The sport called "football" in my country is even more harmful than the Olympics. The original intention of the Olympics was lofty, but unfortunately, as with most popular things, it turned into a money grab.
Olympic rivalries are often a mirror of real-life rivalries. See the Czechs or Americans beating the Russians in hockey. It's a peaceful venue, but one that often reflects the state of the world.
Eurovision is the same. Though yearly, limited to Europe, and not taken anywhere near as seriously as the olympics, it's an important political event imo. The late disqualification and the voting this year had me on the edge of my seat. Russia haven't been able to show up without being drowned out by booing for a decade, for their anti-LGBT law changes and then for their invasion of Ukraine amongst other things. No so-called miracles on ice happen at Eurovision but the politics run a lot deeper than just countries keeping to their voting blocs lol.
The politics are always going to be a part of these kinds of events
> Coubertin called this sport in the service of global harmony – nothing short of a new “religio athletae,” or “religion of athletics.”
I think that he succeeded. I see many people celebrating their nations pride, but also human accomplishment of athletes of any nationality.
One can be cynic about it, but one can be cynic about everything and enjoy nothing. But even that the Olympics exist in our reality, with its problems and injustices, it is still inspiring and enjoyable in many levels.
We need more things that connect the world this way, but they only work if you can set aside the cynicism a bit or at least see the good and the bad and enjoy the good when appropriate and try to fix the bad when appropriate. It's been genuinely fun watching this year and just enjoying the competition and surrounding celebration and coverage.
> Dès les premiers jours, j'étais un colonialiste fanatique… Les races sont de valeur différente, et à la race blanche, d’essence supérieure, toutes les autres doivent faire allégeance.
> From the very first days I was a fanatical colonialist… Races are of different value, and to the white race, of superior essence, all others must swear allegiance.
> Le véritable héros olympique est, à mes yeux, l’adulte mâle individuel. Je n’approuve pas personnellement la participation des femmes à des concours publics
> The real Olympic hero, in my eyes, is the individual adult male. I personally do not approve of women participating in public competitions.
Yup, his idea of perfection is most certainly imperfect by our standards, why even try to dress it up? Are we going to extol the virtues of Margaret Sanger and John Money next?
The guy praised eugenics [1] and admired Hitler [2]. You think that's not relevant to an article about how the Olympics are a "religion of perfection"? What kind of perfection do you think that was, exactly?
[1] Pierre de Coubertin, "L'Éducation anglaise," In: J.-M. Brohm, Pierre de Coubertin, le seigneur des anneaux, Homnisphères, 2008.
[2] Daniel Bermond, Pierre de Coubertin, Paris, Éditions Perrin, 2008, 429 p. (ISBN 978-2-262-02349-2)
Trying to apply current moral standards to historical people will leave you finding nothing but demons in history. If people have to be perfect for their creations to not be discarded, then almost all modern institutions which have survived for long time will be in danger.
I’m not sure the article does glorify him. It does call out some shortcomings of his vision and even implementation of the games over the years. The entire point is to get better and move beyond where we are now (and where we were then.) The fact that we can decry his views is a testament that much of humanity has largely moved on from them.
Abhorrent as those views are, in the context of his time they were more or less the accepted normal. Back then, women couldn't vote in France or most other countries he had visited/used for inspiration. On the contrary, feminists, rare as they were, were mocked.
Racism was prevalent, colonialism rampant. He was born 30 years before Hitler, and we all know his views and how popular they were among large parts of Europe and even elsewhere.
That doesn't excuse his views, but it contextualises them.
Belgium showed black people in a zoo until the 60s, and women did not have voting rights in “enlightened” Switzerland until 1971. Holier than thou attitudes in Europe are a product of fairly recent brainwashing.
This is a take I agreed with, then I read about it, and behold, it isn't really true. While among the aristocrats and/or oligarchs, it was certainly the majority opinion (engenism, racism and pro-colonialism to clarify), it wasn't among the population. A lot of people fought against colonialism, in the first place religious people. And a majority didn't care.
It's a bit hard to gauge the opinion of the masses, but jingoism was prevalent and a popular political stance to have, so I doubt the majority didn't care.
In any case, I didn't say those views were universal - just that they were normal and acceptable to have.
Both articles are about an obsession with peak human performance, 150 years later women do not excel in this regard and are not represented in the records, only in their own category, an adjective, nothing has fundamentally changed except categorization to accommodate.
