Olympics

The Lessons L.A.’s Anti-Olympics Organizers Are Taking From Paris

December 17, 2024 Phineas Rueckert, Next City. Strategize! Califonia, Displacement, Homelessness, Los Angeles, Olympics, Paris

On Nov. 3, a group of young people armed with banners began to prepare a protest. It was just two days before the U.S. election, but these activists weren’t at the White House or Trump Tower. Instead, they made their way to the Eiffel Tower in Paris. As evening fell, the activists beamed a powerful laser onto the iron grills of the tower. “Olympics Legacy: 20,000 Evictions,” the message read. This action was the grand finale of The Other Side of the Medal, a coalition of Parisian activists shedding light – in this case, literally – on how the Olympic Games can harm host cities through temporary displacement of rough sleepers, heavy policing of low-income communities, greenwashing and other side effects.

Olympic Games Once Again Marred By Western Bias And Controversy

August 13, 2024 Monica Moorehead, Workers World. Educate! China, Doping, Global South, Olympics, Sinophobia

The 2024 Summer Olympics, officially the Games of the XXXIII Olympiad, in Paris, France, officially ended on Aug. 11. There were certainly some historic moments achieved by athletes who hail from the Global South. These included gold medal winners Julien Alfred from St. Lucia, Marileidy Paulino from the Dominican Republic and the legendary Cuban boxer, Mijain Lopez, the only athlete in Olympics history to win gold medals in five successive games. In another historic moment, North and South Korean athletes took collective selfies together during the table tennis medal ceremonies in a show of unity.

United States Elites Fail To Sink Chinese Swimmers

August 12, 2024 Rick Sterling, Resumen English. Educate! China, Doping, Media, Olympics, Propaganda, Racism, Sports

US political and media elites tried but failed to sink the Chinese swimming team at the Paris Olympics. The Chinese swimmers performed well despite the increased stress caused by media-induced rumors of “Chinese doping”. And now, the tables are being turned as the US anti-doping regime is coming under increasing scrutiny and criticism. The media manufactured cloud of suspicion Just a few months ago the NY Times and German ARD media ignited the controversy with an “investigation” regarding an incident from December 2021. At that time, 23 Chinese swimmers tested positive for a trace amount of the heart medication Trimetazadine (TMZ) during a swim meet for top swimmers from across the country.

USA Lets Athletes Cheat With Steroids, While Accusing Russia And China

August 11, 2024 Ben Norton, Geopolitical Economy. Resistance Report Benjamin Netanyahu, China, Doping, France, Gaza, International Criminal Court (ICC), Iraq, Israel, Olympics, Palestine, Russia, spying, Ukraine

The United States has for a decade allowed athletes in international competitions, including the Olympics, to use prohibited drugs such as steroids, recruiting them as informants to spy on others. This is according to the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), the global authority on the use of banned substances in sports. WADA revealed this in a statement on August 7, detailing “a scheme whereby the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) allowed athletes who had doped, to compete for years, in at least one case without ever publishing or sanctioning their anti-doping rule violations, in direct contravention of the World Anti-Doping Code and USADA’s own rules”.

The Struggle To Stop The ‘Social Cleansing’ Of Paris For The Olympics

July 27, 2024 Daniel McArdle, Waging Nonviolence. Organize! Evictions, Homeless, Migrants, Olympics, Paris

With the approach of the Paris 2024 Summer Olympics, organizers and aid groups are working to ensure the continuation of social services in the city. They are also trying to stop the evictions of over 12,500 of the city’s most vulnerable people, who often face the destruction of their dwellings, belongings and documents. “Those are their homes, no matter how rough,” emphasized Antoine De Clerck, coordinator of La Reverse de la Médaille, or RDLM, a collective of over 80 different aid organizations formed in response to the “social cleansing” operation underway in the city.

Predictive Policing And The Paris 2024 Olympic Games

July 26, 2024 Yegor Halva, Unicorn Riot. Educate! France, Mass Surveillance, Olympics, Police

As Paris prepares to host the 2024 Olympic and Paralympic Games from July 26 to August 11, 2024, the French government is implementing unprecedented surveillance measures to ensure safety. However, these measures have sparked fierce debate over the potential erosion of civil liberties, with opposition groups claiming that these systems automate social injustice. Sporting mega-events, including the Olympic Games, have long been testing grounds for new surveillance technologies. Their exceptional size and security demands constitute an emergency situation which is used as a pretext to justify the accelerated implementation of extraordinary regulations and policies that temporarily suspend law, along with the adoption of legislation that would be otherwise very hard to pass during “normal” periods.

Migrants And Homeless Expelled From Paris Ahead Of Olympic Games

July 25, 2024 Ana Vračar, People's Dispatch. Educate! Evictions, Forced evictions, France, Homelessness, Housing, Human Rights, Migrants, Olympics, Paris, Right to housing

One of the latest communities at risk of forced displacement is a Roma encampment in La Courneuve, Seine-Saint-Denis, located on the route of the Paralympic marathon scheduled for September. About 200 people, most of whom moved from worse living conditions in a nearby camp, now live in fear of eviction, with no clear relocation plan proposed by the local authorities.

Extinction Rebellion Is Targetting The Olympics Before They’ve Even Begun

July 20, 2024 The Canary. Resist! Bicycling, Extinction Rebellion, greenwashing, Olympics, shell

Extinction Rebellion activists visited the National Cycling Centre in Manchester on Tuesday 16 July to call on gold medalist and active travel guru Chris Boardman to help them convince British Cycling to drop its sponsor Shell ahead of the Olympics in Paris. Extinction Rebellion: Love The Olympics, Hate Shell The protest took place as Boardman, who was British Cycling’s policy advisor for over a decade, set off on an eight-day bike ride from Manchester to Paris ahead of the 2024 Olympic and Paralympic Games. Boardman aims to travel across England highlighting the work of inspirational organisations who are working hard to become environmentally sustainable.

