Reasons why I can't get into the Olympics anymore

[pilight]

Politics has always been intertwined with sports and probably always will be. People wishing for a return to some supposed time when they were separate are actually reminiscing about their own lost innocence, before they realized sports aren't always about what happens on the field.

[Syd Thrift]

Originally Posted by Bub13

Or Kevin Saucier, who retired because he feared his sudden loss of control might kill someone one day.



And getting the yips while tumbling through the air is a bit more dangerous than missing free throws. Best comparable is probably racing drivers: if you start thinking about how dangerous it is to do what you're doing, you'd best stop.

Yeah, this second part is the thing even I didn’t completely realize until after I posted. Simone Biles was practicing a move earlier in the year that only a handful of men, let alone women, have ever done correctly in world competition, and which was even given a lower base value to try and discourage people from doing it. And multiple women have seriously injured themselves training or warming up in competition - there’s a Russian woman trying to come back from a nasty broken leg (exacerbated because the USSR tried to push her back too quickly) to compete in the 1980 Olympics who broke her neck and was paralyzed from the waist down, as well as a Chinese woman who had a bad fall in warmups who was paralyzed from the chest down in the 90s. Do we have to wait for one of these incidents to happen in actual competition and/ or result in a death?

[Westheim]

Practicing a move that might cripple you and doesn't give a lot of points sounds like a third-rate strategy.

[Syd Thrift]

Originally Posted by Westheim

Practicing a move that might cripple you and doesn't give a lot of points sounds like a third-rate strategy.

The threat of injury is why it was downgraded and I think Biles kept with it just because it had never been completed by a woman before, downgrade or not. Still, that kind of thing demonstrates the difference between the twistys and the yips.

[Déjà Bru]

Well, here is something that I might actually tune in to see.



Why the sudden interest? Good question. I don't know for sure, but I will hazard a guess.

Rather than watching the so-called GOAT marching inevitably to gold medal heaven and corporate-sponsored riches, here we have a human being who had a real difficulty to overcome, had the courage to admit that she wasn't up to it at first, and who now has the courage to try again.

Now, that's a human interest story.

[Déjà Bru]

And now, I am a Simone Biles fan.

[pilight]

US managed to slip by China for the most gold on the last day of competition

[thehef]

I think the political angle was vastly overplayed by the media. I'm sure there were a few minor "protests" or other displays here and there, but from what I saw, it was exclusively U.S. athletes happy to wrap themselves in the flag and being extremely proud to represent the USA.

[Antonin]

Originally Posted by dkgo

Brady/Lebron skipping a playoff game for "mental stress" would be absolutely eviscerated. People already love to throw out that a player is "mentally weak" as a huge negative.

It isn't her being a woman, it's that almost no one cares about the olympics at the same level people care about the NFL.

It is partly about her being a woman. It's also about her being an African-American woman.

But, let's be real. The total weight of the medals Simone Biles has "brought home to the USA" probably exceeds her body weight, so the idea that somebody sitting on their couch nursing a beer and a bowl of nachos feels they have the right to criticize her for needing a break from the pressure to continue being the best in the world, maybe the best ever, is laughable.

[cephasjames]

Originally Posted by Antonin

It is partly about her being a woman. It's also about her being an African-American woman.

But, let's be real. The total weight of the medals Simone Biles has "brought home to the USA" probably exceeds her body weight, so the idea that somebody sitting on their couch nursing a beer and a bowl of nachos feels they have the right to criticize her for needing a break from the pressure to continue being the best in the world, maybe the best ever, is laughable.

Everyone has the right to criticize and opinionize anything they want. Whether their words carry much weight based on who they are and what their experience is is a whole other matter. But everyone can speak on anything nonetheless.

Saying someone is not allowed to speak on something simply because they are not that something or don't have experience in that something is the surest way to squelch honest conversation and create unnecessary division.

[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?

[jumpSeat]

The Olympics are a great ideal, but as with most things in life, they tend to fall short when confronted by reality. For me, I'm struggling with what I consider to be over-saturation. There's just too many new 'sports' that are gaining Olympic status, and rightly or wrongly, it's becoming harder to track, too balkanized, and at times, bordering on ridiculous. I mean at this point, I honestly wouldn't be surprised if Olympic lawn bowling was a thing.

[Syd Thrift]

Lawn bowling was actually an event in the 1988 Olympics in Seoul. If you go back to the early days, too, you're going to find some weird competitions and stuff you'd associate more with summer camp than the Olympics. Tug of war was an event in the early days, for instance. Also croquet. Also medieval tennis, aka jeu de paume.

And honestly a lot of sports that are just there that have been there forever are kind of weird too. Like the triple jump... I'm sorry but that crap is just goofy, and the fact that people spend literal years perfecting the hopping event only makes it goofier. And honestly hurdles are just... man, who thought of "hey, let's make running in a straight line harder by making the athletes have to jump over obstacles every ten meters"? That one might even be more sensical on paper than IRL because IRL it just looks silly. Also Greco-Roman wrestling. Not saying regular / freestyle wrestling is dumb - I wrestled in high school, it's a sport with a lot of strategy involved - but Greco-Roman is the version where you can't do leg takedowns, which makes it a lot like sumo, which, well, is sumo wrestling.

[low]

It's commercial and political theater. I have zero interest in any Olympics.

[thehef]

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?

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...

[Westheim]

Originally Posted by Syd Thrift

Lawn bowling was actually an event in the 1988 Olympics in Seoul. If you go back to the early days, too, you're going to find some weird competitions and stuff you'd associate more with summer camp than the Olympics. Tug of war was an event in the early days, for instance. Also croquet. Also medieval tennis, aka jeu de paume.

Don't forget medals being awarded in the early 1900s in art competitions.

[Déjà Bru]

My wife was wondering why the Olympics are on several channels, often simulcasting. I explained that the proliferation of Olympic sports and "sports" has created many more money-making opportunities and that the sheer number of competitions is too much for one network to handle anymore. It's a bigger pie and money floweth. Everybody is happy, from the sponsors to the networks to the IOC.

[Syd Thrift]

TBH I find snowboarding far, far more enjoyable to watch than the biathlon. YMMV I guess...

[Déjà Bru]

Originally Posted by Syd Thrift

TBH I find snowboarding far, far more enjoyable to watch than the biathlon. YMMV I guess...

Yes, I don't want to be a weenie, and I appreciate the athleticism of the sport, but don't you find biathlon to be somewhat militaristic?

Biathlon began as "an exercise for Norwegians as alternative training for the military. Norwegian skiing regiments organized military skiing contests in the 18th century, divided into four classes: shooting at mark while skiing at top speed, downhill race among trees, downhill race on big hills without falling, and a long race on flat ground while carrying a rifle and military pack."

After all, “Since 1993, the United Nations General Assembly has adopted the Olympic Truce resolution two years before every Games, unanimously calling for all hostilities to cease during the Games, thereby mobilizing the youth of the world in the cause of peace.”

[Westheim]

Hey hey, look who tops the medal table after today ...!

I have not watched a minute of anything, but I like looking at stats and tables