Quote:
Originally Posted by Déjà Bru
I have to admit, I am enjoying these Winter Olympics. I am tuning them in every day. I just got done watching Curling, of all things, including consulting with Wikipedia on the finer points.
Why the heck the turnaround? It's not the difference in the sports, winter vs. summer, I don't think.
Well, for one thing, I have put aside politics. Domestic and foreign. I don't care that these games are being played in Beijing. I feel sorry for the Muslim Uyghurs, but my boycotting the telecasts is not going to help them.
The other thing, about corporate influence and money saturation ... well, look; I could live in this world and enjoy as much of it as I can despite all the bad influences, or I could be an ascetic hermit and deny myself any pleasure. Perhaps wear a hair shirt in the bargain.
So this time, I am focusing on the sports and the individuals, not the geopolitics or the commercials and logos. And enjoying myself.
What am I, a different person six months later? Or somebody who has picked up a bit of wisdom since then, after becoming tired of all the relentless bad news?
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I'm enjoying them, too, though I pretty much always do. Many sports I watch on DVR, so anything political I just wizz on past. This is especially helpful with the NBA (and the NFL to a smaller extent; thankfully both sports - in the most-recent/current seasons - have significantly minimized the exposure of their divisive political stances), but in the end I default to the fact that the players are simply tools for my enjoyment and nothing more. Any thoughts they may have on politics or anything else couldn't be less relevant to me (despite how important
they think their opinions are).
About the only thing that annoys me about the Olympics - and this is definitely NOT restricted to the Olympics - is the farce of the whole mask thing with the athletes. Don't get me wrong, I'm neither advocating for nor against mask-wearing, nor looking to debate their effectiveness here. But when a skier or snowboarder and interviewer are outdoors, 10 feet away from each other and anyone else, there's simply no need for both the athlete and the interviewer to be wearing a mask, when moments earlier the athlete was hugging other competitors and other people while maskless (and then later they'll be in an indoor setting with Mike Tirico and won't be wearing masks.) This, in particular, is pure farce. Much like in the NBA, when coaches routinely pull down their masks to yell instructions at players or yell at refs, and most players on the sidelines - after sweating all over each other minutes before - are wearing their masks below their noses or around their necks... At any rate, I'm watching the Oly's for the competition, and not so much the interviews, but on those occasions when I'm curious what the athlete has to say about winning or crashing out, it's pretty annoying to not be able to see their expressions, and know that the reason for that is all about symbolism, and nothing more.
I'll reiterate that my beef here is not about masks in general, not about the Olympic workers wearing masks and so forth. It's simply about the narrow circumstances I describe above, which - again - are exclusively for show. Stupid.
Ya, totally agree that me boycotting telecasts isn't going to help anyone victimized by China. I guess I wonder how an organization can be so oblivious to award the hosting of games to countries like China. But that's who the IOC is, and who they've always been. To them it's about athletic competition and the money it can bring in. There's no evidence that anything else matters unless it falls in line. I guess in that respect, the IOC is kinda like LeBron...
