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Prestor Jon wrote:

 gorgon wrote:

Prestor Jon wrote:
I'm sure the tv coverage will be great. We'll have great views of Olympic athletes competing in outdoor water venues that are contaminated with raw sewage, hospital waste and strains of super bacteria. The games are always a massive undertaking and rarely ever see all the venues and infrastructure completed on time or without issues but I think making sure that the venues don't pose an active threat to the health of the athletes should be of tantamount importance. It's bad enough that Rio's residents are stuck with badly polluted waters but there's no excuse for asking athletes to compete in them.

Still a lot of hullabaloo for what, rowing and kayak as the affected events? Realistically, those events could be cancelled entirely, and it still wouldn't make the Rio Games a disaster.

I think we have different ideas of disaster. I'm much less concerned with tv ratings and everyone who was going to profit from the games already has their money ( aside from post games endorsements for winning athletes). In my opinion the act of knowingly and needlessly endangering the well being of athletes is an inexcusable disaster. Inviting the world to send their best athletes to compete when the venues aren't even safe is a terrible violation of the principles of the games themselves.

Then those athletes can choose not to go, or attend and take whatever precautions they deem necessary. It's their decision, and there's nothing saying that the OG have to be conducted in pristine environments. In 2008 there was tons of talk over smog levels in Beijing, and that was something theoretically affecting all athletes and spectators. Those games went off as planned, and athletes and spectators chose whether the particulate matter intake was worth it.

http://www.nbcnews.com/video/nightly-news/25874812#25874812
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/olympics/london-2012/5597277/Beijing-Olympics-were-the-most-polluted-games-ever-researchers-say.html
https://consumer.healthday.com/circulatory-system-information-7/blood-pressure-news-70/beijing-s-olympic-smog-shows-pollution-s-effect-on-health-664780.html

IMO, a few months from now we'll all likely have forgotten about Pollution-calypse 2016.

 gorgon wrote:

Prestor Jon wrote:

 gorgon wrote:

Prestor Jon wrote:
I'm sure the tv coverage will be great. We'll have great views of Olympic athletes competing in outdoor water venues that are contaminated with raw sewage, hospital waste and strains of super bacteria. The games are always a massive undertaking and rarely ever see all the venues and infrastructure completed on time or without issues but I think making sure that the venues don't pose an active threat to the health of the athletes should be of tantamount importance. It's bad enough that Rio's residents are stuck with badly polluted waters but there's no excuse for asking athletes to compete in them.

Still a lot of hullabaloo for what, rowing and kayak as the affected events? Realistically, those events could be cancelled entirely, and it still wouldn't make the Rio Games a disaster.

I think we have different ideas of disaster. I'm much less concerned with tv ratings and everyone who was going to profit from the games already has their money ( aside from post games endorsements for winning athletes). In my opinion the act of knowingly and needlessly endangering the well being of athletes is an inexcusable disaster. Inviting the world to send their best athletes to compete when the venues aren't even safe is a terrible violation of the principles of the games themselves.

Then those athletes can choose not to go, or attend and take whatever precautions they deem necessary. It's their decision, and there's nothing saying that the OG have to be conducted in pristine environments. In 2008 there was tons of talk over smog levels in Beijing, and that was something theoretically affecting all athletes and spectators. Those games went off as planned, and athletes and spectators chose whether the particulate matter intake was worth it.

http://www.nbcnews.com/video/nightly-news/25874812#25874812
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/olympics/london-2012/5597277/Beijing-Olympics-were-the-most-polluted-games-ever-researchers-say.html
https://consumer.healthday.com/circulatory-system-information-7/blood-pressure-news-70/beijing-s-olympic-smog-shows-pollution-s-effect-on-health-664780.html

IMO, a few months from now we'll all likely have forgotten about Pollution-calypse 2016.

Obviously the onlympics won't be getting a lot of news coverage after the games are over. I think the smog issue in Beijing was minor compared to asking triathletes to swim through a bay contaminated with raw sewage and hospital waste. Not having filthy venues is a pretty low bar to clear for a host city, at least it should be.

http://www.cnn.com/2016/07/05/americas/rio-de-janeiro-super-bacteria/
http://olympics.cbc.ca/news/article/rio-olympic-sailing-venue-leaves-boats-completely-brown-with-pollution.html
http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2016/03/what-happens-when-theres-sewage-in-the-water/476013/
http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2015/07/30/427693471/testing-by-ap-finds-water-at-2016-olympic-sites-rife-with-human-sewage

 gorgon wrote:
IMO, a few months from now we'll all likely have forgotten about Pollution-calypse 2016.

IMO, Rio has every possibility of setting a new record for the most corrupt, deadliest, filthiest Olypmics ever. It's like they're actually trying.

