While the "Spirit of the Games" is a highly touted tag line by the IOC and its affiliates, I believe that it is a continuing delusion. At one point the Olympics may have been about international cooperation, friendly competition, showcasing of amateur athletes, sportsmanship and all of the other positive connotations that they traditionally carry. Unfortunately, that is no longer the case, the Olympic Games are just another corporate holiday, with a moral message no greater than Valentines Day or Halloween. They represent a massive money making enterprise first and a show case of amateur sports second.
The rights to broadcast the 2010 Vancouver games and the 2012 London games sold for over 2 billion dollars[1]... for the United States alone. For the same right north of the border? another cool 156 million [2]. Truly astronomic sums of money for an event that last two weeks featuring sports that are never again shown on TV. When was the last time you turned on NBC, CTV or ESPN for that matter and seen long track speed skating or ski jumping. The athletes competing in the world cup circuits are exactly the same, the rules are exactly the same, the venues exactly the same, but they are never shown. They won't draw the necessary viewership to justify the air time, but during the Olympics they not only earn the air time, but justify (b)millions more to be spent on the right to air them.
I hazard to propose two hypothesis (which really is the point of a blog, blindly speculating on things you really have no clue about...). Firstly, nothing makes a better argument to cheer for someone other than "if you don't, your not patriotic." People watch the olympics because they think it makes them better . You don't care who wins the cross country skiing relay event, names don't matter, the flag matters, the national bragging rights matter. Olympics matter for national fervor, when there is no other outlet for competitive drive between developed nations.
Secondly, TV is boring. I said it, 98% of things that make it on to the TV aren't worth my time. Flipping channels I frequently ask myself: who watches this stuff? As an avid sports fan, I can also say this extents to sports. Who watches an 82 game season, every year, and doesn't get at least a little bit bored of the same thing? I certainly do. Thats why every 2 years when we get exposed to a whole different type of competitive sport, we swallow it hook line and sinker.
So if the Olympics are a two week event that is watched for national pride and a change of pace, while being promoted as a money making scheme, why do I care? Its entertaining, I enjoy it, let me watch my Following the Athletes segment in piece, followed by my horribly commentated obscure sport I don't care about in the least.
The reason that you care is that the athletes themselves get the short end of the stick and will fade back to obscurity once these two weeks are over, and that just isn't right. Sure they get a shiny piece of metal with a thin coating of their medal of choice [3] and in some countries maybe a little cash [4] but thats mostly it (save for the Phelps style exception). We use them up, profit off of their sacrifice, and spit them back out. Used and abused for corporate profits (and don't think it stops at TV deals, Canadian swag alone is expected to earn over 500 million, with 3 million of those little red gloves being sold [5].)
These sports should either be followed and supported with athletes earning a living wage from the entertainment they provide, or dropped all together, for government funding is not the answer. It is not the job of government to provide funding for our entertainment when they cannot balance their budget as it is, little less provide adequate basic services. Ultimately, governments fund the games for the same reason they're watched, feeding a national ego.
Give Olympic sports the opportunity to sustain themselves outside of their two week spotlight. Allow athletes to support themselves through their sport of choice by flowing profits from sales to the performers, instead of daming that stream at corporate headquarters. And keep Government out of the entertainment business and back to spending our tax dollars responsibly.
[3] - http://i.imgur.com/gQYtJ.jpg
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