Jim Taylor’s Weblog

Sunday February 14, 2010

Give Olympics back to the athletes

By Jim Taylor

Loss of ideals
        I suspect that Baron Pierre de Coubertin would be appalled if he could see what has happened to his ideals. He founded the International Olympic Committee in 1894, in an attempt to revive the athletic competitions of pre-Christian Greece.
        He insisted that athletes must be pure amateurs. They gathered for one reason only – to compete with each other. He wanted no sponsorships, no political posturing, no dreams that a medal would pay off in fat advertising contracts.
        Today, athletes rely on government funding, to enable them to train year-round. And the IOC relies on funding from corporations, who expect to recoup their investment from thousands of star-struck consumers.
        Bell Canada, for example, paid $200 million to be an Olympic sponsor. Royal Bank, $110 million. Hudson’s Bay, $100 million. General Motors, while being bailed out by taxpayers, $53 million. Petro-Canada, $62.5 million. Rona hardware, $68 million.
        And that’s only the Canadian sponsors. International sponsors include Coca Cola, McDonalds, Panasonic, VISA, General Electric….

Enforced monopolies
        In return for this generosity, Olympic officials protect their benefactors. The IOC barred a native group from selling “bison burgers.” During the Games, it turns out, only McDonald’s is allowed to have burgers. Even children taking public library programs must be served McDonald’s’ products.
        American skier Lindsey Vonn cancelled her blog for the duration of the Games. She blamed an Olympic news blackout during the Games themselves.
        Bob Condron, director of media services for the U.S. Olympic Committee, denied any such blackout. Athletes are free to blog. But only about their own personal experiences.
        “You can’t act as a journalist if you aren’t,” warned Condron.
        More significantly, it turns out that Vonn’s Facebook page features photos of her wearing logos from her sponsors, such as Red Bull and Sprint. The IOC considers that cheating.
        For the same reason, speedskater Nick Pearson told fans that he could not post photos of himself on Twitter.

Pure dedication
        The Games should be about the athletes, not the sponsors.
        As Rick Mercer declared, in a recent rant, “I have never, in my entire life, come close to being as committed to a single thing as they are to their sport.
        “God knows they don’t do it for the money; most of them still live under the poverty line. They work harder than anyone I have ever met in my life….”
        Over the past few weeks, I’ve had the privilege seeing some of these people up close. I go cross-country skiing on the same trails used for training by athletes from 11 nations.
        They’re young. They’re fit. They’re beautiful. They’re humiliatingly fast.
        Without them, there would be no games. But they have become merely the means to an end. The real end is to sustain an institution as addicted to income as Elvis was to drugs.
        When Gordon Campbell’s bid to host the Winter Games won IOC approval in 2003, he estimated that the Games would cost B.C. about $660 million.
        VANOC, the Vancouver Organizing Committee, still insists its $1.76 billion budget is on target.
        That claim is hard to defend when federal and provincial governments have already put in over $2 billion.
        And those costs don’t include $885 million for a new convention centre. Or the costs of upgrading the Sea-To-Sky highway between Vancouver and Whistler. Or the new rapid transit line from Vancouver’s airport to downtown. Or the construction of an 1100 unit Olympic village along False Creek.
        To say nothing of close to $1 billion for security – for some 15,000 police, soldiers, and private guards – almost twice as much as the costs of building and upgrading the facilities where athletes actually compete.

Economic circus
        Ferreting out as many costs as possible, the Toronto Star estimated the total bill for the Games at $6 billion.
        Granted, some of those investments will provide long-term benefits for the citizens of Vancouver.
        But they won’t be paid for by revenue from these Olympic Games.
        The University of British Columbia’s Sauder School of Business concluded that there is “little evidence of big economic benefits.”
        The Conference Board of Canada estimated that the Games will generate only $4 billion in economic activity – about half of the original estimate.
        Instead of being about athletes competing, the Games have become an economic circus.
        It’s time to get the marketing machine out of the Olympic Games, and give the Games back to the athletes.
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Copyright © 2009 by Jim Taylor. Non-profit use in congregations and study groups permitted; all other rights reserved.
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Your Turn



I think Kerry Brewer best caught the silliness of expecting groundhogs to forecast the coming of spring. He wrote, “Other than the fact that Groundhog Day provides a little diversion from the bleak months of winter, I have also wondered about its significance, especially here in Manitoba, where another six weeks of winter would be an early spring!”

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About My Books

Over the years, I think I have written (or ghostwritten) about 17 books. Several of them (mercifully) are no longer available from any source. But here’s a listing of those that are still available. The ones marked “WLB”, you can order from Wood Lake Books, either on-line at http://www.woodlakebooks.com, or call Wood Lake Books directly at 1-800-663-2775 in Canada, 1-800-654-5129 (Pilgrim Press) in the U.S. The ones marked “JT only” are now available only directly from me — as collector’s items, I price them all at $25 Cdn.

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