#ben pobjie

[indizombie]

The medallists ascended the dais. Time stood still, while history crackled around the arena like electricity. The Australian stood in silent solidarity as the Star-Spangled Banner played, and Smith and Carlos bowed their heads and silently raised black-gloved fists to the sky. Boos rang out around the stadium and there was a sharp intake of breath from US and Olympic authorities as they realised that these rude young men had introduced the squalid odour of – shudder – politics into the sweet and fragrant air of the Olympics. This was not what the Olympics were for! They were for the celebration of sporting excellence. They were for the coming together of the world’s peoples in peace and festivity. They were for the marketing of various products and the enrichment of various businesspeople. They were for the glorification of governments, the placating of electorates, the papering over of social and economic cracks, the maintenance of grandiosely mendacious narratives about the superiority of certain national populations over others and the reinforcement of soothing illusions regarding the acceptability of the status quo. But for athletes to protest against injustice? Never! It simply was not done. If medallists were to go round raising their fists willy-nilly, people might start getting the idea that sportspeople cared about things – such an outcome was unthinkable.

Ben Pobjie, 'Standing for something', The Roar

[bob-belcher]

There’s two types of people

[booksandwords]

For as long as human beings have been dying, they have been turning into ghosts. Or maybe they haven't. That's the great thing about ghosts: nobody knows if they're real, so they are endlessly entertaining, like Bigfoot or Elon Musk.

Ben Pobije, 100 Tales from Australia’s Most Haunted Places

[indizombie]

Those who come second are usually merely bit players in the drama that is someone else’s victory. Funnily enough, Peter Norman was also a bit player in the much larger drama that built itself around the 200 metre final of 1968 – no doubt he wouldn’t have had it any other way. But a bit player can still be a hero, if he recognises the moment that the opportunity arises and grabs it. Peter Norman, the fastest man in Australia, the lad whose mother bought the Guinness book every year, the Coburg kid who had no chance at the Olympics but ended up with a medal round his neck and a badge on his chest, grabbed it. Surely no silver medallist ever showed more champion qualities. For his part, Norman thought it was all terribly simple. “I believe in civil rights,” he said in the aftermath of the medal ceremony, as controversy raged around him. “Every man is born equal, and should be treated that way.”

Ben Pobjie, 'Standing for something', The Roar

[indizombie]

In 2006, Peter Norman succumbed to a heart attack at the age of sixty-four. He was buried on October 9, 2006, the day proclaimed ‘Peter Norman Day’ by the US Track and Field Federation – America always did appreciate Norman more than his own country. Smith and Carlos were pallbearers at Norman’s funeral and gave eulogies to the man who’d stood with them thirty-eight years previously. Six years after his death, Australia’s Federal Parliament passed a motion recognising Peter Norman’s “extraordinary athletic achievements”, apologising to him for his treatment following the Olympic protest, praising his courage and “belatedly” recognising “the powerful role that Peter Norman played in furthering racial equality”. In 2019, a statue of Norman was unveiled at Albert Park’s athletics track – on Peter Norman Day.

Ben Pobjie, 'Standing for something', The Roar

[indizombie]

In 2000, with the Olympics in Sydney and the entire nation leaping about waving their hands with joy at the attention the world was lavishing on us, Peter Norman received no official invitation to the Games, nor any official recognition from the AOC. The Committee insisted that this, like his non-selection in 1972, was not a sign of anything sinister – they simply couldn’t bring everyone to Sydney, and Peter could’ve bought his own tickets if he wanted. If not a snub, this was at least a declaration that the AOC did not consider Norman to be anything special in the annals of Australian Olympic history. The possibility that he may have been the most extraordinary Aussie Olympian of them all never occurred to them. The Americans had certainly not forgotten him, however: after hearing he wouldn’t be attending the Sydney Games, the US invited him themselves. It takes a lot to make American sporting authorities look noble, but Australia has always punched above its weight.

Ben Pobjie, 'Standing for something', The Roar

[indizombie]

Tommie Smith and John Carlos had been profoundly affected not just by the racism that they had seen and experienced over their lifetimes, but also by the spirit of the 1960s: the decade that began with the BBC introducing their first ever female newsreader, and ended with actual full-on boobs on Monty Python’s Flying Circus. Progress was in the air like the smell of an onrushing steamroller, and the American civil rights movement was the steamrolliest steamroller of all. Black Americans had been marching in the streets, fighting for their rights, and generally refusing to sit in the back of the bus, and Smith and Carlos were determined to use their platform – literal and figurative – to tell the world that they were part of that movement, and would not stay silent.

Ben Pobjie, 'Standing for something', The Roar

[ellieellieoxenfree]

please never change, ben pobjie