“There is nothing to criticize about people uniting in the pride and joy of their nation.”
Before issuing such a sweeping statement the author may have wanted to ask some WWII veterans whether they felt there was anything to criticize about the Germans and Japanese uniting in pride and joy of their nations to achieve their manifest destiny.
If the goal is simply to generate enthusiasm and attendance just hire the Rolling Stones to perform a free concert.
Of course it would be extremely costly but hey, cost is no object to generating enthusiasm and attendance – at least for those sharing the mindset of the author of the opening quote.
It is a mindset that ignores cost. Cost not simply measured in the dollars spent but including the consequences of using the dollars to have a blowout of a party, rather than to pay the bills.
It is a mindset focused only of the short term and thinking only of what feels good right now, ignoring the consequences of actions taken or being taken in its enthusiastic pursuit of that feels good high. It is the mindset of an addict.
In becoming a society seeking instant gratification, a society that takes the easy way out without regard to cost, we have become a society whose behaviours grow ever more similar to those individuals in our society who struggle with an addiction to mind altering substances.
Perhaps it is seeing the consequences of thoughtlessly enjoying the high and ignoring the consequences on a daily basis that denies me the ability to blindly, thoughtlessly ignore the consequences of spending billions on the Olympics and paying for those billions by making cuts to essential services such as Fraser Mental Health.
As the health region with the fastest growing population Fraser Health’s mental health budget needed to be doubled, especially after responsibility for addictions was shifted to mental health by Fraser Health.
To pay for the multi-billion dollar cost of the Olympics BC chose NOT to raise taxes but to forgo crucially needed increases in areas such as mental health services and budget cuts to already seriously underfunded services. We pay for our fun not responsibly by raising taxes, but by further burdening our children and our children’s children with OUR debts and by cutting services to the most vulnerable in our society.
The first round of these cuts resulted in programs such as the adolescent psych unit at Abbotsford’s new hospital being closed. There are still more programs that will have to be cut to meet this years Fraser Mental Health budget. There will be another round of cuts next year as the cost of paying for the Olympics continues to negatively impact the mental health budget.
These cuts are not just going to reduce the quality of life for those with mental illness and/or mental challenges or deny addicts treatment. They are going to kill people by neglecting them to death. These deaths will not be labelled as ‘Olympic Costs” but as suicide, or death by police officer or accidental etc. But they are ‘Olympic Costs’ because it is the program cuts to pay for the Olympics that will bring about these deaths.
How many deaths are acceptable as the cost of staging the Olympics in BC? How many deaths before there is something to criticize about people uniting in the pride and joy of their nation?
Moreover, how can anyone have pride and joy in a nation, a province, a city or a society that would consider the death of vulnerable Canadians ‘an acceptable cost of doing business’ in regards to the Olympics?
? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ? ?
The author went on to expound:
“… but let’s also applaud what these athletes represent, and let’s appreciate community spirit at its finest.”
These would be the same athletes of who over 30 were disqualified for using performance enhancing drugs the day before the games opening ceremony was even held?
Athletes choosing to take the easy way out, to seek easy and instant gratification by winning without doing the work, so as to reap the financial rewards of winning.
This suggests that these athletes, this competition, are about winning at all costs with drug screening and doping waging a technological war between cheating; a war that attempts to have or create a level playing field.
The attitudes and behaviours of the athletes teach the young that only winning counts; that you employ any means necessary to win; that competing and doing your personal best is meaningless unless you win.
At one time the Olympics were about competition among amateur athletes but today’s athletes are highly paid professionals, working for the business that the Olympic Games have become under the auspices of the International Olympic Committee.
A committee that is noted for such applause deserving behaviours as wretched excess, greed, special interests, scandal, expensive perks for committee members, bribery, exchanges of favours, turf protection, extortion etc.
The Olympics have ceased to be about anything other than politics, money, big business and greed. Or at least that is what they are about for those who are not blinded by the glitz, glamour and the powerful Olympics Media Machine.
“community spirit at its finest”.
We are in serious trouble as communities, a country, a world and a species when the wretched excess the Olympics have become is considered as “community spirit at its finest”.
People turning out to donate, support and cheer on Terry Fox; the people who donate to, support and participate in annual Terry Fox runs; neighbours turning out to help their neighbours after tragedy or disaster strikes; the people who serve dinner in Abbotsford on Thursday nights to those who are hungry and homeless; Volunteers; these are community spirit at its finest.
That such drivel as “There is nothing to criticize about people uniting in the pride and joy of their nation” and “… but let’s also applaud what these athletes represent, and let’s appreciate community spirit at its finest” is what passes for journalism and commentary in today’s news media is a sad comment on what the news media has become.
That so many choose not to think about the myths and lies that are told around the Olympics, choosing instead to wallow in the mindset of addiction, of instant gratification, of ME – ME – ME and ignoring the consequences is why we continue to dig ourselves into an ever deepening hole.
It would certainly be more fun to ignore reality, join the party and ‘don’t worry be happy’. But I seem to be constitutionally incapable of ignoring reality and the costs and consequences of societies growing addiction to the high of instant gratification.