International Olympic Committee Must Sanction Israel Over Its Genocidal War

June 24, 2024 Open Letter, Mondoweiss. Resist! BDS, Gaza, Genocide, Israel, Olympics, Palestine, Sanctions

Like apartheid South Africa, Israel uses its participation in international sport as a tool for normalizing its systematic discrimination against Palestinians. In response, Palestinians are making the same calls for boycotts as black South Africans did. Palestinian civil society groups are urging us to isolate Israel and hold it accountable for breaches of international law and crimes against humanity. The indiscriminate killing being conducted in Gaza, described by many as the first live-streamed genocide, is just the latest example of industrial-scale slaughter of Palestinians by Israel’s leaders. In January this year Israel killed the Palestinian Olympic football coach, Hani Al Masdar, and destroyed the office of the Palestinian Olympic Committee in Gaza.

Calls Mount For IOC To Kick Out Israel From Paris Olympics

March 24, 2024 Maryam Qarehgozlou, Orinoco Tribune. Resist! BDS Movement, France, Genocide, Israel, Olympics, Sanctions

In a detailed letter to FIFA, backed by six other member associations, PFA called for a ban on the Israeli football federation and all clubs associated with it, citing “unprecedented violations of human rights and humanitarian law.” “The entire football infrastructure in Gaza has been either destroyed or severely damaged,” read the letter. “The loss of innocent lives, including no less than 99 footballers, the destruction of homes… Are clear violations of international law.” According to Palestinian media, citing local sports bodies, more than 160 athletes, including at least 99 footballers from various divisions, have been killed in the Israeli genocidal war that is now in its sixth month, killing nearly 32,000 already.

After Protests, Paris Says It Won’t Fell Trees

June 8, 2022 Olivia Rosane, EcoWatch. Resist! climate crisis, Olympics, Paris, Trees

The plan to redevelop the tower area in time for the 2024 Olympics would have created tourist facilities near the famous landmark but also reduced traffic and increased green space. However, Parisians were concerned about the fate of trees near the tower, some of them a century or more old. “We reject the felling and endangerment of dozens of healthy trees, in particular the 200-year-old and 100-year-old trees, which really are the city’s green lungs,” a petition circulated by four environmental groups read, as France 24 reported. The plan to redevelop the area around the tower was known as the OnE Paris project, according to RFI. It would have been designed by U.S. architect Kathryn Gustafson and was championed by Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo during her 2020 reelection campaign, according to The Guardian.

American Athletes Subverted The US’S Information War Against Beijing

February 22, 2022 Danny Haiphong, The Chronicles of Haiphong. Resist! China, Media, Olympics, Sinophobia

Few events have been more politicized than the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics. New cold warriors and atrocity propagandists led by the United States did everything in their power to generate popular support for a full boycott of the Games. NED-backed organizations formed a coalition for the cause, the corporate media engaged in a full-scale “China bad” propaganda blitz, and the political establishment got busy crafting several pieces of legislation to respond to the so-called “China threat.” Their efforts failed. To save face, the U.S. implemented a non-consequential “diplomatic boycott” that found support from only a handful of junior partners in the West. However, failure didn’t put an end to the U.S.-led information war at the heart of the boycott campaign.

The Hypocrisy Of The ‘Diplomatic Boycott’ Of The 2022 Beijing Olympics

February 4, 2022 Charles Xu, People's Dispatch. Educate! boycott, China, Olympics, US Imperialism

On February 4, the 2022 Winter Olympics are set to open in Beijing. With this, the Chinese capital will become the first city to have hosted both the Summer and Winter Games. It will also make the People’s Republic of China the first country in the Global South ever to host the Winter Olympics, which have historically been dominated by Europe and North America (home to the top 14 countries in the all-time medal table). China remains the only Asian host nation in history besides Japan and South Korea. These milestones have gone almost entirely unremarked-upon in Western media coverage leading up to the Games, which instead paints China as a uniquely “authoritarian” and therefore undeserving host.

US Olympic Boycott Not About Uyghurs

February 4, 2022 Ramzy Baroud, Consortium News. Educate! China, New Cold War, Olympics, Uyghurs

The diplomatic boycott of the Beijing Winter Olympic and Paralympic Games may go down in history as the official start of the cold war between the U.S., a handful of its allies and China. The American strategy, however, of using boycotts to pressure Beijing in the name of ‘human rights’, may prove costly in the future. On Dec. 6, Washington declared that it would not send any diplomatic representation to the 2022 Winter Olympic Games in Beijing. In subsequent days, the U.K., Canada and Australia followed suit. The official American line claims that U.S. diplomats will not participate in the event in protest of the “human rights abuses … in Xinjiang.” That claim can easily be refuted by simply recalling that the U.S. has taken part in the Beijing 2008 Summer Olympics.

China Condemns US Attempt To Disrupt Beijing Olympics

December 8, 2021 Telesur English. Educate! China, Olympics

On Monday, the current U.S Joe Biden administration confirmed it would not be sending any government officials to the Beijing Olympics. In response, the Chinese Foreign Minister declared the move a statement of ideological prejudice. Jen Psaki, Press Secretary for the White House alleged as the reason for this diplomatic boycott of the Beijing Olympics, supposed crimes against humanity committed by Chinese authorities and abuses of human rights.

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