Should the Olympics be abolished?

[mhaze]

Ironically that's a left over snottyism from the olden days when kings and lords took artists, and in some cases, athletes, in and would be their patron....

The Olympics? Should it be abolished? No way!!!!!

But it can be greatly improved.

Just cut out everything except girls' beach volleyball and figure skating.

 

[Meadmaker]

...We have an international track and field circuit. Gymnasts and figure skaters have official world championships tournaments every year, plus other international competitions. Soccer has its World Cup, which is far more prestigious than the Olympics. Basketball and ice hockey even have world championship tournaments.

There are only a few sports, mostly sports that few spectators pay attention to and therefore don't provide sufficient revenue to make international competitions economically viable, in which winning in the Olympics is considered to be winning the championship.

To amplify on a previous comment, now that I have a real keyboard available, this is technically incorrect.

In order to be eligible for play in the Olympics, all sports must have a recognized world championship event. It may be a series instead of a single event, such as the rankings given to golfers, but there must be some way in which a world championship is determined.

There is a world championship in Luge, and Modern Pentathlon, and Race Walking, and all the rest. Technically, a gold medal in the Olympics does not, and cannot, make you world champion of anything.

On the other hand, the prestige and recognition associated with an Olympic gold medal is a whole lot higher than what is associated with the world championship of many minor sports. In an awful lot of sports, the world championship is perceived as an Olympic qualifier, and in some sports it actually serves that specific purpose.

 

[AvalonXQ]

The Olympics? Should it be abolished? No way!!!!!

But it can be greatly improved.

Just cut out everything except girls' beach volleyball and figure skating.

Personally, I've found girls' beach figure skating to be not very interesting.

 

[Zelenius]

You should probably try it some time. It is an interesting experience. It is easy to demonize enemies when they are nameless faceless masses. That changes when you meet them face to face, share a drink, see them smile.

The sport at the Olympics is merely an excuse. An excuse to bring millions of people from all over the world together. Friendships, memories and opinions are forged during those times. Taken back to individual nations and expressed to wider audiences.

The Olympics is about celebrating humanity. It is about bringing us together celebrating what we have in common, and for a few short weeks distracting us from all that divides us.

I already practically live(right along the border) in a very international city. In some areas if I walk just a few miles it is like walking through several different countries - Korea, India, Brazil, Egypt, Greece, Russia, China, etc. And generally, we all get along, the diversity is wonderful. So I don't see how hosting the Olympics could make a place that is already very cosmopolitan even more so. We get tourists and students from just about everywhere.

I am fully sympathetic with your views, although I am not sure if the Olympics do a whole lot to bring about "harmony". It would be interesting to see studies done on this. Indeed, World War II took place only a few years after the 1936 Berlin Olympics. Apparently, the Olympics did not make Hitler and the Nazis recant or at least moderate their racist beliefs(the Olympics similarly did nothing to prevent World War I).

Also, international travel, mass media and the Internet make the Olympics more or less superfluous if their purpose is to bring the world closer together. It's funny when I hear how great the current London Olympics are, due to people all over the world visiting London to participate in the games or cheer on their teams. Yet "people from all over the world coming to London" describes London on any given day of the year. This is certainly a good thing.

I love the idea of the Olympics, but don't like the commercialism or their execution. My main concern is we don't hear enough about the dark side of the Olympics and that not every city that hosts them will benefit. All too often, in the long-term, they don't. The negatives are drowned out by the hype.

 

[Zelenius]

The Olympics? Should it be abolished? No way!!!!!

But it can be greatly improved.

Just cut out everything except girls' beach volleyball and figure skating.

If that's how you want to improve them, then I'm all for it. Forget abolishing it!

 

[TellyKNeasuss]

The Olympics? Should it be abolished? No way!!!!!

But it can be greatly improved.

Just cut out everything except girls' beach volleyball and figure skating.

Women's water polo has provided some entertaining viewing at this Olympics.

 

[Sam.I.Am]

Personally, I've found girls' beach figure skating to be not very interesting.

You haven't ever been to Venice Beach California have you?

 

[Quad4_72]

I lived in Salt Lake City for the 2002 Winter Olympics. I even went to the Opening Ceremonies (My brother was a participant in the Opening/Closing Ceremonies). It was definitely an amazing experience. People from all over the world were in town, and it made just an incredible atmosphere. It made a lasting legacy for the city that I know I will never forget, and I feel extremely lucky I got to experience it. So in my personal, biased opinion, I LOVE the Olympics.

Hell, I even got a bit of a taste of being an actual Olympian when I got to compete in the 2003 Utah-Moscow Youth Games over in Russia. We were given a celebrity like treatment everywhere we went, and THAT was definitely one of the most memorable experiences of my life. The Russians pretty much destroyed all of the competition (Moscow has a population of 11 million or so, Utah has a population of about 3 million), but I guess that is to be expected. But hey, I won two gold medals when I was over there, and even got to meet the Mayor of Moscow. So I did my part!

 

[Damien Evans]

I lived in Salt Lake City for the 2002 Winter Olympics. I even went to the Opening Ceremonies (My brother was a participant in the Opening/Closing Ceremonies). It was definitely an amazing experience. People from all over the world were in town, and it made just an incredible atmosphere. It made a lasting legacy for the city that I know I will never forget, and I feel extremely lucky I got to experience it. So in my personal, biased opinion, I LOVE the Olympics.

