NYTimes: International Olympic Committee - "elitist, domineering, and crassly commercial at its core"

Fri Jul 6 11:03:12 CEST 2012

Deep down here in Africa many NGOs champion against forced marriages.
But when forced marriages happen up there at ICANN who speaks against
the practice?

On 7/6/12, Nuno Garcia <ngarcia at ngarcia.net> wrote:
> I have said this once: The Olympic Committee has a budget that is bigger
> than many nations' budgets. They can afford not  to be for-profit. The same
> goes for other organizations.
>
> And some statements are pure intellectual arrogance.
>
> Best,
>
> Nuno Garcia
>
> On 5 July 2012 23:16, Joly MacFie <joly at punkcast.com> wrote:
>
>> But you are not disputing their facts, I take it.
>>
>> j
>>
>>
>> On Thu, Jul 5, 2012 at 5:58 PM, Michael Carson
>> <mcarson029 at comcast.net>wrote:
>>
>>> Alain,
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> I agree.  This op-ed is just that - the opinion of two individuals.
>>>
>>>   Michael Carson
>>>
>>> YMCA of the USA
>>>
>>> ------------------------------
>>> *From: *"Alain Berranger" <alain.berranger at GMAIL.COM>
>>> *To: *NCSG-DISCUSS at LISTSERV.SYR.EDU
>>> *Sent: *Thursday, July 5, 2012 3:55:09 PM
>>> *Subject: *Re: NYTimes: International Olympic Committee - "elitist,
>>> domineering, and crassly commercial at its core"
>>>
>>>
>>> NPOC  really welcomes national Olympic committees as Members because
>>> they
>>> are true notforprofit organizations...
>>>
>>> Alain
>>>
>>> On Thursday, July 5, 2012, Robin Gross wrote:
>>>
>>>>  As a commercial organization that tried to join NCSG, very relevant…
>>>>
>>>> No Medal for the International Olympic Committee says the New York
>>>> Times…..
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/05/opinion/no-medal-for-the-international-olympic-committee.html?_r=3&ref=opinion&pagewanted=print
>>>>
>>>>
>>>> ------------------------------
>>>> July 4, 2012
>>>>  **Olympian Arrogance**** By JULES BOYKOFF and ALAN TOMLINSON****
>>>> ****
>>>>
>>>> Brighton, England
>>>>
>>>> WHILE Europe roils in economic turmoil, London is preparing for a
>>>> lavish
>>>> jamboree of international good will: in a few weeks, the city will host
>>>> the
>>>> 2012 Summer Olympics.
>>>>
>>>> But behind the spectacle of athletic prowess and global harmony,
>>>> brass-knuckle politics and brute economics reign. At this nexus sits
>>>> theInternational
>>>> Olympic Committee <http://www.olympic.org/>, which promotes the games
>>>> and decides where they will be held. Though the I.O.C. has been
>>>> periodically tarnished by scandal — usually involving the bribing and
>>>> illegitimate wooing of delegates — those embarrassments divert us from
>>>> a
>>>> deeper problem: the organization is elitist, domineering and crassly
>>>> commercial at its core.
>>>>
>>>> The I.O.C., which champions itself as a democratic “catalyst for
>>>> collaboration between all parties of the Olympic family,” is
>>>> nonetheless
>>>> run by a privileged sliver of the global 1 percent. This has always
>>>> been
>>>> the case: when Baron Pierre de Coubertin revived the Olympics in the
>>>> 1890s,
>>>> he assembled a hodgepodge of princes, barons, counts and lords to
>>>> coordinate the games. Eventually the I.O.C. opened its hallowed halls
>>>> to
>>>> wealthy business leaders and former Olympians. Not until 1981 were
>>>> women
>>>> allowed in.
>>>>
>>>> Even today, royalty make up a disproportionate share of the body; among
>>>> the 105 I.O.C.
