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The International Olympic Committee (IOC) disqualified Ukrainian skeleton racer Vladyslav Heraskevych before his first run at the 2026 Winter Olympics in Italy for wearing a 'helmet of memory' honouring Ukrainian athletes killed by russia's full-scale war.
@EugeneMcParland Disgusting - fuck the IOC!
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@ReggieHere @EugeneMcParland Sadly, no.
And since "No war, because sports" hasn't worked (ostensibly one of the original purposes of the Olympics was to promote peace and unity among Greek city states)
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I agree with the sentiment, but I suspect that the most likely outcome from such a policy would be the permanent cancellation of all international sorting events.
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The International Olympic Committee (IOC) disqualified Ukrainian skeleton racer Vladyslav Heraskevych before his first run at the 2026 Winter Olympics in Italy for wearing a 'helmet of memory' honouring Ukrainian athletes killed by russia's full-scale war.
How can the Olympics say he can't honour Ukraine heroes of the war because "it's political" when they themselves have banned Russia because of their invasion of Ukraine! Surely that is political too!
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@ReggieHere @Valent @EugeneMcParland which I think is his point?
Seemingly, but it's phenomenally unlikely that ever modern State would put sporting interests ahead of security interests, so the outcome would be no more Olympics and non-warring nations being penalised for the acts of the aggressor nations.
Penalising warlike nations by barring them from competition (ie what we have) seems to be the better option.
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Seemingly, but it's phenomenally unlikely that ever modern State would put sporting interests ahead of security interests, so the outcome would be no more Olympics and non-warring nations being penalised for the acts of the aggressor nations.
Penalising warlike nations by barring them from competition (ie what we have) seems to be the better option.
By example, the international sporting ban imposed on South Africa contributed to the end of apartheid, but would it have had the same impact if every other nation had been prevented from playing alongside SA?
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@Valent @EugeneMcParland LOL. No, we'd just stop having Olympics competitions immediately. Probably going to anyway. It's a silly practice from an ancient time when people thought war was a bad thing and wished to have some sort of gathering of shared fun to avoid it. No place for bullshit like that in the modern world.
Pretty sure that war is a bad thing for most of the people involved.
Bankers, politicians and resource hoarders might disagree.
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The International Olympic Committee (IOC) disqualified Ukrainian skeleton racer Vladyslav Heraskevych before his first run at the 2026 Winter Olympics in Italy for wearing a 'helmet of memory' honouring Ukrainian athletes killed by russia's full-scale war.
@EugeneMcParland Unrelated, you may say - but here is a completely different take by IOC, this time their official merchandising.
You can't make that up.
https://www.dw.com/en/olympics-t-shirt-marking-1936-berlin-games-raises-eyebrows/a-75909285
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By example, the international sporting ban imposed on South Africa contributed to the end of apartheid, but would it have had the same impact if every other nation had been prevented from playing alongside SA?
@ReggieHere
Fair point. What I was suggesting is that if "everyone" was prevented from competition, there would be massive pressure to end war/ genocide/ apartheid etc. And as a nice side effect, it removes the propaganda effect of the spectacle until that happens.But yeah, I know money rules and that people can never fully agree on anything so it would never happen. @lerxst @EugeneMcParland
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@ReggieHere
Fair point. What I was suggesting is that if "everyone" was prevented from competition, there would be massive pressure to end war/ genocide/ apartheid etc. And as a nice side effect, it removes the propaganda effect of the spectacle until that happens.But yeah, I know money rules and that people can never fully agree on anything so it would never happen. @lerxst @EugeneMcParland
I like the idea, and I think the criteria for banning countries from sporting events could certainly be applied far more fairly than it has been of late (some wars are deemed more worthy of a ban than others). I'm just not sure that nations who invade other nations would care overly about international opprobrium arising from sports when they're also being accused of war crimes.
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How can the Olympics say he can't honour Ukraine heroes of the war because "it's political" when they themselves have banned Russia because of their invasion of Ukraine! Surely that is political too!
@monkeyben @EugeneMcParland Then why is everyone allowed to wave flags? Countries are inherently political. What they mean is "don't do anything that'll affect our sponsor's brand images".
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