1,590 kilotons. No, it’s not how much you drink after a night out in the toon, believe it or not. It’s the estimated number of greenhouse gases emitted as a result of the Winter Olympic games hosted in Pyeongchang back in 2018. This sort of thing doesn’t make national headlines as media coverage focuses more on the athletes themselves, their achievements and personal lives. Which, of course, is important but not when the ethics behind the Olympics are so skewed.
Let’s take the 2014 Winter Olympics, hosted in Sochi. They needed to build a completely new infrastructure to host the Olympics which led to the destruction of countless animal migration trails and parts of Sochi national park. These types of incidents often get neglected by the mainstream media and lead to cases of sports-washing with the official Committees. The International Olympic Committee's go-to phrase seems to be 'We focus on the sport not the politics.' It never did quite click for them that the two go hand in hand.
"We cannot forget that human rights abuses don't just disappear once that Olympic torch is set alight."
In the lead up to the 2016 Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, a reported 4,120 families lost their homes and a further 2,486 were threatened with eviction to make room for the new infrastructure. The lack of care for human rights due to the games has long-lasting impact. We cannot forget that human rights abuses don't just disappear once that Olympic torch is set alight.
More and more actions are undertaken to try and limit the ethical and ecological implications of the Olympics. Take the games hosted in Tokyo back in 2021. They made the environment a genuine priority. One way they showed their effort was through carbon offsetting. This was widely reported at the time but we must remember that a portion of the wood in the new stadium came from Indonesia through deforestation.
"One thing that we know for sure is that the Olympics is starting to steer towards the right direction, that direction being green."
These efforts are positive but it does beg the question Why has it taken so long for changes to be made? These ethical and ecological implications have been staring us in the face for years. After all, human rights abuse is nothing new, is it? One thing that we know for sure is that the Olympics is starting to steer towards the right direction, that direction being green.
