“The goal of the Olympic Movement is to contribute to building a peaceful and better world by educating youth through sport practised without discrimination of any kind and in the Olympic spirit, which requires mutual understanding with a spirit of friendship, solidarity and fair play.” (IOC website)
It’s been a long time since muscled, oiled, naked men wrestled one another in front of excited crowds. Well, it’s been a long time since that happened and didn’t require an MPAA rating. But now, in honor of javelins and stuffed grape leaves, the Olympics is being held in that famous Greek city, Beijing.
Renown for the quality of its air pollution, Beijing is thrilled to host the Olympics and bring glory to the motherland. Mao Zedong, whose name translates to “Spell Checker,” was quoted as saying nothing because he’s dead.
Normally I don’t become involved in athletic events because they’re boring and stupid, but my nationalism kicks in every two years and I hope for gold. I don’t know what sports are being played, but I’m generally content as long as the United States has more gold medals than anybody else.
In these modern times, however, the games are not nearly as important as the international events surrounding them. You never read ancient Greek poems about Athens boycotting the games that were held in Sparta.
Athenian Delegate: Due to Sparta’s flagrant human rights abuses, the city state of Athens will not be attending the 608 BC games.
Spartan Delegate: Human rights abuses? We haven’t even invented human rights yet!
Athenian Delegate: Free Tibet!
Corinthian Delegate: What does “BC” mean?
No, the ancient Greeks were far too concerned with athletic prowess to bicker over trivial matters, including war. In the same way that I paused Mario Bros. 3 when my mother called me to supper, the Greeks put their wars on hold to wrestle and run naked (okay, the similarities between those two examples may be a bit ambiguous).
Since the games started anew in 1896, they’ve been cancelled three times and boycotted five times. I suppose I can see the logic in a canceling a game during wartime. With soldiers stationed all over the place and Germany invading Belgium again (starting world wars proved to be misguided—and internationally unpopular—hobby for das Vaterland), it’s hard to call off a war. You can’t exactly call up the Axis powers and say, “Hey, Germany, Japan, Italy—even though you don’t really count. We were wondering if you could hold off on committing atrocities against Jews, Gypsies, homosexuals, socialists, republicans, Slavs, Koreans, Chinese, most of Southeast Asia’s citizens, Allied civilians, and prisoners of war. We’d like to hold the Olympic Games.”
The boycotts, on the other hand, were more about being pissy. In 1956, Egypt, Iraq, and Lebanon boycotted the games to protest the Suez Crisis because there is a direct correlation between the nationalization of a European-dominated Egyptian-based waterway and the 400 meter sprint.
The United States and about 61 random countries boycotted the 1980 Olympics because the USSR had just invaded Afghanistan, which, incidentally, participated in the games. In response, and conveying the utmost dignity, the Soviet Union boycotted the 1984 Olympics because “we were really, really mad about the 1980 thing. Come on, Cuba, Vietnam; we’ll go have some friendship games, instead.”
So far, the 2008 games have gone relatively smoothly, except for a murder, some bombings, the beating up of two Japanese reporters, and the kind of forced happiness that makes The Stepford Wives look like Platoon. My only complaint is that America has won a measly three gold medals. I mean, for Heaven’s sake! We are tied with Italy. Italy! They can’t even meaningfully compete in a world war!
Therefore, I suggest we start doping our athletes until our female competitors begin to bear a striking resemblance to former-East Germany’s men’s hockey team (and our male competitors start looking like East Germany’s women’s weightlifting team).
There’s nothing quite so beautiful as friendship, solidarity, and fair play.
(My new goal is to offend as many countries and world leaders as possible. So far, so good.)
12 August 2008 at 7:49 am
This is hillarious! Well written. You should consider writing as a profession.