≡ Menu

Noted in Passing: The Olympics? They’re having the Olympics? Who Knew?

Outside the Olympic stadium today, as multi-millionaire bling merchant John Legend wailed about imagining a world of no possessions, hundreds of mainly Japanese protestors chanted ‘STOP THE OLYMPICS!’ and carried placards saying, ‘LIVES OVER OLYMPICS!’

I’m not yawning. YOU’RE yawning.

Be honest, we were all bloody falling asleep during that endlessly downbeat and dreary opening ceremony for the Tokyo Olympics.

It was like watching the Eurovision Song Contest -“ an annual competition between the most god-awful singers in each European country – with just a handful of smug old farts in suits for an audience, and only attended by the few contestants who could be bothered to turn up.

By comparison to the joyous and spectacular fervor of the opening ceremonies for the past two Olympics in Rio and London, this was frankly an embarrassing snoozefest.

And aside from the tedious ‘entertainment’ – since when was a guy running on a treadmill supposed to thrill the soul? – it just felt so jarringly wrong to observe a soulless procession of gurning flag-waving athletes waving to a sea of silent fake fan faces in the empty 68,000 seats, with a tiny crowd of under 1000 made up solely of privileged foreign dignitaries and diplomats including Japan’s Emperor Naruhito and America’s First Lady Jill Biden, International Olympic Committee members and Olympic sponsors.

Though the latter didn’t include any executives from key sponsor Toyota, the largest carmaker in Japan and main supplier of cars for the Games, who pulled Japanese TV ads about the Olympics for fear of alienating its local market as polls show 70% of Japanese people don’t want the Games to go ahead.

Those people believe their leaders have greedily put commercial interests – the Olympics is a money-making machine for host nations – over protecting lives from the pandemic….

Due to draconian covid restrictions, winners will have to wear masks on the podiums and put their own medals, handed to them by officials wearing disinfected gloves, around their necks.

All to the deafening sound of virtual silence from an empty stadium.

It’s hard to imagine a less inspiring moment or image for an Olympian who’s dreamed all their life of this, isn’t it?

And that’s before we even get to other troublesome issues, like the first transgender athlete to compete in the Olympics, New Zealand weightlifter Laurel Hubbard, in what many see as a direct threat to the viability of women’s sport.

Is anyone truly going to feel the spirit of the newly adapted Olympic motto ‘Faster, Higher, Stronger, Together’ applies if Hubbard wins Gold and deprives a woman born to a physically inferior female biological body of victory?

And what’s going to happen if ‘activist’ American hammer thrower Gwen Berry wins a medal, decides to ignore an Olympic ruling not to make political gestures during medal ceremonies, and performs another churlish tantrum as the US anthem plays, as she did in the trials?

RTWT AT PIERS MORGAN: The boring Tokyo Olympics opening ceremony proved why Games should be canceled

Comments on this entry are closed.

  • gwbnyc July 23, 2021, 9:12 AM
  • ghostsniper July 23, 2021, 11:02 AM

    I watched Dorothy Hamill tear it a new one back in 76.
    Other than that, it’s never existed as far as I’m concerned.
    BTW, do they have a knitting category yet at the olympix?

    FWIW, I always thought whale racing would be a cool category.

  • Kevin in PA July 23, 2021, 11:10 AM

    Not much of a Piers Morgan fan and I’d pretty much tired of the Olympics many years ago. Nothing but a bunch of spoiled rich kids competing against mostly spoiled rich kids from other countries.
    I do think Beijing is very much deserving of a boycott next year as they host of the winter games. Without a boycott the CCP is going to play it for everyone to see them as a first class nation- pure propaganda opportunity for the commies.

  • PA Cat July 23, 2021, 11:43 AM

    Under the “Who Knew?” category: I forgot about the World Series last year because I was so turned off by the cardboard “fans” in the stands, and missed the All-Star Game this year. And now that the Cleveland team formerly known as the Indians is rebranding itself as the Guardians, there’s yet another reason to tune out MLB. Here’s one Cleveland fan’s rant:
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JTheMM_O-OE&ab_channel=fredrubino

    Myself, I think the team should call itself the Ten Cent Beers, aka the Cheap Suds, after the infamous 1974 fan riot in what was then Cleveland Stadium:
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nx_zzHjqFRk&t=1s&ab_channel=TheHistoryGuy%3AHistoryDeservestoBeRemembered

  • andre July 23, 2021, 2:03 PM

    70% don’t want the Olympics. These are the grandchildren of former Kamikazi flyers, now afraid of Covid. I guess they have the same problem there too.