People appreciate it and the discipline involved, the context of “Olympic hero” based on what it aimed to showcase is still relevant today by that standard. That observation in and of itself is not misogyny.
The shooting competition got split into gendered competitions after the first woman won in 1992; women were then banned from competing in the formerly mixed event until 2000 when a separate women’s event was organized. https://olympics.com/en/news/zhang-shan-the-only-female-shoo...
way to go Zhang Shan, that seems tangentially relevant to the statement. Its own independent issue about the subsequent split, not changing anything about my statement in a scatterplot of all absolute records, and nothing to do with whether a statement in 1869 was misogyny.
People in wheelchairs. It's not even close. They have to put them in a different category from the, um, able-bodied people, so that the able-bodied can also win.
If it becomes official, there may be at least 3 who trained hard enough to get all the medals. Actually, can able-bodied person compete in paralympic that they have no inherent advantage?
Because so many families relied on the haenyeo for the majority of their income, a semi-matriarchal society developed on Jeju with the haenyeo at the head of the household.
On the tiny islets off the coast of Jeju, such as Mara Island, where sea-diving was the sole source of income, this reversal of traditional gender roles was fully realized; men would look after the children and go shopping while the women would bring in money for the family.
for generations, haenyeo—or sea women—have supported men and children by free-diving to the ocean floor, harvesting such prized sea creatures as conches, abalones and sea cucumbers to supply the local economy.
When Jeju men were called out to other seas or lands to fight wars, or languished in prison, the haenyeos of Jeju Island found an opportunity near home, off the choppy waters of the island’s coast.
Haenyeo women went under water more than 100 times a day, as low as 65 feet under, grabbing precious sea treasures with their bare hands, trading them for money that would be used to feed and clothe their families, pay for their children’s college education and pay off the steep taxes and fishery fees formerly imposed by the Japanese colonial government.
And in 100 years people will criticize you as well.
What your generation did to the environment, biodiversity, the climate, will be offensive to them.
Maybe you said something in favor or against AI and that then backfires. Because if AI is used to dominate humanity tech people who made it possible will be the most hated.
Or who knows, maybe you ate an animal or used too many kWh in your house.
It's pure hubris to assume you know what the concerns and cultural fads will be important to people of the future. You don't know what they'll care about any more than I do.
I think you need to take a hard look in history and see how popular belief eugenics was at one point. It doesn't make it better, but it means you can't use it as a point to completely describe a person and everything else they did.
Eugenics started by trying to transfer the lessons of selective animal breeding to people. IQ measurements had a connection with eugenics, and low IQ individuals were targetted... in the US.
We know IQ is inheritable but IQ is influenced by many factors like pollution and nutrition.
> > The real Olympic hero, in my eyes, is the individual adult male. I personally do not approve of women participating in public competitions.
The modern Olympics organizers have taken this sentiment and updated it with a twist: women can participate but they may be forced to compete against any adult male who claims to be female.
Just as in de Coubertin's day, males are prioritized while women are demeaned.
The Olympics are a great many admirable things… but they’re also fundamentally a capitalist money making exercise with corporate sponsors, ad breaks, yadda yadda. It’s inevitable that it will end up being a reflection of western values at large.
I find the Olympics hypocritical because nations at war get to participate on seemingly arbitrary lines despite the foundational desire for peace.
Personally, absolutely no nation actively waging any sort of war or conflict, regardless if it's offensive or defensive, should get to participate.
In today's terms that would prohibit the US, Russia, Ukraine, Israel, Palestine, China, the Philippines, Myanmar, Iran, North Korea, South Korea, and many more.
We need to remember that the original Olympics demanded that warring Greek citystates come to a ceasefire such that no blood was shed during the games. That should be the hard, non-negotiable first rule to participating in the Olympics.
Are you at war? Then kindly GTFO from the Olympics. Come back when you've made peace.
I view the Olympics (and perhaps more so events like the Football World Cup) as a means of channeling the energies that also inspire war: national pride, international rivalries, etc etc. Hopefully that diversion of energy works as an outlet to diffuse real world tensions.
But at the same time the professionalisation of the whole thing detracts somewhat. The US and China win so many medals because they invest so much money in their athletic programs. Even in a theoretical meritocracy money still speaks. The few exceptions are sports like marathon running where smaller countries can remain competitive.
