I haven't watched much from the Winter Olympics except for a few highlights.
But as usual, I tend to comment more on the sociological aspects of sports than the actual games themselves.
Here are a few thoughts
North/South Korea tensions
That this Olympics was to be held in PyeongChang, South Korea (not to be confused with Pyongyang, North Korean, where one Olympic official flew to by mistake), which is not very far from the very-militarized border made for an interesting choice.North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un is always threatening to use nuclear weapons against real or perceived enemies, bringing worries that he would destroy South Korea into a nuclear wasteland.
There was also a war of words between Kim Jong Un and Donald Trump, raising even more tensions.
And in the middle of the Pacific, a state emergency worker accidentally pressed the missile alert that was to be sent to all mobile phones in Hawaii, causing massive panic this past January.
However, even the worst dictators know when to be strategic and pull back, as when Kim Jong Un allowed North Korean athletes, cheerleaders and more attend the Winter Olympics in South Korea. Unfortunately, they were followed by North Korean security officials who kept them isolated from the rest of the Olympic community.
But even with that, it did prove true to the cliche that the Olympics is a time when all the countries put their tensions aside and allow the athletes to compete
The athletes from both Koreas even marched together in the Opening Ceremonies.
https://www.salon.com/2018/02/09/north-korea-and-south-korea-march-together-at-olympics-opening-ceremony-as-tensions-continue/?source=newsletter
-- worker conditions
Winning an Olympic now means the town has to build some new facilities in time for the games to start.Sometimes, that means workers have to be imported. Sadly, that means that it was an opportunity for corrupt employers to abuse what they view as "cheap and pimpable" labor
https://www.thenation.com/article/winter-olympic-roundup-new-athletic-heroes-alongside-the-same-old-grifts/
For starters, as with previous Olympics, the Pyeongchang Games were run on the backs of a labor force of exploited workers. One German media outlet reported that of the 15,000 “volunteers,” more than 2,000 had quit because of squalid living conditions, tiny portions of sub-par food, and an absence of work breaks. It wasn’t unheard of for 10 volunteers to be crammed into a room built for four. Dozens of petitions were filed with South Korean President Moon Jae-in, complaining that working and living conditions “are unbelievably inadequate.” One volunteer said, “When I think about how much money is being spent here, I wonder why we do not get paid at all.”
Speaking of money, there’s the International Olympic Committee, whose members parachuted into Pyeongchang, enjoyed five-star treatment, and then jetted home. The IOC reportedly has around $1 billion in its coffers. Not paying people for their labor saves each Olympics millions. In Rio, where 70,000 “volunteers” were sought out, conservative estimates put savings at more than $100 million. It’s ugly as sin; the only thing changing is the languages that foremen use to berate these uncompensated laborers.
Sadly, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) doesn't do anything to ensure that all the contractors are providing basic worker's rights
Diversity
Granted, those who live where there is snow would be more likely to become Winter Olympic athletes. Places that have snow tend to have lighter-skinned people.
So it's no surprise that there is less diversity among Winter Olympic athletes as compared to Summer Olympic athletes.
However, as the 1988 Jamaican bobsled team shows (as well as the movie based on their story "Cool Runnings"), even those from the tropics can join the winter fun too!
This year, we had a bobsled team from Nigeria
There was also a skeleton (sort of like an individual version of bobsled) athlete from Ghana
http://www.bbc.com/sport/winter-olympics/42694188
from the United Arab Emirates, there was Zahra Lari, a figure skater who has led the movement to allow fellow skaters to wear a hijab on the ice
https://www.globalcitizen.org/en/content/zahra-lari-pg-procter-gamble-loveoverbias/
And from the Pacific, Pita Taufatofua, the Tongan taekwondo fighter who was the heartthrob of the Summer Olympics came to the Winter Olympics as a cross country skier! Obviously, a man of many talents.
However, even places with snow have descendants of immigrants from more tropical places. The USA has long been noted for its diversity, but there is less diversity among its Winter athletes as compared to its Summer athletes.
However, there has been an increase of non-white athletes for the USA Winter Olympics team, with a few more of African & Asian ancestries than before.
Sadly, in the era of Donald Trump, the basket of deplorables are making their disgust towards diversity known, as Fox News editor John Moody claiming that the nonwhite athletes were there to fulfill a diversity quota
https://www.salon.com/2018/02/09/fox-news-executive-blasts-darker-gayer-u-s-olympic-team-in-bigoted-rant/?source=newsletter
In the now-deleted piece, Moody alleges that the U.S. Olympic Committee would like to replace its modus operandi of pursuing victory with pursuing inclusion even at the cost of medals. "Unless it’s changed overnight," Moody wrote, "the motto of the Olympics, since 1894, has been 'Faster, Higher, Stronger.'" He continued, "It appears the U.S. Olympic Committee would like to change that to 'Darker, Gayer, Different.' If your goal is to win medals, that won’t work."Moody noted that a USOC official expressed pride in an interview with the Washington Post "about taking the most diverse U.S. squad ever to the Winter Olympics. That was followed by a, frankly, embarrassing laundry list of how many African-Americans, Asians and openly gay athletes are on this year’s U.S. team." He added, "No sport that we are aware of awards points – or medals – for skin color or sexual orientation."Moody continued, asking if this year's athletes were "selected because they're the best at what they do, or because they're the best publicity for our current obsession with having one each from Column A, B and C?" After mentioning the achievements of Jackie Robinson, Jeremy Lin and the 1993 film "Cool Runnings," he said that, "Insisting that sports bow to political correctness by assigning teams quotas for race, religion or sexuality is like saying that professional basketball goals will be worth four points if achieved by a minority in that sport – white guys, for instance – instead of the two or three points awarded to black players, who make up 81 percent of the NBA. Any plans to fix that disparity? Didn’t think so."
