia Farrow. And now the crackdown by China on Tibetan
protestors has the world’s attention. The president of France
is threatening to stay away from the opening ceremonies. There
is pressure on President Bush and others to do as well, though
China is too powerful for any nation to boycott the Games; it
would risk hurting economic relations with one of the world’s
behemoths.
The crackdown on Tibet inspired an eloquent cartoon by Tom Toles
of the Universal Press Syndicate. It portrays the five Olympic
rings, not with its usual colors, but with interlocked barbed-wire
circles. Another point of irritation is the danger of pollution
in Beijing that worries many athletes, notably the world record
holder, Ethiopian Haile Gebrselassie, who has said he probably
would not compete in the marathon.
At times like these, Olympic proponents rant that politics has no place in the Olympics. This is the most laughable canard of all. Politics are at the heart of the Olympics. They have been ever since the good Baron Pierre de Coubertin inaugurated the modern Olympics in 1896. Upset with France’s defeat by Germany in 1870 in a war that lasted only six weeks, he vowed to harden the nation’s backbone by putting an emphasis on physical activity and sports. This led eventually to the inauguration of the Games.
Now, people are protesting the movement of the Olympic flame toward Beijing. In 1936 there were calls in the United States for a boycott of the Games staged by the Nazis in Berlin. A coalition of Jews, and Catholics who considered the Nazis to be a godless regime, campaigned against American participation in what came to be known as “Hitler’s Games.” American Olympics head, Avery Brundage, a fanatic supporter of he Olympics, went over to investigate the situation of the Jews in Germany. He was wined and dined, shepherded by German officials all the time, and came back denouncing the boycott campaign as something of a Jewish plot.
From Coubertin onward the Olympics have been held up as the personification of high ideals. Yet an Australian historian, Tony Perrottet, wrote that the ancient Greeks “were vain and individualist,” with “a very narrow definition of democracy” that allowed only “free born Greeks”--no slaves or foreigners allowed--to compete at Olympia. (Women were forbidden even to watch, depriving them of the exalted sight of men competing in the nude.)
The modern Olympics have been rife with
controversy. This reached a peak with the Cold War competition
between the United States and the Soviet Union. The Olympics
became something just short of war for them as both vied for
Olympic dominance. It took the murderous actions of Arab terrorists
killing Jewish Olympians to overshadow the controversies of the
1972 Games, notably the incompetence of basketball officials
that caused the Americans to lose a basketball game for the first
time in Olympic history.
From the beginning money has dominated the Olympics. They have
evolved into the private preserve of billionaires and officials
of third-world countries on the make. They are marked by the
three P's-politics, profiteering and professionalism. I see the
five Olympic rings standing for Terrorism, Fanaticism, Hypocrisy,
Incompetence and Arrogance. The Olympics are overblown and commercially-driven.
The Olympics are, admittedly, an inspiring, gaudy international spectacle. The opening ceremony is full of inspiring pageantry and bonhomie. At their best, they represent a chance for athletes in minor sports to enjoy some moments in the world spotlight. But professionals dominate the competitions in the major sports; and sportsmanship frequently suffers in the face of the lust for victories.
The controversy about China hosting these Games will play throughout the spring and summer as protestors dog the moving Olympic flame; athletes worry about Beijing pollution; and controversy in Tibet doesn’t go away.
Let’s just not hear that politics has no place in the Olympics.
©2008 by Stan Isaacs. The Stan Isaacs caricature is ©2001 by Jim Hummel. The illustration is from elements taken from IMSI's Master Clips Collection, 1895 Francisco Blvd. E., San Rafael, CA, 94901-5506, USA. This column first posted April 7, 2008.
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