{"id":6481,"date":"2004-08-26T16:47:58","date_gmt":"2004-08-26T23:47:58","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/2004\/08\/26\/the-decline-of-the-olympics.html"},"modified":"2004-08-26T16:47:58","modified_gmt":"2004-08-26T23:47:58","slug":"the_decline_of","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2004\/08\/26\/the_decline_of.html","title":{"rendered":"The decline of the Olympics?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Nick Gillespie at Reason argues that the Olympics are less and less meaningful — and that it’s for reasons we should be glad of<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Once arguably the world’s premier sporting spectacle, the games, in both their winter and summer versions, no longer command the cultural attention they once enjoyed. Ratings in the U.S. may be up from the Sydney games, but it’s clear that the Olympics, like so much else in a world characterized by cultural proliferation, an ever-growing list of options for expression and enjoyment, just don’t matter the way they used to. As recently as 20 years ago, it seemed as if the world stopped to watch the Olympics. But no more.
\nPut another way, Michael Phelps will never be as famous as Mark Spitz remains 32 years after his unprecedented triumph, and not simply because the big winner in Athens failed in his quest to surpass Munich’s wonder boy in accumulating gold (even as Phelps set a record for medals in a single games). The stakes of Olympic competition just ain’t what they used to be, which means the games’ champions will never again loom so large in our hearts and minds.<\/p>\n

The reasons he gives are solid ones. First, the exoticness of the Olympics — the sports viewed, and the places and people revealed — have declined, in an increasingly global and media-rich world. <\/p>\n

But in an increasingly globalized world, one in which goods and people migrate without a second thought, such variety and such mixing is an everyday occurrence. An ever-growing number of niche cable channels deliver ever-more tailored sports content and the World Wide Web caters to every possible fetish, in sports every bit as much as porn. Compared to 30 years ago, it’s a much smaller globe\u2014and a far more interesting world. But in such a setting, the Olympics lose a good deal of what the ad men would call their “unique selling proposition.”<\/p>\n

The second is perhaps more questionable, but has at least some element of truth. The Olympics reflected, in the 50s-70s, the great geopolitical challenges of our time, from the East-vs-West\/USSR-vs-US proxy fights, to the rise of the former colonies against their erstwhile European masters. The former is no longer the case, and the latter is old news. While it smacks a bit of an “End of History” sort of assertion, he has a point.<\/p>\n

Geopolitics nevertheless made the Olympics important in a way that they never again will be. The fall of the Berlin Wall and the end of the colonial period has (thankfully) seen to that. Whatever else one might say about it, the rise of militant Islam and the ongoing war on terrorism (or whatever you want to call it) is unlikely to intersect with the Olympics in ways similar to the last half of the 20th century.<\/p>\n

All of which may be true, and the deification of the Olympics as the all-father of sporting events may no longer be what it once was, but, as a panoply of sporting competition, damn, it’s still can be a fine show.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Nick Gillespie at Reason argues that the Olympics are less and less meaningful — and that it’s for reasons we should be glad of. Once arguably the world’s premier sporting…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"","_seopress_robots_index":"","_seopress_robots_follow":"","_seopress_robots_imageindex":"","_seopress_robots_snippet":"","_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"","_seopress_robots_breadcrumbs":"","_seopress_robots_freeze_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_custom_modified_date":"","_seopress_robots_canonical":"","_seopress_social_fb_title":"","_seopress_social_fb_desc":"","_seopress_social_fb_img":"","_seopress_social_fb_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_fb_img_height":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_title":"","_seopress_social_twitter_desc":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img":"","_seopress_social_twitter_img_attachment_id":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_width":0,"_seopress_social_twitter_img_height":0,"_seopress_redirections_value":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled":"","_seopress_redirections_enabled_regex":"","_seopress_redirections_logged_status":"","_seopress_redirections_param":"","_seopress_redirections_type":0,"_seopress_analysis_target_kw":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6481","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-fourth-estate"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":38488,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2013\/08\/16\/the-sochi-olympics-and-russian-law.html","url_meta":{"origin":6481,"position":0},"title":"The Sochi Olympics and Russian Law","author":"***Dave","date":"Fri 16-Aug-13 3:02pm","format":false,"excerpt":"A good backgrounder on what all the brouhaha is about. Plus, a Colbert clip. How Russia's Anti-Gay Law Could Affect the 2014 Olympics, Explained Gay rights activists have called for boycotts, protests, and even moving the Winter Games in response to the new legislation. View this post on Google+","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":24095,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2011\/11\/27\/bhopal-causes-potential-london-olympics-embarrassment.html","url_meta":{"origin":6481,"position":1},"title":"Bhopal causes potential London Olympics embarrassment","author":"***Dave","date":"Sun 27-Nov-11 4:05pm","format":false,"excerpt":"The Bhopal disaster continues to haunt Union Carbide's buyer, Dow Chemicals -- sort of like it continues to haunt the victims and their families. Shame, that. #ddtb Embedded Link London Olympics in crisis as India threatens boycott Indian athletes are threatening to boycott next summer's London Olympics in an extraordinary\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":28712,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2012\/07\/31\/olympics-stuff-from-2012-07-30.html","url_meta":{"origin":6481,"position":2},"title":"Olympics stuff from 2012-07-30","author":"***Dave","date":"Tue 31-Jul-12 8:54am","format":false,"excerpt":"Some G+ posts I made on Olympics topics yesterday: NBC is getting a wee bit sensitive to Olympic coverage criticism\u00a0- Including getting a journalist critic bumped from Twitter. Looking back at the Games of 1912\u00a0- The look of the competitors has changed in a century. A lot. Premature Olympian ruins\u00a0-\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "History"","block_context":{"text":"History","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/history"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/07\/london-2012-olympics-logo.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":45623,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2014\/10\/02\/its-the-olympics-ioc-not-mount-olympus.html","url_meta":{"origin":6481,"position":3},"title":"It's the Olympics, IOC, not Mount Olympus","author":"***Dave","date":"Thu 2-Oct-14 1:14pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Aside from the very high costs of hosting the Olympics (venue construction, etc.), all for dubious economic benefit, the International Olympic Committee seems determined to turn off applicants by including host city requirements for the IOC that rival a Rolling Stones contract:- Cars and drivers for IOC members, with special\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":41015,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2014\/02\/06\/remembering-the-la-olympics-of-84.html","url_meta":{"origin":6481,"position":4},"title":"Remembering the LA Olympics of '84","author":"***Dave","date":"Thu 6-Feb-14 5:40pm","format":false,"excerpt":"I lived in LA at the time -- just out of college -- and I remember the biggest concern was going to be the traffic. And, yeah, suddenly companies discovered (with plenty of encouragement) the wonders of telecommuting and timeshifting and the like. \u00a0It probably says something unfortunate about my\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":27526,"url":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/2012\/04\/23\/let-the-games-begin-but-dont-upload-your-pictures-of-them-to-facebook.html","url_meta":{"origin":6481,"position":5},"title":"Let the Games Begin (but don't upload your pictures of them to Facebook)","author":"***Dave","date":"Mon 23-Apr-12 8:48pm","format":false,"excerpt":"Let the Games Begin (but don't upload your pictures of them to Facebook)The London Olympics this summer look to be even more draconian than the Beijing edition for controlling what can be said, seen, photographed, referred to, etc. To the point where I'd have to question, from a civil rights\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "~PlusPosts"","block_context":{"text":"~PlusPosts","link":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/category\/blogging\/plusposts"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6481","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6481"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6481\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6481"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6481"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hill-kleerup.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6481"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}