J Y Provocative Question # 42: What is your opinion on the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris?

The Olympic Games has an interesting history, nowadays it is marked by performance and political controversies. Let’s get an overview.

The Olympic games were started in ancient Greece around 776BC, at a site called Olympia, which was a site where Zeus the king of the Greek gods was to have set up residence when the Eleans (people from the City State Elis), conquered the surrounding region. Olympia had a sanctuary built to honor Zeus.

Originally the games were religious and athletic festivals that took place every four years inside the Sanctuary of Zeus. It usually took place at a certain date where it would coincide with the summer solstice, which took place from August to mid-September. The festival concluded with the harvesting of the sacred Zeus olive trees.

The dates when the ancient games officially ended is in dispute. It is said that the Roman Emperor Theodosius I banned the games in his promotion of Christianity around 393 AD; or it was done around 426AD when Theodosius II ordered the destruction of all Greek temples.

The modern revival of the Olympic Games took place when a wealthy Greek philanthropist floated the idea to the Greek king, and offering to fund it. The king agreed and in 1859 the first modern games took place in Athans.

The International Olympic Committee was formed during the 1890’s and it was agreed that the games would be rotated internationally, with the first games under the International Olympic Committee administration held in Athans, Greece in 1896. From that time the games had only been suspended three times, during World War I, in 1940 when Finland announced that it was incapable of hosting the games, due to Germany’s invasion of Norway and Denmark and during World War II.

 Inasmuch that the Olympic Games are supposed to showcase a nation’s pride in athletic performance, politics has been steeping into the games; one of the most infamous was during the 1936 Olympics. The games were held in Berlin, Germany where the games were supposed to showcase Adolf Hitler’s NAZI notion of superiority, however it became known for the American athlete Jessie Owen’s record braking performances.  

Then there was the controversy of American race politics seeping into the 1968 Olympics held in Mexico City, Mexico. Where at two American athletes who won medals raised, they hand and displayed the Black Panther Party symbol of black power on the winner’s podium.  

Then there was the violence that took place during the 1972 Olympics which was held in Munich, West Germany. It is known as the “Munich Massacre,” it happened when members of the Palestinian militant group Black September attacked members of the Israeli Olympic team and murdered eleven athletes and held the rest hostage, demanding the release of Palestinian prisoners held in Israeli and West German prisons.

The “Munich Massacre,” has changed the security precautions and protection of the Olympic athletes.

It was discovered that athletes have been engaging in taking performance enhancing drugs since the 1930’s.  It led to the creation of a program of testing athletes for those drugs and other substances.

Some scandals surrounding the performance enhancing drugs happened when it was discovered that during the 1970’s and 80’s, East German athletes were given steroids to enhance their performance, that was not detected by tests.

The most high profile scandal was Canadian sprinter Ben Johnson’s record breaking performance in the 100 meters. He was later disqualified and his record breaking time removed from the Olympic record book because he was tested positive for steroids.

Then the Marion Jones scandal when it was discovered that she took performance enhancing drugs. She was stripped of all her medals and her record removed from the books.

Now as far as the 2024 Olympic games, True_George has mixed feelings. There was a big scandal from the opening ceremonies. The use of drag queens and the portraying of the last supper.

It was outrageous and offensive, and it was beyond me why the International Olympic committee approved it.

 Another big controversial was the withdrawal of the defending women’s 100-meter world champion, from the 100 meter finals.

Reports were inconsistent as to the reason why she decided not to compete. But, what is agreed upon that it had something to do with not being let into the warm up area. Perhaps it was by design that security was told not to let her in, even though they recognized who she is, and that she was due to participate in the final race. She was really treated unfairly.

There was the scandal of a female boxer from Algeria being accused of being a male because her opponent quit after 48 seconds of the bout, saying that she never felt being hit that hard in her boxing career. Not surprising that people thought the Algerian female boxer was a male due to the infusion of the trans female into women’s sports.   

Then there was inclusion of silly sports like badminton, rock climbing as well as break dancing (is break dancing even a sport). What will they think of next.

Except for the apex sports like Boxing, Wrestling and Judo and track which I watched, I don’t care to watch the entire thing. But overall, it was something that brought nations together in spirit.

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