The Olympics Prove It’s Impossible To Keep Politics Out of Sports

If you can’t escape sexism, rape culture, and racism in the real world, you can’t escape it in sports either.

Photo by Peter Robbins on Unsplash

The 2024 Olympics saw a huge jump in popularity with 34 million viewers, up 79% from the 2021 Tokyo Olympics. With fun storylines like Pommel Horse Guy and the Turkish shooter casually getting silver, it was a great time to see the world’s most elite athletes compete.

But while we saw the best of people, we also saw the worst of them. While it’s easy to ignore these as isolated events, what happened on the world stage is actually just a microcosm of the larger world in general.

All Women Are Real Women

Angela Carini and Imane Khelif were competing in boxing when after just 46 seconds, Carini cried and gave up. She stated that she’s “never been hit with such a powerful punch”. This brought out far-right extremists who claimed that Khelif was a man.

• J.K. Rowling said: “A young female boxer has just had everything she’s worked and trained for snatched away because you allowed a male to get in the ring with her.”
• Donald Trump said: “I WILL KEEP MEN OUT OF WOMEN’S SPORTS”.
• Riley Gaines said, with Elon Musk retweeting: “Men don’t belong in women’s sports #IStandWithAngelaCarini”.

But Khelif is not a man and has never been a man. She was born female, grew up as a female, competed as a female, and has had female on her passport her whole life. Funnily enough, her dad actually discouraged her from boxing when she was younger because he didn’t believe girls should be boxing.

And she’s not transgender either. She, her family, the Algerian Olympic Committee, and the International Olympic Committee (IOC) have all condemned these allegations and said that she is simply a woman. And it’s also important to note that Khelif is from Algeria, a country that is known to be anti-LGBT. They have no discrimination protections, banned gender-affirming care, and made it illegal to transition. They certainly wouldn’t send a trans athlete to represent them either.

IOC president Thomas Bach was firm that Khelif is unquestionably a female and that the media targeting has been unwarranted, harmful, and more importantly, false:

“This is not a question of inclusion, this has never played a role in all this, this is a question of justice: women must be allowed to take part in women’s competitions.”

“We will not take part in a sometimes politically-motivated, cultural war. Allow me to say that what is going on in this context in social media with all this hate speech, with this aggression and abuse fuelled by this agenda is totally unacceptable.

Critics point to the fact that Khelif supposedly failed an unspecified gender test in 2023 IBA Championship. But suspiciously there were never issues about her gender until she beat Azalia Amineva, a previously unbeaten Russian athlete. After she won, the Russian-led IBA suddenly disqualified her and claimed that she and another boxer “failed to meet the required necessary eligibility criteria and were found to have competitive advantages over other female competitors.” This then restored Amineva’s unbeaten record.

Furthermore, the IBA itself has been permanently banned from the Olympics because of corruption around match-fixing with judges and referees, governance issues, and lack of financial transparency. To make matters even more complicated, the IBA also said they would award $50,000 to Angela Carini, her federation $25,000, and her coach $25,000.

Even when asked basic follow-up questions about the tests, the IBA keeps sharing contradictory information. IBA chief executive Chris Roberts said they did chromosome tests. But IBA president Umar Kremlev kept emphasizing that they did testosterone tests instead, saying the tests “show that they have a high level of testosterone. Like men. They have men’s level of testosterone”. Yet this even goes directly against the official IBA statement, which said that “the athletes did not undergo a testosterone examination” and underwent a “separate and recognized test, whereby the specifics remain confidential.”

So which is it?

Then the IBA said it sent the tests to 2 different labs that were accredited by the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA). But WADA responded that it doesn’t even oversee gender tests.

IOC Spokesman Mark Adams summed up the entire inconsistency and said:

“The whole process is flawed. From the conception of the test, to how the test was shared with us, to how the tests have become public, is so flawed that it’s impossible to engage with it.”

To this day, the IBA still has shown no evidence to back up their claims at all.

Remember, this blew up because:

An athlete was hit hard.
In a boxing match.
At the Olympics.

Notice how there were never any complaints about Khelif being a man when she was losing her matches.

