Friday, February 19, 2010

U.S. Beats Germany in Men's Figure Skating at Vancouver 2010 Olympics

In spite of my colleagues here not being too enthused about the Olympics, I find myself cheering the latest news that America has beaten the Germans in Men's figure skating, frankly, not one of my favourite spectator sports.

Here's a video of us cleaning German glocks gesundheit!

7 comments:

Dag said...

We figure-skated them to death. How great we are! I love the Olympics.

truepeers said...

But yesterday it was the Russian who went down to the mighty U.S.A. Of course there was a time, not too long ago, when a lot of Germans were Russians; maybe we'll see it again.

truepeers said...

I love the Olympics more than you do!!

Dag said...

Uh, yeah, I suspect you do love the Olympics more than I do. I wonder if me confusing a Russian 1930s Eisenstien movie with Olympic skating might have given me away. I didn't think anyone would notice the German figure skaters were on horseback. Damn. Foiled again. But I'll be back, and more sneaky next time.

truepeers said...

Come on Dag, go for the crowd gold, you do love the Olympics more...

Dag said...

I am completely happy that Vancouver is host to the Winter Olympics this year. I think people here are very lucky to have this chance to showcase this city and its culture and-- its greatest asset-- the sheer beauty of this city on those rare sunny days. Vancouver is a beautiful city that I'm sure most people would love to visit, had they a reason, and the Olympics gives one. A good reason, too, to come to this city to see some of the world's finest athletes in action.

I like the idea of the Olympics to start with: it's a world competition in which only the very few and unlucky are hurt or killed, an that's a matter for mourning. People from all nations can celebrate Human excellence in sport, and they can cheer for the home contender while feeling some awe in the triumph of the actual winner, a person who is better at his game than all others. hat a great thing to see the best person at his best winning.

More than that, the competitors need n audience to really achieve greatness. No athlete can do his best without the crowd cheering him on. That cheering and personal involvement in the competitor fills the competitor and pushes him further than he can go on his own, no matter how well-trained he might still be. It's the audience that makes the difference. It's the man in the stands who gives the competitor a spirit to win. That makes us all part of something great, even if we sit like slugs cheering at a television. We get to do that cheering, to be part of a winning greatness by cheering the Olympic athletes.

In this beautiful city we get to encourage greatness and be part of it. I love it.

I hope to post some footage of other sports in coming days. Yes, I'm a partisan and usually cheer loudest for the old home-team. I'll closely watch the coverage and see what is worthy of inclusion in our blog, something excellent and beautiful. And I'm sure there will be something. I'm excited.

truepeers said...

The Olympics is an event whose greatness or lack is not something pre-ordained. Taking up the challenge, there is obviously a great desire in this city to share in a transcendent moment and that is nothing to take lightly. But how many can articulate something transcendent as well as Dag just did? If I have a gripe it's along these lines - the banality of our representations and our media elites and the refusal to talk serously about why we have to burn a billion dollars in "security".

It seems to me that what is spontaneously happening with the crowds is at once a "not so fast" to all the elites of the postmodern intelligentsia whose project has been cyncical deconstruction of every possible form of shared transcendence; and yet this moment does not so much substitute for nihilism any new age central figure, but simply insists on a shared presence before a God no one needs to define (but how long can this moment be sustained without acknowledgment that it does depend on certain understandings of the divine, and not others?)

How far can that worship of a shared presence take us? Will it collapse quickly into the banal - "I love the Olympics more" - or will it foster a continuing sense of shared Being that will allow future moments and figures around which we can rally in defense of the greatness that only freedom can foster, with all due deference to the limited accomplishments of the former soul-destroying East German weightlifing program.