Why the Olympic Flames Should Be Extinguished

By: Noah Benjamin Dobson | Written on 11.6.2019

In 2018 - the International Olympic Committee (IOC) was faced with the lowest bid count as cities pulled out of the process.

Bearing the Olympic torch used to be a high honor, but now it’s become a curse. As the clock counts down to the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, Japanese citizens are incredibly distressed. Two anti-Olympic groups in Japan, known as the Hangorin No Kai and Okotowalink, banded together with other groups (Anti Pyeongchang Olympics Alliance, NOlympics LA, Non aux JO 2024 à Paris) in the first-ever global anti-Olympic summit.

Resilience is high for good reason. The Olympics have rendered itself into a pointless spectacle as it’s only crippled the countries’ economies, destroyed environments, and abandoned its people’s interests in favor of countries’ image to the outside world. It’s an issue that’s seen no change in history therefore the show needs to end.

For a sixteen-day event, the Olympics is incredibly expensive. For 56 years, cities have gone over budget. Bidding alone is costly as seen when Chicago spent 100 million dollars during the bid for the 2016 games, only to lose money which could’ve been spent on lowering the 12.4 percent poverty rate more than its previous 2018 rate of 13.7 percent.

It also leaves cities in severe debt and close to bankruptcy. Lake Placid was 6 million dollars in debt which took Montreal 30 years to pay off costing 3 million dollars. Athens also went over 60 percent of its budget which magnified the 2007-2012 Greek Financial Crisis according to ProCon.org.

The Olympics can offer opportunities for countries to increase in jobs and tourist attraction – but that’s only temporary.

Such can be said for Atlanta, who’s tourist rates post-1996 Olympics only saw an increase of 4 percent from international visitors between 1994-1998, only to drop in 1998 according to Researchgate.net.

Amongst high monetary loses, there is also environmental degradation. The IOC heavily supports green acts, but talk is cheap, as the waters in Rio were still 1.7 million more times hazardous than a beach in the U.S. according to CBS News.

Not only does the Olympics fail in solving environmental issues in countries, it also creates new ones. In Sochi, Russia, more than 8,000 acres of Sochi National Park were cleared after politicians reversed laws protecting national parks from construction according to The Conversation. Even Vancouver – considered the Greenest Games Ever – generated 278 kt of greenhouse gases between 2005 and 2010 simply due to transportation to and from the games. Worse, the sacrifices for these infrastructures add to nothing, as areas like Athens were left with rotting pools and stadiums.

Countries hosting the Olympics have an incredible problem of negating their responsibility to their citizens. Brazil’s poverty rate was 20.70% in 2016, and to handle it prior to the games they built walls hiding the poverty-stricken towns and only revealed newly built schools to tourists as seen on Vox Media.

And not just hidden by walls, the poverty-stricken are completely displaced. Atlanta displaced 6,000 residents and Brazil 70,000 people according to the Institute for Policy Studies.

History repeats itself in Japan, as the government currently builds infrastructures in Fukushima. And because of this, citizens who lived there are not qualified for relocation benefits; thus forced back to move to a home deemed safe, but in reality completely damaged by the fallout and radioactive water according to DeadSpin.

If the Olympics stays, then it needs to evolve. Host cities should only be selected if they have the necessary infrastructure like Los Angeles. And if another city wishes to host, it should be one that has previously done so to reuse old infrastructures. Or better – pick one city each to host the Summer Olympics and one to host the Winter Olympics.

And if not, then end the Olympics altogether.