There are so many issues with the Winter Olympics that are beginning in Sochi, Russia. The venues may be the only thing that is ready for the games. Sleeping quarters in Sochi have become a laughingstock. Reporters are tweeting about everything from dual toilets that you cannot put TP in to yellow drinking water to no door knobs. Hackers are having a field day going after every electronic mobile device (it is Russia, after all). And did I mention the close proximity to world’s biggest tinder box for terrorist activity, the Caucuses? And then there is this little Russian anti-gay law that seems to be generating a lot of controversy… so much so that the IOC finally spoke up about it this week.
Now, you would think that a global organization like the IOC might actually look at how the world is progressing and decide that gay rights might be something to back against Russian President Putin’s wishes. Or, at the very least, they would choose to say nothing about the issue, especially with the other problems plaguing Sochi. Well, Thomas Bach and Dick Pound of the IOC gave everyone a rude awakening to those thoughts. Bach took aim at the President all right… at the U.S. President, Barack Obama. President Obama’s crime? A mild passive-aggressive approach to not attend the Winter Olympics and sending a delegation that includes three high-profile openly gay athletes (one of those, athletes Billie Jean King, has had to withdraw at the last minute due to an ailing mother). Bach thinks that politics should not be put above athletic competition and slammed President Obama from not including himself or Vice President Biden in the delegation. Yes, let’s not include politics in the Games, something that has shown up in EVERY single Olympic Games—at least since 1936.
Memo to Thomas Bach: This isn’t 1980. At least the U.S. is competing this time in Russia. They are sending a full team. There has been no formal protest sent about Russia’s anti-gay policy. The U.S. just chose to not send their top VIPs and included some athletes to prove the point that it doesn’t matter; that if you are good enough, you can attend the games, regardless of race, creed, religion, or sexual orientation. And, apparently, that’s the biggest problem of these games, according to Thomas Bach.
But it’s not only Thomas Bach who feels this way in the IOC. Dick Pound—yes, the same guy that used to head up the World Anti-Doping Agency—had to weigh in to USA Today…
"That's a foreign policy response to a major power; I don't think they thought it through… I think they were tone deaf on it. This is the United States of America's response to an issue that is not very much under control in the United States either? I thought it was an unfortunate response and frankly not fair to the members of the delegation… You have the chardonnay folks, sipping, saying, 'This is an issue for me.' Sip. 'And I want you to go over there and be my soldiers.' Sip. 'I'll be watching it on television with another glass of chardonnay,' … It's kind of cheap.”
The IOC has clearly decided to throw their support behind the suave Mr. Putin in the hopes of not looking foolish for even giving Sochi the Winter Olympics in the first place. And if they have to go so far as to ignore all the problems Sochi has and focus on political controversies, so be it.
Look, I will not carry the water for the pro-gay rights group in this debate (memo to VU Alums Ryan Arnold, Ben Nichols, & Kate Hahn: Are you going to engage or is this your Month off?). But in the end, the IOC will have to return to countries whose opinions on gay rights are more in favor of supporting those rights than opposing. Bach & Pound may be figuring short-term benefits for supporting Putin may outweigh the longer-term damage the IOC may inflict on itself. They may have miscalculated badly, especially if these Sochi games run into major problems…
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