Washes Whiter Than...

The term 'sports washing' is rather new,
it was first coined less than ten years ago
by Amnesty International to describe
the repression that was covered up
by the 2015 European Games
put on in Baku in Azerbaijan,
a former Soviet Socialist Republic.

If there had been an award
for levels of political repression
then as host country
Azerbaijan would have won that too,
though they would have to fight
The Russian Empire for that medal.

If the dead could be resurrected
then they would have got Adolph Hitler,
the earliest known sports washer, to make the presentation.

Smiling Men With Bad Reputations

I don't know what it takes 
to like sport as entertainment,
any more than I know
how to enjoy being competitive.

No sporting activity
I was ever enrolled to lose in
ever involved mentoring.

I have no idea how it feels
to feel supported as you compete,
and regardless of the result,
simply 'keep in the game'.

I see sports speculation and news
as public relations exercises,
where a win by a given side
props up the status quo,
a loss represents instability,
possible insecurity and change;
whatever happens the speculators
continue with their speculations. 

From the 1936 Olympics onward,
states with democratic deficits
have enjoyed staging public sports events;
they are cheap way of improving
their reputations whilst avoiding
doing anything to address
why they got the bad rep in the first place.   

After The Last Financial Crisis

we found out that firms beyond a certain age
who 'don't adapt with the markets' sow the seeds
of their own demise-death by dinasaurism-
usually when approaching their centenary.
Are The World Cup and The Olympics
now ageing very badly? For more than a decade
they seem to me to have been poorly led,
by 1-their sponsors, the creators of the worlds
least healthy snacks and drinks, who collectively
are responsible for mass obesity in western society.
2-the television companies who are always trying
new gimmicks to report on the action and give us
the results, with the human element provided for
by an off putting partisan vigour, and finally...
3-the international construction industry,
who rely on third world labour to build the stadia
for these occasions.

 All of the above account for a far bigger effort
than those who merely play the games.
Who would have thought that in a sports event
the smallest amount of money for the occasion
was required to be invested in the actual competitors?