2014 Sochi Winter Games: Article Analysis

How someone remembers an event depends on the context in which they witnessed it in. The factors that make up the context are not limited to things like the weather or the emotional state of the spectator; the larger socio-political context also has a part to play. The 2014 Sochi Winter Games are no exception to this theory but a prime example of it. The Sochi games come at least to this author mind as a dud. Yes, women were for the first time allowed to participate in the ski jump, and many Americans got to fulfill their Olympic dream, but the Cold War “magic” was not there. The Western and Russian Media played their part, the United States and Russia are currently opposed in many important international conflicts, but we did not get …show more content…
This article published five days after ESPN’s is not in response to ESPN, but a response to many of the issues it and other Western media bring up. The article is mostly written as an elaboration on comments made by Russia’s President Vladimir Putin. In response to the protest by Western States over Russia’s anti-gay laws President Putin played defense by insinuating that “he was perplexed by the fact that while homosexuality was a criminal offense in 70 countries around the world, Russia, where it was not, there were attempts to give Russia the reputation as the most anti-gay country on the planet,” (RT). President Putin also goes on to reassure the global public that security at the games will be top notch, even if it is more conspicuous then the London Games. He also addresses the issue of corruption and expenses paid for putting on the games. He claims that the corruption was not systemic and the costs were nowhere near as high Western Media was reporting. And while this whole article was a political response to political accusations about and around the games, the head line was a quote from President Putin. It read “I would very much like sports not to be marred by politics,”(RT). And once again politics are being played by elites and being reported on, but this effort to keep the spirit of competition free of politics, the elites reaffirm that they should remain …show more content…
The author Anton Fedyashin wrote that the West needs to get over the Cold War, and move forward. He argues that the Russians spent significant amount of money on the Olympics as part of a larger program to promote athletics and physical fitness across the country. Also, the games were an opportunity to promote the ideal of peace that the Olympic framework is supposed to promote, but the politicization of the games by Westerners who want to hold onto their cold war animosities blew the opportunity. And in the author of this paper’s opinion, the West could have had that full blown Cold War rivalry to the games, if the athletes had been allowed to express their feelings. Instead the elites trumpeted the horns, but turned to the athletes and told them to keep quiet keep their minds on the immediate task at hand. And the result was an Olympic games that was to have the same potential for a magical moment like Lake Placid, but once the torch was lit, we let the animosity go and tried to keep the focus away from the politics. The excitement dies then. We didn’t see massive demonstration, or impassioned athletes feeling that extra motivation, it was just another Olympic Games. And so, the memory that remains, is there was geopolitics playing into the set-up of the games, but we were instructed to look at the events once they began without that context. No