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Another four years have passed and now the 2012 London Olympics are just months away. Gather round global sport fans. It’s time to kick the hornets’ nest and delve into that controversial debate over the relevance of the ancient games in the modern sporting landscape.
When the 2012 Olympic Games kick off there’ll be more than the prospect of Aussie gold in the minds of us sport-watching chumps. It brings up a complex yet important discussion.
Where does the Olympics stand among those “real” sports that we play all year round, not just every four years? Can it be measured against the dramatic highs of a Premiership, Cup or Shield? And ultimately, is it still relevant in the modern sporting world?
Forged from a love of naked wrestling in the colosseums of Ancient Greece, the Olympic Games are a revered event that has built an ideology of peace and global citizenship around it. Political, cultural and religious differences are to be put aside, all in the name of a sport meet. Broadcast to a global audience, it’s where athletes from countries big and small can represent their nation against the best in the world. And most importantly, the Olympics is where legends are made.
Take away the rose-tinted glasses and put on the grimy spectacles of reality however, and you can quickly see the Olympic dream begin to fall apart.
You see, not all sports are represented. It’s unfair, but necessary.
Then you have some popular Olympic sports like football, who put greater importance on other international competitions (e.g. The World Cup). Just look at the difference in squads between the Socceroos and the Olyroos.
And don’t think for one second there hasn’t been any political, cultural and religious controversies at the Olympics! Beijing was a cesspool for such things and Saudi Arabia resisting the inclusion of a female athlete in their team for London, is just another example of an uncomfortable cultural clash we must endure every four years.
Sure we still get to see the birth of new “Olympic legends” but with most media coverage bordering on the obsessive and overly romantic, it can at times feel a bit force-fed.
Compare this to the genuine joy we feel each year when our team vies for the Premiership flag, when an Aussie inches towards a Grand Slam victory, when our national team defeat the best in Asia, or when your state team reigns supreme.
To complicate matters, as Bob Dylan so philosophically noted, the times they are a-changin’.
In the past you’d be glued to your TV watching and often learning about sports you didn’t play on the weekend. You saw different surnames, culture, and foreign faces all coming to life in your living room. It was as much about the learning and discovery as it was about the sport. Eric the Eel was my introduction to Equatorial Guinea. Not big swimmers, in Equatorial Guinea.
These were the days before cheap air travel, cheap pay TV, and fast Internet. Before social media exploded on the scene and shrunk our attention span, and before the sporting market became so saturated, commercial and competitive. Previously native sports around the world are now desperately seeking global expansion.
It’s a different place now. We live in a world that is becoming increasingly globalised. If I want to see London today, I can go on Google Earth. The surnames, culture and faces aren’t as foreign anymore either, especially in a multicultural society like Australia.
Do you see how this changes the experience and aura of the Olympics somewhat? You see how that might make people less inclined to give a toss?
I do believe the achievements of those athletes who compete should not be ignored. They train just as hard as any other sportsperson, even though many will receive little money or recognition for their efforts.
That commitment has to be admired.
Undoubtedly, the Olympics still command an untouchable place as the premiere sporting event of the world.
But as technology further improves and the world gets smaller and smaller, so does the sporting landscape. And that may seriously alter how we see the Olympics in the future.