Olympians

Unlike a lot of what I write, this is in no way tongue-in-cheek.

A little bit late, but serious.

Mrs. A and I watched a bit of the Tokyo Paralympics these last couple weeks. It was on directly after the news, and we seem to have reached that age where watching the news feels important. The progress of the pandemic and state(s) of emergency directly impact how and where I'll be working, so I like to keep abreast of things, but this post isn't about that.

Fuck the Olympics. The IOC is an utterly corrupt racket that leaves a swath of destruction in the cities it descends upon. It has managed to convince nations and cities that there will be a massive tourism bump that will pay for all the investment they have to make to get the Games, but that bump is all smoke and mirrors, a complete illusion, and the costs of upgrading infrastructure and building facilities far outweigh the amount of money brought in by the spectators, leaving cities with bills that have to be paid down out of taxes for decades.

But this isn't about that either. This is about the Paralympics.

Fuck the Olympians. Goddamn lebensborn mutants with the right genetics for height, proportion, and muscle mass for their sport. Yeah, a celebration of human potential at the bleeding right edge of the bell curve. Whatever.

But the Paralympics, dude...

We watched people people that it should be a felony to allow onto a pool deck zip through the water faster and farther than I ever could. Blind? No problem! Paralyzed legs? No problem! No arms and one incomplete leg? No problem!

Basketball games played on regulation courts, with regulation height hoops, where the players couldn't have topped 4 feet, couldn't jump at all, and still sank perfect shots. 111-95? No, but it was a damn good game with a clear winner anyway.

Beats the fuck out of watching the ball not move in football (either version).

A lady who worked her way from quadriplegic up to paraplegic after the 2005 JR West train derailment competing in archery vs a person without arms using their teeth to pull the bowstring.

The beautiful symmetry of someone lacking legs below the knees using synthetic legs to compete in the long jump.

Bocce. That's an old man's game, right? Watching a dude in a wheelchair with some sort of non-standard hand and arm formation and muscle tremors absolutely do something perfect (I don't know the rules, but the announcers just about shit themselves when he did it) and win a gold.

This is the pinnacle of human athletic achievement. This should be the main event.

Spoiler: Unanswered questions

There are some things I don't completely understand which I'll note without taking the standard asshole "That's not a fucking problem! Why do they get to compete?" attitude.

For example, in the more-sighted categories of vision impairment, the swimmers walked their way, unescorted and detouring around obstacles, to their starting benches. Obviously they have some vision, and that was reflected in their disability class, but how important is good vision to swimming? Without my glasses but wearing non-prescription goggles the world is pretty much a blur when I'm in the pool. I dunno.

The other one that I wondered about was the (and this is the way Japanese TV translated it to English, apologies if the terminology is wrong) athletes with "intellectual disabilities" category. One in particular who stood out was a Japanese swimmer with autism. He found his "thing" in swimming and was able to apply a great deal of focus to becoming a good swimmer. He was interviewed on camera and, had Mrs. A and I not stepped in late, there would have been nothing in his speech or mannerisms to clue us in that he was autistic. He spoke clearly and with assurance, and she informed me that there was nothing in his language usage that set him apart from any other random Japanese athlete. We saw similar people in a couple running events. I'm uncertain at what point in athletics one goes from "disabled" autistic to a merely focused and withdrawn personality.

But my main point stands: The Paralympics were a much better display of achievement than a bunch of goddamn mutant Super(wo)men showing off how perfect they were to keep a bunch of geriatric sports oligarchs in coke and hookers.