Saturday, October 3, 2009

Rio Wins The Bid To Host 2016 Olympics

Common knowledge, I know... but blogs are for putting up one's thoughts and here are my thoughts: I'm glad that Rio De Janiero is going to be hosting the next Olympics instead of Chicago. The Olympics is one of only a few worldwide events (some would say the only worldwide event) and I think that it should be spaced out diplomatically and democratically based on the following criteria: (1) Continent/Region, (2) Country, and (3) City.

So here is the breakdown of Summer Olympics since 1940 by Continent/Region...
  • Europe plus Russia, 9 times, not including 2012.
  • East Asia plus Australia, 5 times.
  • North America, 4 times.
  • South America, never.
  • Africa, never.
  • Middle East plus India, never.
I'm not calling for equivalency here — I don't think that the next 18 Olympiads should be limited to the bottom 3 continents/regions on the list. However, I do think that they certainly should get some special consideration for putting together a reasonable and respectable bid.

And there is no arguing: Rio certainly is a world-class city in its own right, and will be able to slap together (if nothing else) one hell of a show.

p.s. I hereby propose that all Olympic swimmers in 2016 wear the famous Brazilian fio dental (dental floss) bikini for all events.

p.p.s. Just to encourage a bit of conversation, I propose the following 10 cities for consideration:
  1. Bombay
  2. Istanbul
  3. Dubai
  4. Cairo
  5. Riyadh
  6. Buenos Aires
  7. Johannesburg
  8. Bangkok
  9. Singapore
  10. Kuala Lumpur
p.p.p.s. Where are Republicans on this? They are happy to see America lose because it can be called a loss for President Obama as well.

Chronos at Little Green Footballs said it best:
This is where the rhetoric of "FAIL" leads — they’re openly celebrating when America loses, just because Barack Obama is President. And even though this Olympic bid was also promoted by George W. Bush. This completely puts the lie to the excuse that those who say they want Obama to fail really mean they want his policies to fail. No, they want Obama himself to fail, and if that means America fails too, they’re just fine with that.
And, as always, my hero, Andrew Sullivan:
Criticizing a president is one thing — and important. Hoping he fails — even to the point of celebrating a national loss — is a sign of partisanship that has become pathologically blind to any sense of perspective or patriotism.
at

4 comments:

  1. AnonymousOctober 3, 2009 at 11:30 AM

    Simple question. What would the headlines have read if President Obama's personal appeal for the Olympics to be held in Chicago had been successful?

    Mike Farrell
    Cagayan de Oro

    ReplyDelete
  2. AnonymousOctober 4, 2009 at 9:39 AM

    I think it is a wake-up call for the USA. I know that the IOC is not the spokesman for the entire world, but one of their reasons for not selecting Chicago is the way we look at the rest of the world. Since our "war on terror" the USA has made visiting the USA difficult for many citizens of certain countries. Even America's own citizens are frequently hassled traveling within the USA. We can blame the tactics of DHS (Dept of Homeland Security) in part for the lost bid for the Olympics.

    ReplyDelete
  3. AnonymousOctober 7, 2009 at 2:24 PM

    Jil, the World Cup is the worlds largest event.

    Bigger than the olympics...


    Gary y

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  4. Jil WrinkleOctober 7, 2009 at 6:56 PM

    World Cup:

    "In all, 75 nations have played in at least one World Cup. Of these, 11 have made it to the final match, and seven of them have won."

    "The current format of the tournament involves 32 teams competing for the title at venues within the host nation(s) over a period of about a month – this phase is often called the World Cup Finals. A qualification phase, which currently takes place over the preceding three years, is used to determine which teams qualify for the tournament together with the host nation(s). The World Cup is the most widely-viewed sporting event in the world, with an estimated 715.1 million people watching the 2006 final."

    Olympics:

    "From 241 participants representing 14 nations in 1896, the Games have grown to 10,500 competitors from 204 countries at the 2008 Summer Olympics."

    "Viewership increased exponentially from the 1960s until the end of the century. Worldwide audience estimates for the 1968 Mexico City Games was 600 million, whereas at the Los Angeles Games of 1984, the audience numbers had increased to 900 million; that number swelled to 3.5 billion by the 1992 Summer Olympics in Barcelona."

    Then this:

    The myth that the World Cup final attracts a global television audience of more than a billion people has been debunked by an Independent investigation into TV viewing figures that shows that true audiences are between a quarter and a third of that size.

    This prompted Fifa to admit yesterday that numbers up to now have been massively exaggerated in some cases, and simply guessed in others.

    And, here:

    Almost One Third of The World’s Population Watch Historic Beijing 2008 Opening Ceremony

    Based on television audience data collected from 38 markets around the world, The Nielsen Company estimates that just over 2 billion people - almost one third of the world’s population - watched the Beijing Olympics Opening Ceremony.

    ReplyDelete