YOU CAN’T GO HOME AGAIN

Here's the Olympian point: We ogle the flesh (Margaret Wente, Globe and Mail, August 24th, 2004)

The Olympics have become like Field Day in Grade 3. There are so many medals on offer that, eventually, every country's bound to get one, so long as it shows up. No nation is allowed to go home empty-handed, not even a scrawny little one like us. Besides, artistic gymnastics is nothing to sneeze at. It is definitely higher on the athletic status ladder than synchronized swimming, another event that has frequently stood between us and global shame. I don't know why we're so good at it. Perhaps synchronized swimming is simply too silly for anybody else to bother with.[...]

Are all sports equally worthy? The ancient Greeks didn't think so. They didn't go in for synchro-anything. Unlike Canadians, who love playing nicely together, they were strictly individual competitors. They did not believe in team sports, artistry or nose plugs. They believed in running, jumping, wrestling and hurling heavy objects through the air. Unlike synchronized swimmers, they approved of gouging and pummelling their opponents to death. This made determining the victor a whole lot easier than it is today. You never had to worry about scoring 9.787. You knew you'd won when you'd killed the other guy.

Not everybody minds that the pure spirit of the Olympics has been diluted by the addition of women and all kinds of silly pseudo-sports. My husband, for example, rather likes it. He is an avid student of women's beach volleyball, which he thinks is a noble addition to the Games. He also loves the Amazons who run around the track. He adores the female wrestlers, and wonders what it would be like if Tonya Verbeek got him in a headlock. Speaking for myself, I don't know beans about the men's backstroke or the fly, but I appreciate the broad shoulders and narrow hips of the swimmers and the gymnasts in their itty-bitty skin-tight suits. My husband swears that half of them are gay, but I think he's just being mean.

After these Games, they will debate adding sports like skateboarding, squash and rugby to the Olympics. Frighteningly unattractive women now wrestle and weightlift while announcers never dare say what is on everyone’s mind. Disabled athletes are demanding full participation with that defiant sense of entitlement that characterizes modern victimhood (Can seniors be far behind?). Judging is suspect in most sports where “presentation” is scored. It now takes a decade for the host to prepare because the entire city must be rebuilt and the Games can only be financed by forcing us to watch two minutes of cutesy, repetitive commercials for every one of competition. Drug cheating remains endemic and threats to suspend countries or entire sports are never carried out. Yet, like Ozymandias’ kingdom, the movement is incapable of even the most minor retrenchment and we watch the whole silly, boring extravaganza with artificially induced excitement, knowing full well we are witnessing a modern Roman circus destined to collapse.

It is enough to make a poor boy yearn for a good soccer match.