>>>> members<http://www.olympic.org/content/the-ioc/the-ioc-institution1/ioc-members-list/>
>>>> are
>>>> the likes of Princess Nora of Liechtenstein, Crown Prince Frederik of
>>>> Denmark and Prince Nawaf Faisal Fahd Abdulaziz of Saudi Arabia. The
>>>> United
>>>> States has only three representatives, two of them former Olympic
>>>> athletes.
>>>>
>>>> Then there are the excessive demands that the I.O.C. makes on host
>>>> cities. For instance, the host cities have had to change their laws to
>>>> comply with the Olympic
>>>> Charter<http://www.olympic.org/Documents/olympic_charter_en.pdf>,
>>>> which states that “no kind of demonstration or political, religious or
>>>> racial propaganda is permitted in any Olympic sites, venues or other
>>>> areas.” When Vancouver, British Columbia, hosted the Winter Games in
>>>> 2010,
>>>> the city passed a bylaw that outlawed signs and banners that did not
>>>> “celebrate” the Olympics. Placards that criticized the Olympics were
>>>> forbidden, and the law even empowered Canadian authorities to remove
>>>> such
>>>> signs from private property.
>>>>
>>>> The I.O.C. also makes host cities police Olympics-related intellectual
>>>> property rights. So Parliament adopted the London Olympic Games and
>>>> Paralympic Games Act of
>>>> 2006<http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/2006/12/contents>,
>>>> which defines as a trademark infringement the commercial use of words
>>>> like
>>>> “games,” “2012” and “London” in proximity.
>>>>
>>>> Such monomaniacal brand micromanagement points to another problem: the
>>>> I.O.C. has turned the Olympics into a commercial bonanza. In London,
>>>> more
>>>> than 250 miles of V.I.P. traffic lanes are reserved not just for
>>>> athletes
>>>> and I.O.C. luminaries but also for corporate sponsors. Even the
>>>> signature
>>>> torch relay has been commercialized: the I.O.C. and its corporate
>>>> partners
>>>> snapped up 10 percent of the torchbearer slots for I.O.C. stakeholders
>>>> and
>>>> members of the commercial sponsors’ information technology and
>>>> marketing
>>>> staffs. Michael R. Payne, a former marketing director for the
>>>> committee,
>>>> has called the Olympics “the world’s longest commercial.”
>>>>
>>>> Most worrisome, perhaps, is that the I.O.C. creates perverse incentives
>>>> for security officials in host cities to overspend and to militarize
>>>> public
>>>> space. The I.O.C. tends to look kindly on bids that assure security,
>>>> and
>>>> host cities too often use the games as a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity
>>>> to
>>>> stock police warehouses with the best weapons money can buy.
>>>>
>>>> Visitors to London, where the games are scheduled to run from July 27
>>>> to
>>>> Aug. 12, would be forgiven for thinking they had dropped in on a
>>>> military
>>>> hardware convention. Helicopters, fighter jets and bomb-disposal units
>>>> will
>>>> be at the ready. About 13,500 British military personnel will be on
>>>> patrol
>>>> — 4,000 more than are currently serving in Afghanistan. Security
>>>> officials
>>>> have acquired Starstreak and Rapier surface-to-air missiles. Even the
>>>> Olympic mascots look like two-legged surveillance cameras.
>>>>
>>>> Let us be clear: the concern about ensuring a terror-free Olympics is
>>>> tragically warranted. In 1972, members of the Palestinian militant
>>>> group
>>>> Black September killed 11 Israeli athletes and coaches at the Olympics
>>>> in
>>>> Munich — after which the I.O.C. president notoriously insisted that
>>>> “the
>>>> games must go on” — and in 1996, a bomb at the Atlanta Olympics killed
>>>> a
>>>> spectator and injured more than 100 other people. Yet there is such a
>>>> thing
>>>> as excess — and surveillance and weaponry are not a panacea.
