The Paralympics are awesome.
This is my first exposure to them, and I think they’re great.
I tried watching them during the summer games, but Comcast refused and offered me that infamous error message instead when I tried to access them.
This time, though, I can watch, and man, they are fantastic.
Incredibly, I’m liking them more, I think, than the “normal” Olympics. They are a nice contrast and really show how… low the normal ones have sunk.
I think I’ll list the reasons the Paralympics are great, if only for purposes of self-examination. Ok, here goes:
1) No politics. Thank GOD. No fucking politics. Yay! And this, during the Ukraine crisis no less! What a wonderful thing. It’s just athletes, competing to win, and for fun and self- actualization. It’s a really nice atmosphere. There’s no politics from the anchors behind the desk, the announcers, the athletes, and yes- there’s even less from the ads! Hallelujah!
2) The ads are MUCH nicer. Most are actual ads, like the kind you typically see on TV, and not… IDK, brainwashing, or propaganda, or abstract art, or whatever the fuck it is they show during the normal games.
I noticed a distinct lack of scowling, angry black people during these ads. It’s a much nicer package we’re getting this time around.
Gods, were the ads during the normal games just dreadful. Not so much even tone-deaf as… hostile, even disturbing. I remember one particular ad that jumped out at me as being uniquely ugly even in an ocean of cringe. It was that one featuring Maame Biney, the black short-track skater, who equated competing as a black athlete in these Olympics with someone enduring cancer treatment, and a Paralympian living life as an amputee. I can’t find it online as it seems to have been buried, but I did notice that even an MSM outlet of all things questioned this one: https://nypost.com/2022/02/12/ad-of-olympian-maame-biney-pushes-idea-of-black-victimhood/
But gods, what the ever loving fuck. I can’t believe that thing ever made it to air. What on Earth were these people thinking? I can’t imagine any way to paint the athlete here in an uglier way. Probably the biggest self-own of these games. Honestly, whoever green lighted that thing should be fired.
3) I’m really liking the athletes. They’re… IDK, nicer, and certainly more humble, than the athletes in the main games. They’re more grounded. They seem less spoiled, and honestly, less self-absorbed, than their more famous counterparts. It’s refreshing.
It just occurred to me that these athletes are what athletes in the main games were probably like before they started letting professionals compete. Paralympians seem like people who do sport because they love it, or because it fills some spiritual need within them. The pros in the main games do as well, but jeez, there is a LOT of… self-aggrandizement with those types, and a lot of “brand” marketing, and a lot of frankly needless melodrama.
Too often the athletes in the main games come across like spoiled rich kids. I’m thinking of Eileen Gu here, Shiffrin crying on the slopes for like 20 fucking minutes, Shaun White crying and emoting for like half an hour, and a bunch of other stuff. Jeezus, guys.
It’s really refreshing to see people compete and act like adults both during competition and around it. There’s a minimum of showboating and drama in the Paralympics, and that is really nice.
4) The sports themselves are new to me, and thus interesting. I’ve never seen any of this stuff! It’s cool to watch. Neat.
5) There’s a minimum of “fluff”. For the events that I’ve seen, they just show the events, and then get to the next ones, and so on. There’s not much extra stuff, and they only show the events once, I think to not emphasize the importance of one event over any others. The outlay of the Paralympics is REALLY nice. times.
There’s not nearly as much jingoistic drivel as during the normal games, like constant medal counts, all sorts of stuff about Team USA versus everyone else, etc.
I remember during the main games NBC rebroadcasting the women’s Monobob runs over and fucking over again because a black woman won. Christ, did that get repetitive. I kept watching, hoping they would show something else sometimes, but no, jeebus, I swear I saw those runs four or five times spread out amongst the channels. Gawd have mercy. It got to the point where I was starting to memorize the fucking scores. Lordy, people. I just wanted to see some biathlon!
The woman who won held the USA flag during the closing ceremony. Man was she coached to within in inch of her life as to what to say. Not much in the way of spontaneity in her remarks. Which I understand, she’s been doing bobsled for a long time and it’s all probably old hat by now, but wow, did she come across as robotic- even to ME, and I’m a fucking cyborg, lol.
6) I think the general gist of all this is that the Paralympics are mostly about sports, whereas the normal games no longer are to a large extent. I read online from some older Americans that the games and their tone shifted dramatically once they lifted the ban on pros playing, and now I think I can see why. That was before my time, but wow, yes, I get it.
It seems that inviting pros into the games brought in a lot of egos, a lot of greed, and a lot of interference, whether from governments or corporations.
7) I’m going to be streaming the crap out of the Paralympics on Xfinity when I have the time. That should be fun.
8) I remember some news segments and interviews near the end of the main games where people analyzed Norway’s dominance, and came to the conclusion that the reason they are so good is because their youth sports are mostly about… wait for it- sports, and ours are about mostly parents pushing their kids around, and everyone in general being way too overbearing and competitive.
And I remember the people saying all of this were the same ones pushing the shit I outlaid and complained about about, and they reported this fact without a shred of self-awareness. Bleh.
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Well, this was cathartic, lol.
Since I know nothing about the Paralympics, I’m not sure of what to comment on. I guess I just liked getting to know them in general.
Beyond all of this, I remember doing some skating myself on the Olympic ice after the main games wrapped up. It was fun, and boy was it difficult. Wowwwww is that stuff haaaaard. I mean, I realized that before, but man, they aren’t fooling. The ice is cold, which for some reason I didn’t realize (lol), and the spins make you dizzy. And so do the jumps. And the skating. And the rest of it. Holy cow, skaters are amazing athletes.
I did this via astral projection, of course. It was a fun experience to have while chilling in bed, waiting for sleep. I liked it. Made me think of roads not traveled for myself.
Occasionally I would get flashes of myself as a pro figure skater in some alternate reality. Retired now of course, but still doing it, for fun. It’s… interesting. I get the feeling that out of all the stuff in the Winter games, that that would have been the only one I would have been good at.
I suppose there’s a reality in which I would have been a good bobsledder, but that one is so far from here I can’t see it. Same for snowboarding, or short track, etc. But figure skating? Yes, that one I can touch.
There’s just something about flying that appeals to me. I love the sensation of spinning through the air, whether it’s with my physical body or my soul, or my robotic/synthetic side, or my mind, carving out the air around me. Or just some other me, in a parallel universe, helping me along.
Well, I think I would have been good at pairs. Or ice dancing. IDK.
You know- back in the day, I loved doing those jumping spin kicks in those martial arts classes I took. They were… fun. A lot of fun. Freeing. They let me loose from the tyranny of gravity, if only for a second. Not too unlike the jumps the skaters do, I guess. Kinda. Kinda-sorta.
Well, something to think about.
I hope that other me has a gold medal somewhere in his closet.
Well… whatever. I think it’s time to pack this one in.