Badly run Olympics can be parasite on host city

• Source: Global Times
• [22:07 February 24 2010]
• Comments

The LA politicans of the 1980s modernized the bill to include high-fives, and bandanas making the case that Blood and Crip Joe Hills were overrunning the city. It was in the Gates sweeps that the seeds for the LA Rebellion of 1992, as well as the debut music video by a group called NWA, were formed.

The Atlanta games in 1996 were no different. These games were supposed to demonstrate what President Clinton called "The New South," but the New South ended up looking a lot like the old one, as African-American occupied Public Housing was razed to the ground to make way for Olympic facilities.

Repression followed the Olympic Rings to Greece in 2004. As Democracy Now, a daily TV/radio news program in the US, reported, city authorities "round[ed] up homeless people, drug addicts, and the mentally ill, requiring that psychiatric hospitals lock them up. Also affected by Athens Olympic clean-up are refugees and asylum seekers, some of whom are being targeted for detention and deportation in the days leading up to the games."

GT: How can the Olympic Games be reformed?

Zirin: I think you need to have the Olympics at one permanent site.

That would eliminate the corrupt bidding process, take pressure off nations to make bids, and remove much of the behind-the-scenes dealings.

By blotting out both the corruption and corporate feeding frenzy that surround the Games, there would be more space for the spirit of sport to emerge.