>>>>
>>>> Security measures can also be counterproductive: London residents who
>>>> learned that the Ministry of Defense was attaching missile launchers to
>>>> the
>>>> roofs of their apartment buildings can’t be blamed for wondering if
>>>> they’ve
>>>> unwillingly become a prime target for terrorists. And, symbolically, at
>>>> a
>>>> certain point it gets hard to square the image of the militarized state
>>>> with the Olympic ideals of peace and understanding.
>>>>
>>>> What can be done? The I.O.C. has acknowledged that the escalating scale
>>>> of the games — “gigantism” — is a real issue. Competitions drenched in
>>>> privilege, like the equestrian events, should be ditched (with apologies
>>>> to
>>>> Ann Romney’s horse Rafalca, who will be competing in dressage in
>>>> London).
>>>> Pseudo-historical events like Greco-Roman wrestling, concocted in the
>>>> 19th
>>>> century, could also go. Events with high start-up costs could be
>>>> swapped
>>>> for those requiring fewer resources. Why not bring back tug-of-war (a
>>>> hotly
>>>> contested event in the early 20th century) and add more running events,
>>>> like trail running and cross-country?
>>>>
>>>> Governance is another challenge. After the bribery scandal surrounding
>>>> the selection of Salt Lake City to host the 2002 Winter Olympics, and
>>>> under
>>>> pressure from Congress, the I.O.C. created an ethics commission to
>>>> monitor
>>>> the bid process — but it reports to the I.O.C.’s executive board, which
>>>> still has the final say.
>>>>
>>>> Other measures worth considering are to streamline committee membership
>>>> and to provide greater representation for the international sports
>>>> federations that administer athletic competitions — though either
>>>> approach
>>>> would continue to pose accountability problems.
>>>>
>>>> In these bleak economic times, the world could use a little athletic
>>>> transcendence. Sadly, the arrogance and aloofness of the organization
>>>> behind the spectacle are all too ordinary.
>>>> **
>>>> Jules
>>>> Boykoff<http://www.pacificu.edu/as/politics/faculty/jules-boykoff.cfm/>,
>>>> an associate professor of political science at Pacific University, is
>>>> writing a book on dissent and the Olympics. Alan
>>>> Tomlinson<http://alantomlinson.typepad.com/> is
>>>> a professor of leisure studies at the University of Brighton.
>>>> ****
>>>> ******
>>>> **
>>>>    MORE IN OPINION (2 OF 19 ARTICLES) Op-Ed Columnist: Doughnuts
>>>> Defeating
>>>> Poverty<http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/05/opinion/doughnuts-defeating-poverty.html?src=un&feedurl=http%3A%2F%2Fjson8.nytimes.com%2Fpages%2Fopinion%2Findex.jsonp>
>>>>
>>>> Read More
>>>> »<http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/05/opinion/doughnuts-defeating-poverty.html?src=un&feedurl=http%3A%2F%2Fjson8.nytimes.com%2Fpages%2Fopinion%2Findex.jsonp>
>>>> Close
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> Alain Berranger, B.Eng, MBA
>>> Member, Board of Directors, CECI,
>>> http://www.ceci.ca<http://www.ceci.ca/en/about-ceci/team/board-of-directors/>
>>> Executive-in-residence, Schulich School of Business,
>>> www.schulich.yorku.ca
>>> Treasurer, Global Knowledge Partnership Foundation,
>>> www.gkpfoundation.org
>>> NA representative, Chasquinet Foundation, www.chasquinet.org
>>> Chair, NPOC, NCSG, ICANN, http://npoc.org/
>>> O:+1 514 484 7824; M:+1 514 704 7824
>>> Skype: alain.berranger
>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>> --
>> ---------------------------------------------------------------
>> Joly MacFie  218 565 9365 Skype:punkcast
>> WWWhatsup NYC - http://wwwhatsup.com
>>  http://pinstand.com - http://punkcast.com
>>  VP (Admin) - ISOC-NY - http://isoc-ny.org
>> --------------------------------------------------------------
>> -
>>
>