Fucking troll user profile created five minutes ago. The site is for individuals who would like to engage in respectful discussion based in science. Get your political shit out of here.
74 comments
[ 3.3 ms ] story [ 186 ms ] threadWell played
- The message, that people from around the world come together to compete safely and peacefully
- Practically, nobody can be thinking of war when they are laser focused on that last tenth of a second (or beach volleyball shot)
The politics are always going to be a part of these kinds of events
I think that he succeeded. I see many people celebrating their nations pride, but also human accomplishment of athletes of any nationality.
One can be cynic about it, but one can be cynic about everything and enjoy nothing. But even that the Olympics exist in our reality, with its problems and injustices, it is still inspiring and enjoyable in many levels.
… and hopefully continues to succeed. Humanity needs more celebrated and shining beacons of what we can accomplish together.
> Dès les premiers jours, j'étais un colonialiste fanatique… Les races sont de valeur différente, et à la race blanche, d’essence supérieure, toutes les autres doivent faire allégeance.
> From the very first days I was a fanatical colonialist… Races are of different value, and to the white race, of superior essence, all others must swear allegiance.
> Le véritable héros olympique est, à mes yeux, l’adulte mâle individuel. Je n’approuve pas personnellement la participation des femmes à des concours publics
> The real Olympic hero, in my eyes, is the individual adult male. I personally do not approve of women participating in public competitions.
And it does give some context to what he might mean by "perfection" and "peace".
[1] Pierre de Coubertin, "L'Éducation anglaise," In: J.-M. Brohm, Pierre de Coubertin, le seigneur des anneaux, Homnisphères, 2008.
[2] Daniel Bermond, Pierre de Coubertin, Paris, Éditions Perrin, 2008, 429 p. (ISBN 978-2-262-02349-2)
Racism was prevalent, colonialism rampant. He was born 30 years before Hitler, and we all know his views and how popular they were among large parts of Europe and even elsewhere.
That doesn't excuse his views, but it contextualises them.
It's a bit hard to gauge the opinion of the masses, but jingoism was prevalent and a popular political stance to have, so I doubt the majority didn't care.
In any case, I didn't say those views were universal - just that they were normal and acceptable to have.
People appreciate it and the discipline involved, the context of “Olympic hero” based on what it aimed to showcase is still relevant today by that standard. That observation in and of itself is not misogyny.
People in wheelchairs. It's not even close. They have to put them in a different category from the, um, able-bodied people, so that the able-bodied can also win.
The world record for the women's 100m sprint was set in 1988 at 10.49s by Florence Joyner at 29. [0]
High school boys in the US easily beat those times. [1]
0: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_world_records_in_athle...
1: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_high_sch...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Haenyeo
and:https://strangersguide.com/articles/haenyeo-divers/
What your generation did to the environment, biodiversity, the climate, will be offensive to them.
Maybe you said something in favor or against AI and that then backfires. Because if AI is used to dominate humanity tech people who made it possible will be the most hated.
Or who knows, maybe you ate an animal or used too many kWh in your house.
Let he who is without sin cast the first stone, I guess?
We know IQ is inheritable but IQ is influenced by many factors like pollution and nutrition.
The approach was very pseudoscientific in nature.
The modern Olympics organizers have taken this sentiment and updated it with a twist: women can participate but they may be forced to compete against any adult male who claims to be female.
Just as in de Coubertin's day, males are prioritized while women are demeaned.
Money and politics, like anything else. The Olympics are a corrupt and venal capitalist enterprise.
Bring on the downvotes.
Personally, absolutely no nation actively waging any sort of war or conflict, regardless if it's offensive or defensive, should get to participate.
In today's terms that would prohibit the US, Russia, Ukraine, Israel, Palestine, China, the Philippines, Myanmar, Iran, North Korea, South Korea, and many more.
We need to remember that the original Olympics demanded that warring Greek citystates come to a ceasefire such that no blood was shed during the games. That should be the hard, non-negotiable first rule to participating in the Olympics.
Are you at war? Then kindly GTFO from the Olympics. Come back when you've made peace.
But at the same time the professionalisation of the whole thing detracts somewhat. The US and China win so many medals because they invest so much money in their athletic programs. Even in a theoretical meritocracy money still speaks. The few exceptions are sports like marathon running where smaller countries can remain competitive.