Russia invasion upends Olympic 'neutrality' — if it existed

It's about time an organization created a new event to compete with the Olympics.

The International Olympic Committee has always been political

Russia's invasion of Ukraine three weeks ago exposed its irreconcilable claims of “political neutrality.”

Here is the truth!!! Finally!!! It's official!!! IOC is NOT politically neutral!!!

Winning the most gold medals becomes a surrogate for national superiority, increasingly a competition between authoritarians and democracies.

That has ALWAYS been the case!

Patriotism and politics drive some of the Olympics' appeal to sponsors and TV broadcasters

Exactly!

The IOC has permanent observer status at the United Nations to increase political clout — not reduce it.

Playing politics.

Jules Boykoff, a political science professor at Pacific University and a critic of the IOC, suggested that instead of athletes marching under national flags, they should enter under sports disciplines — skaters together, basketball players in a group, gymnasts paired up. “Athletes might get to know each other more with that kind of mingling,” said Boykoff, author of “Power Games: A Political History of the Olympics.”

That's the way it should be, but that would kill IOC.

"Over the years the IOC has shown a conspicuous tolerance for tyranny. But by using 'apolitical' as a shield, they can ward off the legitimate criticism and just claim they work with everyone regardless of politics. They choose to ignore the fact that neutrality can mean siding with oppressive forces.”

Beijing Genocide Olympics being the latest example!

International Paralympic Committee President Andrew Parsons complained that his speech at the opening ceremony on March 4, which began with an impassioned anti-war plea, was censored by China's state broadcaster. China has declined to publicly criticize Russia's invasion, and Parsons' words in English were left untranslated or muted, which Chinese officials attributed to an unexplained “glitch.”

A good reason to ignore/distrust anything that CCP says!

Now, the Olympics move from China, a country that bans virtually all protest, to France, where vigorous street protest is part of the culture — and where dissent could be played up rather than shut down. For Paris, when it comes to keeping order, it could be a rough ride.

One only has to look at French history to know what kind of country it is.

“It seems to me," Xu said, that "there has never existed a pure Olympics.”

For once he is right!

IOC and Thomas Bach is a complete joke and a travesty over the athletes who put their lives on the edge to achieve results and make happy sport lovers all over the world. Thomas Bach has been in IOC VP and President roles for over 20 years by now, longer than so much blamed Putin, and is a totally corrupt bureaucrat who's only ambition is to stay (make money) as the head of IOC as long as possible.

IOC is in need of a complete reorganization otherwise we can forget about the Olympic principles and the interest to the Games will diminish over the short period of time.