Carini herself stated: “Actually, I want to apologize to her and everyone else. I was angry because my Olympics had gone up in smoke. I don’t have anything against Khelif. Actually, if I were to meet her again I would embrace her.”

Logan Paul, after a Twitter tirade calling Khelif a man and her win as the “purest form of evil” to his 6.8 million followers, also admitted: “OOPSIES! I might be guilty of spreading misinformation along with the entirety of this app”.

Still, the damage has been done, and this keeps spreading. While many people say that this is an effort to protect women in sports, we can see that this is actually harming women in sports.

Khelif and her family have suffered a lot of emotional distress as a result of this, especially during the critical time that she’s competing for one of the biggest competitions of her life. Unfortunately, the quickest insult for a successful female athlete is to criticize her appearance and diminish her abilities by calling her a “man”:

• Serena Williams, one of the greatest tennis players of all time, was frequently accused of being a man and said: “People would say I was born a guy, all because of my arms, or because I’m strong. I was different to Venus: She was thin and tall and beautiful, and I am strong and muscular — and beautiful, but, you know, it was just totally different.”
• Ilona Maher, who just won the first US medal for rugby in the Olympics, said: “I get comments being called a man and being called masculine and asking if I’m on steroids. There will always be negative peopel out there. And they put women in a box. And they think women should be fragile and petite and quiet and meek. But that’s not the case.”
• Katie Ledecky, the most decorated female American Olympian, often faced rumors that she was a biological male and said: “We’re often told we’re too masculine, too aggressive.”

These attacks on Khelif at the Olympics represent a larger issue that if you don’t fit the traditional image of a feminine woman, you can be easily targeted. If your muscles are too big, your voice too deep, your hair too short, your cheekbones too strong, your jawline too wide — you will have to prove you’re a woman and keep proving it with more and more invasive testing. But it should be obvious that women can be strong and muscular, especially athletic women, and that doesn’t make them a male. The truth is there is no “right” way to look like a woman. We know women can all look differently and that should be celebrated, not vilified. It’s important that we support ALL women, not just women who look a certain way.

Rape Culture Permeates Up To The Top

Despite the Olympics being a chance for a country’s best to represent them on the world stage, the Dutch Olympic team sent a convicted child rapist to compete in beach volleyball.

Steven van de Velde pled guilty to 3 counts of rape of a 12 year old girl in 2016 when he was 19. He admitted to knowing her age when he travelled to Britain to see her and was sentenced to 4 years in prison. He served 1 year in Britain before being transferred back to the Netherlands, where he was released after just one month and even competed for the Netherlands in the same year.

Yet his crimes did not prevent him from competing in the Olympics. The Dutch Olympic Committee continued to defend their inclusion of him, saying he met all the requirements.

Even worse, they were actively protecting him: he is not staying in the Olympic Village with the other athletes, and he is not required to speak to the media. When asked if they were protecting a convicted child rapist, Dutch team spokesman John van Vliet said:

“We are protecting a convicted child rapist to do his sport as best as possible and for a tournament which he qualified for.”

Yes, he really said that. This sends a horrifying message that rape is an excusable crime as long as you are a good athlete.

Despite serving just 13 months of a 4 year sentence, still others believe that he has a right to be able to move on.

• IOC Spokesman Mark Adams said: “Not to excuse it in any way but this took place, I think, 10 years ago and I think, as a general rule I think we need to allow for the possibility of rehabilitation”.
• One fan said: “I think he has had his penalty, so now he can start with a clean sheet.”
• His teammate Matthew Immers said: “What is in the past is in the past”.

But while it’s clear that the people who support him believe he should be allowed to continue living life as if he didn’t commit a terrible crime, it’s important to remember that victims do not have that privilege.

According to RAINN, the nation’s largest anti-sexual violence organization, victims continue to suffer long after the initial rape:

• 94% of women who are raped experience symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) during the two weeks following the rape.
• 33% of women who are raped contemplate suicide
• 38% of victims of sexual violence experience work or school problems, which can include significant problems with a boss, coworker, or peer.