Similar experience here with the 2006 Melbourne Commonwealth Games. Loved every second of it.

 

[Kid Eager]

I was working in Sydney before and during the 2000 Olympics.

There were some not so pleasant discoveries made in the hosting, that I see recurring for London - in particular the much lower than expected occupancy rates for accommodation. Why? Pricing for one, and corporates intentionally deferring or relocating business meetings and business travel away from the host city due to the hassles.

The Sydney Olympics didn't make money, but we got a lot in the way of useful infrastructure that we wouldn't have got otherwise (new suburb, new stadiums and other sporting venues that have been in use ever since).

One thing that was a standout was the atmosphere - there was a real buzz and postive vibe. People enjoyed being in Sydney and the locals enjoyed playing host. It also inspired the next generation of athletes.

 

[Hubert Cumberdale]

Why not just have the Olympics in the same place every few years?

It would save a lot of money.

 

[Kodiak]

Women athletes from Afghanistan and Libya are taking part in the London Olympics, and I for one think that this is a good thing, and an example of a global social opportunity unique to the Olympics.

 

[This is The End]

In 1948 and 1984 there were no bid cities. Both Olympics were still successfully held

I seem to see the word bid alot in this paragraph:

Following the news of the massive financial losses of the 1976 Summer Olympics in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, only Los Angeles and New York City expressed serious interest in hosting the 1984 games. Given only one city per country is allowed to bid for any Games, the USOC vote for an American bid city was essentially the deciding vote for the 1984 Olympics host city. In this case, Los Angeles's bid won by a vote of 55 to 39. New York City's 1984 bid fell just 9 votes shy of winning the Games and is the closest the city has ever come to becoming a host city for the Olympics, coming even closer than they did in their 2012 bid.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1984_Summer_Olympics

You said there were "no bid cities". Yet, technically there was 1. The American bid city that won the OSOC vote.

 

[Sam.I.Am]

Why not just have the Olympics in the same place every few years?

It would save a lot of money.

Where would you build it?
Who would make that decision?
Who would pay to build it?
Who would pay to maintain it between Olympics?

No matter where you put it someone will complain either about the loss of potential income that can be made from hosting the games or about a "Home field" advantage that would never change. That means that there would very likely be no consensus on where it should be built. Then there's the matter of feeding and housing not only the athlete's but also the spectators (which will also need to be transported to and from the venue). That means that a remote neutral location just wouldn't work simply due to a lack of infrastructure.

There is also the matter of building and maintaining such a facility. Sure you could supplement it by making it a training center during "Off" years but then there would be complaints about how it's either much easier for some countries to get there versus others or that the poorer countries wouldn't be able to afford its use as often as rich countries. When there is usually only fractions of a second between winning and losing there can be a huge advantage when you are intimately familiar with the venue but your opponents are not.

In other words it may sound like a good idea in concept at first but I don't see it working the way that you might think it would.

 

[This is The End]

The only place a permanent location would make sense is Athens, Greece.

 

[JJM 777]

Women's water polo has provided some entertaining viewing at this Olympics.

You mean the underwater camera? They show it too seldom, only a few seconds per game.

 

[JJM 777]

Some sports are still just for the wealthy ruling classes, look at Rowing and Horse riding.

Horse riding, understood. Top class horses cost a fortune.

But then, ice hockey is a very expensive game too, yet the players do not originate from wealthy families, they just prove their talent and climb the stairs up all the way to NHL. What horse riding, sailing and some other expensive sports lack, in contrast to Olympic values of fairness, is equal chances for anyone to prove their talent and climb to the top. If you are poor, you will never get a top class horse or boat to prove your skills with.

 

[bit_pattern]

I was a huge backer of the San Francisco bid to get the 2012 games. We understood the huge commitment but also understood the long term benefits. Infrastructure improvements, for example, benefit the host city decades after the games are gone.

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articl...udies-show-the-impact-is-likely-negative.html

A similar analysis had been undertaken to assess the economic impact of the Sydney Games, held four years earlier. The findings of The Sydney Olympics, Seven Years On by James Giesecke and John Madden of Monash University's Centre of Policy Studies were, if anything, even more damning: “In terms of purely measurable economic variables the Sydney Olympics had a negative effect on New South Wales and Australia as a whole.”

 

[Mark R]

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articl...udies-show-the-impact-is-likely-negative.html

A similar analysis had been undertaken to assess the economic impact of the Sydney Games, held four years earlier. The findings of The Sydney Olympics, Seven Years On by James Giesecke and John Madden of Monash University's Centre of Policy Studies were, if anything, even more damning: “In terms of purely measurable economic variables the Sydney Olympics had a negative effect on New South Wales and Australia as a whole.”

I take it you did not look at the report itself? If you had, you would have noticed the report also clearly states that you should not use the economic impact of one specific Olympic Game to all Olypmic Games. You can find the report here.

Also, I do not see anything in the report about infrastructure at all, which is what Travis specifically mentioned.

 

[Meadmaker]

You mean the underwater camera? They show it too seldom, only a few seconds per game.

I suspect he was referring to the "swimsuit malfunction" that briefly resulted in a visible bare breast on one of the NBC channels.