Sports have always been political — it's just a question of who's speaking out.
Paul Waldman at Public Notice:
We don’t know if Vice President JD Vance anticipated that when he attended the opening ceremonies at the Winter Olympics in Italy he’d be booed by the crowd. But if he did, he probably didn’t mind. Vance is used to it by now — he gets booed a lot — but more importantly, like his boss and most of the conservative elite, Vance knows that every major sporting event is an opportunity for the right to stoke the culture war and play the victim. Which is exactly what the Olympics have become. The Olympics have often featured political controversies, but this year’s games stand out because of the growing number of athletes — especially, but not solely, Americans — making their beliefs known. Unsurprisingly, none of it is particularly complimentary to this administration. The growing anger on the right is mostly performative, but if we’re being generous, we can acknowledge how uncomfortable they must feel at seeing one Olympian after another go public with their distaste for Trump and their chagrin at the administration’s policies. And it comes so soon after conservatives got themselves all worked up over Bad Bunny’s Super Bowl halftime show, which they decided was an affront to everything they believe in. Most distressing for them, Bad Bunny turned out to be one of the most-watched halftime shows of all time, even before you add in the 98 million views on YouTube. At least one Republican congressman has said that though he doesn’t speak Spanish, he thinks there was something fishy in Bad Bunny’s lyrics, and he’s “investigating.”
Coming off that brouhaha, conservatives were primed for outrage, and that’s what they’re getting. It was kicked off by skier Hunter Hess, who was asked about the troubles back home and responded by expressing his complicated feelings. “It brings up mixed emotions to represent the US right now, I think. It’s a little hard. There’s obviously a lot going on that I’m not the biggest fan of, and I think a lot of people aren’t,” he said, noting that he was representing “all the things I think are good about the US. I just think, if it aligns with my moral values I think I’m representing it. Just ‘cause I’m wearing the flag doesn’t mean I represent everything that’s going on in the US.”
[...] Olympic athletes, said Vice President Vance, are “not there to pop off about politics,” which we all know is exactly what he would have said if conservative athletes had praised the president. Sen. Rick Scott of Florida said that any athlete expressing incorrect sentiments “should be stripped of their USA Olympic uniform.” Rep. Byron Donalds, currently running for governor in the same state, tweeted in response to Hess, “YOU chose to wear our flag. YOU chose to represent our country. YOU chose to compete at the @Olympics. If that’s too hard for you, then GO HOME. Some things are bigger than politics. You just don’t get it.” But Hess’s comments were just the beginning. Another skier, Chris Lillis, echoed what Hess said, adding “I feel heartbroken about what’s happening in the United States.” Figure skater Amber Glenn noted that it’s a hard time for LGBTQ Americans right now — not exactly a controversial opinion — and immediately received what she described on Instagram as “a scary amount of hate / threats for simply using my voice WHEN ASKED about how I feel.” (“Another turncoat to root against,” tweeted Megyn Kelly.) “I know that a lot of people say you’re just an athlete, like, stick to your job, shut up about politics, but politics affect us all,” she said. Later, at a press conference next to fellow gold-medal-winning skater Alysa Liu, Glenn dismissed the haters, saying “they hate to see two woke bitches win.” Setting aside British-American skier Gus Kenworthy posting an image of “fuck ICE” written in pee on the snow, the clearest message probably came from Rich Ruohonen, who like many of the members of the US curling team is from Minnesota.
“I’m proud to be here to represent Team USA, and to represent our country. But we’d be remiss if we didn’t at least mention what’s going on in Minnesota and what a tough time it’s been for everybody,” he said, adding that the Constitution guarantees “freedom of press, freedom of speech, protects us from unreasonable searches and seizures, and makes it that we have to have probable cause to be pulled over. And what’s happening in Minnesota is wrong. There’s no shades of grey. It’s clear.”
[...]
A few days before winning the men’s giant slalom, Brazilian gold medal-winning skier Lucas Pinheiro Braathen posted a photo of himself with Colin Kaepernick, who was essentially blacklisted by NFL teams after he began kneeling during the national anthem in a silent protest against police brutality. Ukrainian skeleton athlete Vladyslav Heraskevych was barred from competition because he insisted on wearing a helmet with photos of athletes killed in Russia’s war on his home country; the Olympic Committee said it was too “political.”
Sports have never not been political
Despite the Trump administration’s complaints about being criticized by athletes, the truth is that sports have always been political, and probably always will be. The politics comes from the top down — like the NFL’s longstanding relationship with the US military — and from the bottom up, namely the athletes themselves. One consistent throughline is that when athletes express liberal views, the right’s backlash is swift and furious, often involving attempts to punish those with the temerity to speak out. That has been a long tradition even at the Olympics.
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The America they don’t like
It isn’t as though Trump is suddenly discovering that sports can be political — or used for his own political ends. Early in his first term, he sent Vice President Mike Pence to a Colts-49ers game precisely so Pence could walk out in a huff when 49ers players kneeled during the national anthem in silent protest of racial inequality (and Trump had already demanded that players who kneel be suspended). Nor is this the first time Trump has expressed his contempt for the Olympics. Two years ago while campaigning for the White House, he went on a tear during the Paris games, condemning the opening ceremonies and viciously attacking a female boxer from Algeria whom online right-wing goons had decided was trans (she wasn’t).
There’s a subtle reason why Trump, Vance, and lots of other conservatives can’t stand the Olympics. For all the opportunities to chant “USA! USA!,” as far as they’re concerned there’s something a little off about the US team. You can see it in the opening and closing ceremonies, where the athletes from most nations all look kind of alike, but the American team comes in all the hues of our multi-racial country. While the administration nominates white supremacists to high office, attempts to purge the nation of immigrants (especially those from non-white countries), and wages war on diversity, the Olympic team is a living rebuke — a jumping, spinning, flying, super-fit and undeniably hot one — to their entire worldview. And unlike the “meritocracy” they are trying to build in which white men are restored to their proper dominance, the Olympics are pretty close to a true meritocracy. Conservatives can’t whine that Simone Biles or Chloe Kim must have gotten their spots by pushing aside a more “qualified” white athlete. This year’s US flag-bearers are Italian-American bobsledder Frank Del Duca, who said the honor “feels like a bridge between my family’s heritage, and the country I’m so proud to serve,” and speed skater Erin Jackson, the first Black woman to win an individual gold medal at the Winter Olympics. You can almost feel JD Vance seething at the wokeness.
MAGA whiners cry about “sports being political” need to grow up and deal with it. These same folks then cheer when a sports person spouts out conservative-friendly opinions.
