AUSTIN (KXAN) — The postponed 2020 Summer Olympics are just 80 days away from taking place in Tokyo against the backdrop of the coronavirus pandemic. It will be an Olympics unlike any other — with no international fans.

Athletes will have to pass a battery of nasal COVID-19 tests and are just one positive result away from ruining years of hard work and training.

Millions of eyes will be on the Games all over the world. It’s a tremendous stage — both for athletic triumph and possibly social change. Who can forget this image of Americans Tommie Smith and John Carlos with fists raised during the 1968 Olympic Games to protest racism.


US athletes Tommie Smith (C) and John Carlos (R) raise their gloved fists in the Black Power salute to express their opposition to racism in the USA during the US national anthem, after receiving their medals on Oct. 17, 1968 for first and third place in the men’s 200m event at the Mexico Olympic Games. At left is Peter Norman of Australia who took second place. (Photo by AFP via Getty Images)
But the Olympics continue to ban athlete protests and could punish athletes who choose to protest anyway. That means raising a fist or kneeling during the national anthem as many professional U.S. athletes have done over the past year risks punishment.

Those athletes could even be sent home.

IOC bans ‘Black Lives Matter’ gear
The International Olympic Committee got very granular with what is not allowed. It said specifically that the slogan “Black Lives Matter” will be banned from athlete apparel at the Summer Olympics.

It’s part of the IOC’s long-standing ban on “demonstration or political, religious or racial propaganda” on the playing field, the medal stand or during the Games’ official ceremonies.

More generic words like “peace,” “respect,” “solidarity,” “inclusion” and “equality” will be allowed on T-shirts.

So far, the IOC has not said what types of punishment athletes could face for violating these rules. It only said it would treat each violation on a case-by-case basis.


United States players wear a sweater with the slogan “Black Lives Matter” and most take the knee as the national anthem is played prior to the international friendly women’s soccer match between The Netherlands and the US at the Rat Verlegh stadium in Breda, southern Netherlands, Friday Nov. 27, 2020. (Dean Mouhtaropoulos/Pool via AP)
IOC says majority of athletes support ban on protests
The IOC athletes’ commission cited support to uphold Rule 50 of the Olympic Charter from more than two-thirds of about 3,500 replies from consulting athlete groups. The IOC said 70% of athletes polled do not think it’s appropriate to demonstrate during competition, and 67% said it’s not appropriate either on the medal stand.

Athletes breaching Rule 50 can be sanctioned by three bodies: the IOC, their sport’s governing body, and their national Olympic committee (NOC).

The U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee pledged in December not to sanction athletes for peacefully protesting at the Olympic trials.

Many governing bodies for different Olympic sports also have said they would not punish athletes for protesting, including World Athletics, the global governing body for track and field.

Nonprofits step up to support athletes, push to reform ‘Rule 50’
Many groups have promised legal support for athletes who protest. The World Players Association union said the IOC’s decision was a move it expected.

“Any athlete sanctioned at the Tokyo Olympics will have the full backing of the World Players,” said Brendan Schwab, the union’s executive director.

And the group Global Athlete also issued a statement, encouraging athletes to “not allow outdated ‘sports rules’ to supersede your basic human rights.”

Noah Hoffman is heavily involved with Global Athlete. He’s a two-time Olympian, having competed in cross-country skiing in both Sochi in 2014 and PyeongChang in 2018. Though he thoroughly enjoyed both of his Olympic experiences, he told Nexstar’s Andrew Marden that he strongly believes that it is time to “elevate the voice of the international athlete.”

“We envision an Olympics where the athletes are the center of the show, more than the host country or the politics around it or the sponsors,” Hoffman said. “It is this huge spectacle where the athletes are an afterthought.”
link: https://wgntv.com/news/olympic...for-social-protests/

Sweeeet

Some heads at ESPN and NBC must be exploding.

Yeah, just run with your little ball or do whatever the Olympic Committee thinks qualifies as athletic competition, and shut your ignorant mouths and try to realize that you aren't the center of the universe and no one gives the first shit what a pole vaulter thinks of US policy in the Middle East.

People who are genuinely being oppressed don't get microphones put before them at press conferences. They don't have the eyes of the world trained on them. You have nothing to complain about and you don't speak for any substantial portion of humanity. Just shut the fuck up and dribble or whatever, you spoiled children.