  • stephen_barron July 23, 2021, 3:51 PM

    My wife and I tried to watch a bit of the Olympics, but the programming is awful.
    TCM was running some movies about the Olympics and I recorded a couple, never having seen any of them. We watched first hour or so of “16 Days of Glory”, a 1985 film about ’84 games in Los Angeles. First few scenes are of opening ceremonies beginning at 4:30PM on 28 July at the LA Coliseum. Opening ceremony ended with lighting of the torch, and sky moving to twilight. Must’ve covered about 3 to 3.5 hours of real time, but fortunately only the filmmaker’s highlights were included, so I only saw about 15 minutes worth, more than enough, and was actually enjoyable. People still liked their country in those days. May favorite part was seeing Bruce Jenner walking into the stadium, looking all buff and male, holding one corner of the Olympic flag.
    I knew absolutely I would not watch any of the current opening ceremonies. It would have to be a giant snooze fest. I was happy to hear they honored the Israeli athletes murdered in 1972.

  • TwoDogs July 23, 2021, 5:14 PM

    The Japs ought to have a samurai, complete with sword, standing by to enforce the “no demonstrations” edict with extreme prejudice. There are a number of ungrateful bitches I would pay good money to see their heads roll.

  • John the River July 23, 2021, 7:32 PM

    Not handing out condoms and installed cardboard beds in the dorms to ‘prevent’, scratch that, to discourage the young, healthy athletes from having sex. Covid again.

    Of course, young, healthy people in their sexual prime and in superb condition won’t think of doing it standing up, on the floor ( don’t they have sofas, chairs, tables, …etc).

  • Andy Texan July 23, 2021, 8:11 PM

    When you completely turn off the propaganda media as I have done, all sports cease to exist. Baseball games, football games, et al come and go without me having a slighted idea of the result or whether they actually took place. Live near the local professional baseball stadium and have not a clue whether there was ever a game there this year. Good riddance to bad trash.

  • Nori July 23, 2021, 10:12 PM

    Japan’s Samurai would pass a fish-scented nuclear fart in the direct direction of this travesty.

  • PA Cat July 24, 2021, 3:37 AM

    It wouldn’t surprise me if Shinjuku Cat attracts more viewers in and beyond Tokyo than the Olympics.

  • John the River July 24, 2021, 5:59 AM

    Couldn’t leave a comment last night, see what happens now.
    The beds in the Olympic village were replaced with cardboard beds (hold the weight of one person) to discourage sex among the young, fit athletes who are all in their sexual prime. No free condoms either. Because, Covid!

    So. No sofas, tables, chairs, kitchen counters or floors? Standing up?
    I thought the Japanese had more sense then that.

  • Annie Rose July 24, 2021, 6:59 AM

    In our house we have been boycotting so many of our past favorite shows that have gone woke and lying media outlets, that I wasn’t even aware that the Olympics had started. We actively avoid any place where people are discriminated against because they are white, unmasked, or unvaxxed, and that includes watching events on tv where fans are not allowed to attend or only the elite, vaxxed may attend. Starve that beast. On a positive note, we have been reading a lot of great books this past year, our garden is gorgeous, and we are outside enjoying nature almost every day. I greatly admire the Olympic athletes, but I’m okay with not watching this year.

  • Sam L. July 24, 2021, 9:52 AM

    I somehow got to know the Olympics have started, but I watch very little TV, and it’s OFF.

  • Yaacov ben Moshe July 25, 2021, 5:46 AM

    Higher, Faster, Stronger and TOGETHER? What, now they’ve combined the high jump and the three-legged race?!? The collectivists have perverted everything- even sports that are mostly individual efforts.- with their smarmy poseing.