Victims cannot move on with their lives so easily — perpetrators shouldn’t be able to either.

Although it seems astonishing that committing such a horrific crime doesn’t disqualify people from representing their country and competing in something as prestigious as the Olympics, this discrepancy is seen outside of sports as well. When running for president, there were multiple instances of Donald Trump showing his own lack of concern for consent, like him privately talking about how he uses his power as a famous man:

“I’m automatically attracted to beautiful — I just start kissing them. It’s like a magnet. Just kiss. I don’t even wait. When you’re a star, they let you do it. You can do anything. Grab ’em by the pussy. You can do anything.”

Or even when he was publicly talking about how he uses his power as an owner:

“I’ll go backstage before a show and everyone’s getting dressed and ready and everything else. And you know, no men are anywhere. And I’m allowed to go in because I’m the owner of the pageant. And therefore, I’m inspecting it. You know I’m inspecting it. I want to make sure everything is good. You know they’re standing there with no clothes. Is everybody OK? And you see these incredible looking women. And so I sort of get away with things like that.”

Trump continued to openly admit and defend sexual assault and harassment, and that didn’t prevent him from running for president. What’s worse is that it didn’t prevent him from winning it either.

Despite fear of false accusations ruining people’s lives, both Van de Velde and Trump have shown that true statements don’t actually do that much either. No wonder 63% of sexual assaults are not reported to the police. Seeing abusers continue to not be held accountable makes it even less likely for other victims to speak up, especially when victims face increased scrutiny and criticism from people who do not believe them.

While you’d normally expect people at the highest levels of anything — sports or public office — to have to adhere to higher standards, Van de Velde and Trump have shown that people in positions of power don’t. In fact, they don’t even have to meet normal standards.

The Olympics demonstrated this current horrifying normalization of rape culture, and society’s urge to defend and protect perpetrators when we should be defending and protecting victims instead. If we want to actually prevent these crimes from happening, the very least we can do is to enforce it at the top too.

Speaking Up About Racism Doesn’t Cause Racism

When Simone Biles won her second individual all-around gold medal, she tweeted: “I love my black job”. This was in reference to Donald Trump’s comment that undocumented immigrants were taking “Black jobs”:

“They’re taking Black jobs now and it could be 18, it could be 19 and even 20 million people. They’re taking Black jobs, and they’re taking Hispanic jobs, and you haven’t seen it yet, but you’re going to see something that’s going to be the worst in our history.”

After his comments, many were left wondering what a “Black job” was, with Marco Rubio talking about how it’s lower wage work: “When you flood a country with millions of people, you’re going to have more competition for work. You are. And those workers are willing to do it at a lower wage.”

But people criticized Simone Biles for responding to that:

• One person tweeted: “With so many Americans, Republicans and Democrats, supporting you and cheering for you Simone Biles, why say something divisive?”
• Someone else tweeted: “Another brainwashed athlete/celebrity giving the middle finger to 50% of their fanbase. Brilliant!”
• Another person tweeted: “Stay out of political rhetoric. I’ve supported you but that’s about to end. Keep your gymnastics mouth focused on the sport.”

People always say to “keep politics out of sports”, but the truth is you can’t: sports were never neutral. The people who compete in it, watch it, and make decisions about it all bring their outside biases INTO the sports world, as we saw with the attacks on Khelif and the inclusion of Van de Velde. Even when athletes don’t say anything, it impacts them anyway.

So when athletes speak DO respond to issues, it doesn’t spark division: it reveals it. And choosing not to talk about it doesn’t make it go away either. While many fans don’t want to be reminded of the real state of the world when they’re watching sports, others aren’t lucky enough to be able to just turn off the TV and avoid it. It impacts them everyday.

Even athletes themselves like Lebron James are still subject to racism, as seen when his home was vandalized with someone spray-painting the N-word on his gate. Yet when he talked about that and his experience as a Black man in America, he was told to “shut up and dribble”.

Instead of telling people not to talk about it, we actually have to improve it. After all, what happens at the Olympics (and sports in general) is not a vacuum from the real world — it’s a reflection of it.