Wow, shockingly pleasantly surprised. But, wait and see the coming caving to the protests and boycott threats.

You know some of these dumb asses are planning something anyway. Especially ours. Any country will have squandered their time, effort and money on any who plan to air their SJW nonsense. It can and will cost medals.

I wonder if the US Olympic committee could have our athletes sign contracts related to staging protests that can earn miscreants further punishments and liabilities?

quote:

Originally posted by MRMATT:
Some heads at ESPN and NBC must be exploding.

I look forward to not hearing what Bob Costas thinks.

Wow, somebody finally has a spine to say enough of this bullshit. Good for the IOC.

The rules will be broken and nothing will come of it .

quote:

Originally posted by 83v45magna:
I look forward to not hearing what Bob Costas thinks.

You know he's frothing at the mouth, and has already burned through a couple of drafts of what he HAS TO SAY.

Didn't watch it but heard that this years Academy Awards, was an odd 'open format' with no host, the nominations got little to zero screen time for the audience and the presenters & award winners all spent time stating their 'message'. This upcoming Olympics could easily devolve into varying acts of performative outrage, and over-shadow whatever athletic excellence happens. Meanwhile, at the athlete village, there will be the normal hedonistic party every night and in another corner will be the BLM learn-in sessions.

quote:

Originally posted by 83v45magna:
I wonder if the US Olympic committee could have our athletes sign contracts related to staging protests that can earn miscreants further punishments and liabilities?

IMHO, I don't think there's one person on the USOC with a hair on his or her ass that would require such a thing, let alone ENFORCE such a thing. Just sayin'.

As a side note, I haven't watched the Olympics in YEARS...not even the hockey. The nano-second professional athletes were allowed to compete (despite the excuse that Russia had been fielding professionally trained athletes for years), the Olympics lost its core purpose and value. And that is that someone from the lowliest of background and history could one day have the performance of his or her life and win a medal in the sport of pure competition.

The black athletes in 1968 raising their fist in the Black Power salute weren't doing it to voice opposition to racism, as stated in the article. They did it to be black racists.

I wonder if some will do it anyway and why.

They should have a tape delay instead of airing it live. That way, they can edit out their bullshit and audiences will only see the sport events and no political bullshit.

Strip those assholes of their platform and silence them.

IIRC, protesting at the Olympics has always been against their rules.

Doesn't seem to be anything new here.

I never have watched the Olympics and I am not going to start now.
It was suppose to be for armature athletes. They lost all credibility when they aloud professional athletes to attend.

Break the rules loose your medal no second chances, tough and you have to pay back all monies given for attending. That would be what I would do as the the punishment.
If they did not like the rules don't go.

quote:

Originally posted by 46and2:
IIRC, protesting at the Olympics has always been against their rules.

Doesn't seem to be anything new here.

Well, they HAVE to enforce the 'no politics' thing, or else China, the NorKs, Iran, etc, would turn the games into a blatant propaganda event.

Now, the proof will be in the pudding - to see if they actually enforce it.

My bet is a LOT of US athletes go ahead anyway and make their 'statements of wokeness.' This will generate a LOT of spin for themselves, so they can run off and get multi-million $$$ nike contracts. I personally would love to see violations result in complete and permanent revocation of any medals awarded and IMMEDIATE ejection from the games (so they can't compete in other events). That's the only way I can see this will deter people from doing it anyways.

quote:

I personally would love to see violations result in complete and permanent revocation of any medals awarded and IMMEDIATE ejection from the games (so they can't compete in other events).

This, have it stated up front, have each athlete, coach, trainer sign agreement

Simple solution, if any member from that athletes country protests, in any way podium or not they lose their medal. If any athlete protests, it will cause the revocation of all medals for all athletes in that event from their country.

So if you want to get up and be a BLM ass and think that it's just you, no, you could cause everyone in the USA to lose their medals...

One must abide by the Japanese norms of courtesy while in Japan. Having such displays of hate and division by their guests would be an affront and an embarrassment to the Japanese people.

About time, Sports are supposed to unite people and no divide them. Keep the politics out of it. We just wanna have a great time and support our teams.