In his opinion, "Faster, Higher, Stronger" is a better slogan than, "We will win because we're different," precisely because, "complaining that every team isn't a rainbow of political correctness defeats the purpose of sports, which is a competition. At the Olympic level, not everyone is a winner."
After Moody's column provoked a massive online backlash, Fox News removed it from its website.
“John Moody’s column does not reflect the views or values of FOX News and has been removed,” a network spokeswoman said.
Currently, there are no quotas or any race-based selection at play in the formation of any of the U.S. Olympic teams, even if diversity seems to be a goal in many of their development programs and new bulwarks against discrimination have been added. Instead, it appears Moody's op-ed triggered by the quotes in the Post article alone.
The article begins, "The U.S. Olympic Committee says it’s taking its most diverse team ever to a Winter Games, an impressive and deserved boast that requires a caveat of sorts." It continues to describe the various programs the USOC has been using to make the team more representative of the nation. Repeatedly, diversity is called "No. 1, it’s a priority, and, No. 2," but it's clear that none of it comes at the cost of winning.
The 2018 U.S. winter team includes more African American and Asian American athletes than in previous years, as well as the first two publicly out male athletes to compete four the country in the winter teams. The inclusion of two openly gay male Olympians is particularly significant and, perhaps, a direct outcome of the 2014 Winter Games in Sochi, Russia, after which the Olympic Charter added sexual orientation to Principle 6, the Olympic Charter's nondiscrimination clause.
That said, Team USA totals 243 athletes, 10 black, 10 Asian and the rest "predominantly white" according to the Post. The largest team any nation has ever sent to the winter event, the U.S. squad may be historically diverse, but it is also overwhelmingly white and straight.
From the comment thread for this article, one commenter noted this
What an idiot. These athletes are all (with the exception of maybe hockey) selected by competitive elimination tournaments. You don't have the time or the scores, you don't get on the team. Jackass.
Meanwhile, Jordan Greenway, the first African-American member of the USA Olympic ice hockey team has this to say
"It kind of feels like an inspiration, trying to get more African Americans like me trying to play hockey, not falling into stereotypes of playing football, basketball. . . . Obviously, there’s not a ton of African Americans playing hockey. It’s worked out great for me. I’ve had a great experience with it. I hope kids see that it’s good to play hockey, too."
-Chloe Kim
speaking of diversity in USA Winter Olympics team, there is Chloe Kim, the snowboarder whose parents came from South Korea, which happens to be the host of this Winter Olympics.It must be a surreal experience to be in your parent's homeland while competing with the world's best athletes. Plus, to win a gold medal at 17!
As long as injuries don't get in the way, it would be a great start to what could become a great athletic career.
Kim has also become a social media sensation not only for her snowboarding highlights, but also for her telegenic personality when it comes to TV interview.
However, with celebrity, also comes the creepy fans.
One was a now former radio host Patrick Connor
https://www.the-pool.com/news-views/opinion/2018/8/Yomi-Adegoke-Chloe-Kim-Radio-Host-18th-Birthday-Countdown-Clock
Unlike most people, whose responses ranged between parental and at times even patronising, radio host Patrick Connor’s response to her juvenile nature was to wonder aloud – and on-air – when having sex with her would no longer constitute statutory rape.
“She’s fine as hell,” Connor said to a co-host. “If she was 18, you wouldn’t be ashamed to say that she’s a little hot piece of ass. And she is. She is adorable. I’m a huge Chloe Kim fan… Her 18th birthday is 23 April, and the countdown is on baby.”
The “countdown” Connor speaks of is both figurative and literal – the practise of creating websites to count down the moments until a young female celebrity reaches “adulthood” is as old as the internet.
To all the heterosexual males out there, calling a teenage girl "a hot piece of ass" is just creepy! It's not flattering, regardless of how loud your friend's laughter are when you talk like that!
You can appreciate a girl's cuteness without being vulgar like that!
As for countdown until she becomes "legal", just keep that to yourself!
Patrick Connor learned that the hard way, and he is now fired!
-- Shaun White
Chloe Kim is the next star in a sport in which Shaun White became the first major star.
Shaun White was a teen sensation earlier this sensation known as the "Flying Tomato". He came at the right time as snowboarding became an Olympic sport.
Shaun White is now in his 30's and still winning gold medals and still having amazing highlight videos.
But in the #metoo era, his past transgressions have become public. A former member of his rock band mentioned that White had a controlling personality and sent sexually explicit messages to her.
Shaun White later settled a lawsuit and have publicly apologized during the Olympics
https://mobile.nytimes.com/2018/02/14/sports/olympics/shaun-white-sexual-harassment.html
- Russia
Russia as a nation was disqualified from the Winter Olympics due to the doping scandal of the previous games in Sochi in 2014.
But it wouldn't be fair to the Russian athletes who were innocent of all this.
So the compromise was that athletes from Russia didn't wear their nation's uniforms, couldn't have their national anthem played, couldn't bring their nation's flag. The team was just referred to as "Olympic team from Russia".
It was sort of like the whole "The Artist Formerly Known as Prince" thing.
No matter, the athletes from Russia still won the gold for men's hockey.
Other news
A bullying scandal has been exposed among South Korean speed skaters.
In nicer news, here's an example of good sportsmanship (or really, in this case, sportswomanship), where a Japanese gold-winning speedskater Nao Kodaira comforted South Korean speedskater Lee Sang-wha
From the Czech Republic, Ester Ledecka became the first to win gold medals to 2 different sports - snowboarding and alpine skiing. She's been compared to US American athlete Bo Jackson who excelled as a pro in both baseball and American football a few decades ago
Obviously, there's much more stories from the Winter Olympics, these just happened to be in my mind at this time!
