Will be. But beyond the positions, the sentences, the necessary sockets of distance From the atrocities of wars, of deaths, children killed remains, as always happens when a country is “excluded” by sport, a great sense of bitterness, as if an opportunity was lost, as if a last glimpse was closed, as if hope was lost. They all lose in these cases. He loses the sport he cannot pacify because he cannot call himself out of conflicts, hatred, history. He loses the policy that renounces the oldest mediation tool between peoples, forgive federations, athletes.
It can be discussed indefinitely on the meaning of the symbols, If they have value or if it would be more effective or more right to make the Israelis (but also the Russians) participate or exclude competitions, competitions, worlds, games … certainly yes but the symbolism of sport has a high value that is not only form but also substance and each act or action is an act of politics. With sport, another policy is made and in a certain sense another war is also. Athletes are a symbol for what they do and, for better or for worse, they are brought for example and emulated. The fascist regimes in Italy and Germany presented them as warriors of the nation. Sports companies were a symbol in the years of the Cold War, “challenges” between capitalist and communist systems. The challenge of Ping Pong between the USA and China preceding the historical visit of President Richard Nixon to Beijing was a symbol. The fists raised with the black gloves of American sprinters Tommie Smith and John Carlos were a symbol of the fight against racism on the podium of the Mexico City Olympics in 1968. And it could be continued.
Sport in history has often been used by rulers and dictators as a tool for celebrating power, Of the strength and the alleged military and not only military superiority and Pierre de Coubertin himself, founder of the modern Olympics, considered him as a means of promoting military discipline in French youth. They were Iran-USA political challenges at the World Cup in France 1998 and that between Argentina and England in June 1986, at the Aztec stadium of Mexico City that regulated the accounts after the English blitz at the Malvinas. Eun’s absolute political symbol is Diego Maradona’s goal: “The hand de dios”.
Sport and politics are intertwined, clash, face but follow common destinies which often open new paths, open perspectives, “pacify”. As George Orwell in