Sure, there are sports that are not very dangerous, but they have been around in the Olympics for much longer periods of time. But if you look back in time, more recently in that, you think about what excites people about the Olympics. Yes, team USA winning gold is most definitely exciting, but what else do you remember? Injuries and death. And when we watch, what do we talk about? That's right, who fell and hurt themselves, or maybe just who had a really epic fall. You may disagree with me, even I know that we watch the Olympics for other reasons as well, but we all know deep down that this is correct. On the women's downhill skiing slope, it was so icy that many women fell, very intense falls. The next day at school, that was ALL people were talking about. Before the Olympics even started, a luge athlete died. I hadn't even processed the Olympics were starting until I heard about the guy dying while practicing on the Olympics course.
So why did I introduce my own sport? Synchronized skating is being debated this summer on whether or not it will become part of the Olympics. As I looked online for opinions of this, the first article I clicked on showed me exactly what I have been arguing above. The author first talks about the history of synchronized skating, and how it is much different than people would expect, and much more difficult, but then the article turns to a personal experience. The experiences turn to injury, a calf being sliced open, fingers almost sliced off, and all these girls hopping right back into their program to finished what they started. People cringe as they hear this type of experience, the exact type of cringe you want when you watch the Olympics. As the author goes on to describe more experiences, all they talk about is the dangers and high speeds the skaters go at. And then concludes that it should become an Olympic sport on that knowledge alone.In my mind I'd want to be advocating for Synchro in the Olympics because of the difficulty of it and the strength of the athletes, but instead I'm forced to use the apparently stronger argument of the high speeds teams go at, the high likely hood of crashes during intersections, the many slashes a blade has done to human flesh, and the dangerous lifts that higher teams do.
It is actually quite sad that injuries and death are what draw us in, but it is proven time and again, even outside of the Olympics. News channels often focus on tradegies of different sorts. For example, the incident in Austin, Texas where a man flew his private plane into an IRS building is getting a lot of coverage, considering that it is the Olympics now.
ReplyDeleteI would venture to say that the reason humans are so draw to injury and death is the same as why many people love rollercoasters and driving fast cars; humans seem to be fascinated by the fine line between the living and the dead. Some people like to actually walk that tightrope, others like to watch them; either way, one is brought a little closer to death.
I totally agree that many people are drawn to the olympics are many other things in the world because of the possible danger. Another olympic example of this is the two most recent sports in the olympics: ski and snowboard cross, where competitors race three other athletes on a course with tight turns and huge air, to get the bottom of the mountain first. Because of the other competitors and hard racing, many crashes and wipe outs occur, including some happening 10 to 15 feet in the air. Obviously, a lot of the appeal of these races is the potential for danger among the competitors. And even though there are many examples of people appreciating danger, there are also sports where just the opposite is valued: strategy and finesse. One example of this is curling, which although I had never watched before these olympics, is now one of my favorite things to watch because of how intense and strategy based it is, even though I'm pretty sure throughout the many years of its existence no one has ever gotten injured. Although I completely agree that people like to watch sports which feature violence and danger, I do think there are sports and other things where the very opposite is appreciated.
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