{"id":472698,"date":"2021-05-14T11:54:33","date_gmt":"2021-05-14T18:54:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.swimmingworldmagazine.com\/news\/?p=472698"},"modified":"2021-05-14T11:54:33","modified_gmt":"2021-05-14T18:54:33","slug":"swim-poll-of-the-week-56-believe-athletes-shouldnt-protest-on-podium-in-favor-of-ioc-rule-50","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.swimmingworldmagazine.com\/news\/swim-poll-of-the-week-56-believe-athletes-shouldnt-protest-on-podium-in-favor-of-ioc-rule-50\/","title":{"rendered":"Swim Poll of the Week: 56% Believe Athletes Shouldn’t Protest on Podium; In Favor of IOC Rule 50"},"content":{"rendered":"

This is the Swim Poll of the Week for Thursday May 13, 2021, sponsored by Strechcordz Swim Training Products<\/a>. In our last poll, we wanted to know: Do You Think IOC Rule 50 Should Be Abolished and Athletes Should Be Able to Protest Key Issues They Deem Important?<\/strong><\/p>\n

The project that\u00a0Pierre de Coubertin<\/strong>\u00a0undertook more than a century ago was many things. It was never, however, apolitical.<\/p>\n

The baron grew up in a 19th century France humiliated by defeat in the Franco-Prussian war. He saw the ravages that omnipresent conflict between European states inflicted on the continent, a situation that persisted until World War II. His refuge was an idyllic history of the ancient Greeks. And in meshing the utopia of the past with the distinctly challenging present,\u00a0he saw sport as a remedy<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cWars break out because nations misunderstand each other,\u201d Coubertin famously wrote. \u201cWe shall not have peace until the prejudices which now separate the different races shall have been outlived. To attain this end, what better means than to bring the youth of all countries periodically together for amicable trials of muscular strength and agility?\u201d<\/p>\n

What Coubertin sketched out, what he brought to life for the first time in 1896 and every four years thereafter (world wars and pandemics, notwithstanding) has for the most part lived out that ideal. But what Coubertin created wasn\u2019t a vacuum of politics but rather a grafting of politics onto the sporting stage, one where the stakes were generally less than life and death.<\/p>\n

More than 80 years after his death, the attempt to separate politics from the Olympics isn\u2019t just foolhardy. It runs counter to the values Coubertin built his Olympic movement around.<\/p>\n

The current efforts center on objections to Rule 50 of the International Olympic Committee\u2019s Olympic Charter. That rule restricts \u201cdemonstration or political, religious or racial propaganda \u2026 permitted in any Olympic sites, venues or other areas.\u201d Those that passionately defend Rule 50 do so in defense of the purity of sport, as an arena in which real life and its myriad complications end to allow unfettered enjoyment of a sporting event.<\/p>\n

But that arrangement does a disservice to the Olympics\u2019 ethos. Coubertin didn\u2019t just create an international athletic competition. He didn\u2019t just presage 20th century trends of internationalism, in culture and commerce. He created a philosophical underpinning for the Games, the idea of Olympism. From\u00a0the Olympic Charter<\/a>, describing the \u201cfundamental principles of Olympism\u201d:<\/p>\n

\u201cOlympism is a philosophy of life, exalting and combining in a balanced whole the qualities of body, will and mind. Blending sport with culture and education, Olympism seeks to create a way of life based on the joy of effort, the educational value of good example, social responsibility and respect for universal fundamental ethical principles.\u201d<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

To tell an athlete to stow something so fundamental to them, like a devotion to human rights, to compete runs counter to this philosophy. It is antithetical to the original concept of the Olympics as not just a sporting but a multicultural festival that included, from 1912 to 1948, architecture, literature, music, painting and sculpture. (Fun fact: Hungary\u2019s\u00a0Alfred Hajos,<\/strong>\u00a0who\u00a0won gold medals in the<\/a>\u00a01896 Olympics in the 100-meter and 1,200-meter freestyle, won a silver medal in the 1924 Olympics in the architecture art competition. He also competed in 1928 and 1932).<\/p>\n

The Olympic charter holds that, \u201cThe practice of sport is a human right.\u201d Many of those seeking to express themselves on Olympic podiums are fighting for ideals that are also human rights, whether that\u2019s\u00a0Naomi Osaka<\/strong>\u00a0displaying\u00a0the names of Black people killed by police on her apparel<\/a>\u00a0to underscore their right to live in the face of state violence or athletes kneeling during the national anthem to protest systemic inequality that denies millions of people the free exercise of their rights. In the most famous Olympic protest, by Americans\u00a0Tommie Smith<\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0John Carlos<\/strong>\u00a0at the 1968 Olympics in Mexico City, the media attention was focused on the Black power salute of their gloved fists. Overlooked was the symbology of beads worn to protest the lack of justice for victims of lynching in the United States or the men standing barefoot to protest a system that strands millions in unrelenting poverty. Those rights, to life and a chance at prosperity, are ones that should be inarguable within the framework of Olympism.<\/p>\n

A group of American athletes, led by 1968 Olympian\u00a0John Carlos,<\/strong> last year published a letter to the International Olympic Committee and International Paralympic Committee urging the abolition of IOC Charter Rule 50.<\/p>\n

The letter was sent on behalf of the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee Athletes\u2019 Advisory Council (USOPC AAC<\/a>). It urges the IOC to scrap\u00a0Rule 50<\/a>, which bars political protests by athletes at official Olympic ceremonies, and replace it with new guidelines developed \u201cin direct collaboration with independent, worldwide athlete representatives that protects athletes\u2019 freedom of expression.\u201d<\/p>\n

From the letter<\/a>:<\/p>\n

We are now at a crossroads. The IOC and IPC cannot continue on the path of punishing or removing athletes who speak up for what they believe in, especially when those beliefs exemplify the goals of Olympism. Instead, sports administrators must begin the responsible task of transparent collaboration with athletes and athlete groups (including independent athlete groups) to reshape the future of athlete expression at the Olympic and Paralympic Games. Let us work together to create a new structure that celebrates athletes who speak about issues in alignment with human rights and the 7 principles of Olympism.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Rule 50 of the Olympic Charter purports to \u201cprotect the neutrality of sport and the Olympic Games\u201d by forbidding protests and demonstrations on the field of competition, the Olympic Village and all official ceremonies (opening, closing, medal, etc.) It enumerates such banned protests and including:<\/p>\n