The Olympics: Make It What You Want It To Be

Objectively, the Olympics are a scam.  It’s a conspiracy between global corporations interested in advertising, local governments looking for an excuse to shovel public money to favored private contractors, and the Skekis (also known as the International Olympic Committee) who suck the lifeblood out of young men and women.  If this were the last Olympics ever, it would probably be a net good for the world.

But it won’t be.  So make of it what you will.  Living in the center of the ’96 Olympics was among the most amazing experiences I’ve ever had.  The people, the energy, the – forgive me, Francis – post-history feeling to all of it (it was 1996, after all).  Not even some wingnut with a bomb could ruin it for us.  After the experience of those couple of weeks, I will always be up for hanging out in an Olympic city.

It’s more than a party, though.  It’s – despite NBC’s best efforts to ensure I never care about someone’s triumphantly-overcoming-tragedy again – the story of thousands of people who have busted their ass for most of their lives to be there.  It’s the amazing people it produces, like Otto Peltzer (follow and read that).  It’s people.

And finally, it’s among the very few events where we can truly say that “the world is watching.”  And that, my friends, leads to profound and important actions like this:

The Olympics can still be shaped by individuals.  All of the people in these (amazing) Opening Ceremonies pictures?  They are individuals, like you and me, who worked incredibly hard to be there.  Don’t cede the good of the Olympics to spite the bad.

~

If you want to watch the Olympics online, and live in the United States, NBCOlympics.com is probably the place for you.  I say “probably”, because 1) while it will show most events live, it will delay online access for any event it plans to broadcast until *after* its been broadcast, and 2) there’s some ridiculous deal by which access is only available to those US viewers living in areas served by NBC’s “partners”.  They check this by asking for a zipcode (I have a friend who lives in 22203, and it works perfectly).

If you’re getting screwed by the inability of the IOC and world broadcasters to find a way to make the Olympics accesible to you, you might be interested in this article on the “alternative” means of watching the events.