The Empty Games: The Olympics On Life Support

“Toyota won’t be airing any Olympic-themed advertisements on Japanese television during the Tokyo Games despite being one of the IOC’s top corporate sponsors.”

To paraphrase an old line, what if they threw an Olympics and no one showed up? We’re about to get an answer to that question at the end of the week as the Tokyo Olympics open to acres of empty seats. 

In an attempt to quell a Covid scare (remember where Japan was the model for how to handle the virus?) spectators are not being allowed to attend the events. It’s be only athletes, officials and some media watching the Games, which were delayed a year by the virus. Expect the atmosphere of the tomb as Tokyo’s wildly expensive stadium plays host to the Opening Ceremonies Friday. 

In some grim fashion the virus does allow the International Olympic Committee to avoid having to talk about more than just empty seats and disappointed athletes. If this had been a normal Games in 2020 there would have been much discussion about, among many topics,  the future of the wildly expensive event and trans athletes (over 50 percent polled say they shouldn’t compete in Tokyo). 

Put bluntly, the number of cities able to afford the back-breaking cost of staging the Summer Games has dwindled to a few major cosmopolitan cities and to nations run by dictators, sheiks and autocrats. And even those parties have realized that it’s hard to justify ten billion dollars for a swanky party for jocks and sports hangers-on. The cost of this year’s Tokyo Olympics is expected to be between US $ 12 billion and $ 28 billion. Athens in 2004 was estimated at about $ 11 billion. Rio 2016 ended at $ 20 billion. The most expensive Olympic Games to date was the 2014 Sochi Winter Olympics: $55 billion.

Who remains to stroke a cheque for so much with so little assurance of a positive outcome— other than political? Calgary took a deep breath and said No to the 2026 Winter Games— which are about a third the size of a Summer Olympiad. Many nations have joined their citizens in saying “Thanks, but no thanks” to tying your fiscal future to the IOC.

As the Toyota pullback demonstrates the protectors of the five rings are going to have to get creative to keep their brand desirable. Are there too many events? Too many athletes? What about pairing with gambling, as every major sport has now done?

Another issue that might have consumed the Tokyo Games is the issue of allowing trans athletes to compete I women’s sports. The upcoming two weeks will feature trans athletes— a fact that has left many “XX” women seething. While it was easy for unaffected liberals to say “live and let live” it’s another to compete in an unfair competition.  

As we wrote in March, trans athletes spells bad news for your grandma's feminism. “The flaw in this genial acceptance of trans people became obvious in about 30 seconds. In men’s sports, where strength, power, speed are paramount, a trans person identifying as a man faces significant handicaps from having been born and lived as a woman for years. No man was going to be disenfranchised by a trans man. 

But a person who now identifies as a woman can have major advantages if they participate in women’s sports where strength and speed is a deciding factor. Even if they submit to drug regimes and surgery, a skeletal and muscular benefit remains. In sports with huge pay days for women— tennis, golf, some Olympic sports— that can mean traditional women could be shut out of the benefits. 

A cheque for millions might slip out of the reach of those born (and still identifying) as women. Ditto an Olympic gold medal. Or, a scholarship for a high school champion 

Former tennis star Martina Navratilova said it was “insane” and “cheating” to allow transgender women to participate in women’s sports. She was then mobbed by the Left and forced to backtrack her opinion. Indeed, progressive media has (once again) led the cancel crusade, shutting down debate on a subject, forcing women to silence themselves…

Watching this spectacle wth trepidation are legacy feminists, whose entire political raison d’être has been predicated on there being a traditional female gender. The sacred creed of a woman’s right to choose is dependent on their being a distinct definition of a woman. It’s their line in the sand as they seek to uphold Roe v Wade or Canada’s laws governing abortion. 

The current fetish for pretending trans men can menstruate or bear children— previously the sacred domain of women— is an existential challenge to the women who transported radical gender politics from higher education into the public sphere. The blurring of this line on trans— adopted by the same liberals who once supported them in establishing feminist laws— leaves formerly favoured women as just one of myriad grievance groups now being accepted by government and (gasp) corporate friends.  

There is no room on the modern gender bandwagon for Old Think. So get with Team Victim. So far, most stars of 1970s and 80s feminism have been mute on this bind, torn between their loyalty to old friends in The Progressive Movement and their fear of being  declared non-persons if they point out the obvious flaw in the present gender deconstruction. “

So enjoy stronger/ higher/ faster/ more liberal the next two weeks. You’re probably witnessing the end of the Games as we knew them and the birth of something that takes marching orders from Woke politicians. Pro tip: You won’t like it.

Bruce Dowbiggin @dowbboy is the editor of Not The Public Broadcaster (http://www.notthepublicbroadcaster.com). The best-selling author of Cap In Hand is also a regular contributor to Sirius XM Canada Talks Ch. 167. A two-time winner of the Gemini Award as Canada's top television sports broadcaster, his new book Personal Account with Tony Comper is now available on http://brucedowbigginbooks.ca/book-personalaccount.aspx