Prestor Jon wrote:

 gorgon wrote:

Prestor Jon wrote:

 gorgon wrote:

Prestor Jon wrote:
I'm sure the tv coverage will be great. We'll have great views of Olympic athletes competing in outdoor water venues that are contaminated with raw sewage, hospital waste and strains of super bacteria. The games are always a massive undertaking and rarely ever see all the venues and infrastructure completed on time or without issues but I think making sure that the venues don't pose an active threat to the health of the athletes should be of tantamount importance. It's bad enough that Rio's residents are stuck with badly polluted waters but there's no excuse for asking athletes to compete in them.

Still a lot of hullabaloo for what, rowing and kayak as the affected events? Realistically, those events could be cancelled entirely, and it still wouldn't make the Rio Games a disaster.

I think we have different ideas of disaster. I'm much less concerned with tv ratings and everyone who was going to profit from the games already has their money ( aside from post games endorsements for winning athletes). In my opinion the act of knowingly and needlessly endangering the well being of athletes is an inexcusable disaster. Inviting the world to send their best athletes to compete when the venues aren't even safe is a terrible violation of the principles of the games themselves.

Then those athletes can choose not to go, or attend and take whatever precautions they deem necessary. It's their decision, and there's nothing saying that the OG have to be conducted in pristine environments. In 2008 there was tons of talk over smog levels in Beijing, and that was something theoretically affecting all athletes and spectators. Those games went off as planned, and athletes and spectators chose whether the particulate matter intake was worth it.

http://www.nbcnews.com/video/nightly-news/25874812#25874812
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/olympics/london-2012/5597277/Beijing-Olympics-were-the-most-polluted-games-ever-researchers-say.html
https://consumer.healthday.com/circulatory-system-information-7/blood-pressure-news-70/beijing-s-olympic-smog-shows-pollution-s-effect-on-health-664780.html

IMO, a few months from now we'll all likely have forgotten about Pollution-calypse 2016.

Obviously the onlympics won't be getting a lot of news coverage after the games are over. I think the smog issue in Beijing was minor compared to asking triathletes to swim through a bay contaminated with raw sewage and hospital waste. Not having filthy venues is a pretty low bar to clear for a host city, at least it should be.

http://www.cnn.com/2016/07/05/americas/rio-de-janeiro-super-bacteria/
http://olympics.cbc.ca/news/article/rio-olympic-sailing-venue-leaves-boats-completely-brown-with-pollution.html
http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2016/03/what-happens-when-theres-sewage-in-the-water/476013/
http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2015/07/30/427693471/testing-by-ap-finds-water-at-2016-olympic-sites-rife-with-human-sewage

Theres the risk of training, pushing the lmits, yes there is always that risk but there avoidable, they can mitigated and with good coaching and such avoided as much as possible.
Bejing also cut like nearly all its traffic and factories to make the air for the week or two cleaner than normal.

Now Rio, the swimming and yahting area is a SEWER basically... one month will not fix that one, Boats in a trial race came back with brown hulls and a 8-9% illness rate or some kind of bug, article. think daily mail. basically, the beaches and water in any western nation is unfit to swim, beaches unfit.

its a fiasco.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3674239/Oil-turns-white-boats-brown-Rio-Olympic-sailing-venue.html

 Kilkrazy wrote:


Practically every Olympics has new infrastructure built for it.

Sure; but not to the extent we've seen when they're put in "2nd world" countries.

Part of the point of doing it is to stimulate the local economy with building and transport projects.

I'd posit this should be stopped. It has not been successful with the last 3 summer games (including rio)

The current Zika outbreak had not happened when these Olympics were awarded.

Correct; doesn't make it less of a problem.

If Greece could get their economic gak together, I think keeping it there permanently isn't a bad idea.

As it stands, Rio stands a good example why having some sort of infrastructure before hand is necessary. Hell, the greater Cincinnati area is more prepared to host the games.

The problem isn't really with the fact that Brazil got the event, the problem is that these events are awarded many many years before they happen.

The Brazil that got the Olympics was a perfectly fine choice. They had the money, they had the support, they had the infrastructure potential. They had an event that is actually bigger than the Olympics (yes, I know that may be a shocker to all the US folks) and handled the World Cup without any major complications. They also had the same "they will never be ready for the World Cup, stadiums are in horrible shape, crime and terror" stories that we see now and they did fine. So there was nothing wrong with awarding them the Olympics.

Of course Brazil of 2016 is different than Brazil of 2009: different economy, different global events, Zika, etc. You can't predict that a perfectly fine host in 2009 would fall apart in the next 7 years.

That seems fair

 d-usa wrote:
The problem isn't really with the fact that Brazil got the event, the problem is that these events are awarded many many years before they happen.

The Brazil that got the Olympics was a perfectly fine choice. They had the money, they had the support, they had the infrastructure potential. They had an event that is actually bigger than the Olympics (yes, I know that may be a shocker to all the US folks) and handled the World Cup without any major complications. They also had the same "they will never be ready for the World Cup, stadiums are in horrible shape, crime and terror" stories that we see now and they did fine. So there was nothing wrong with awarding them the Olympics.

Of course Brazil of 2016 is different than Brazil of 2009: different economy, different global events, Zika, etc. You can't predict that a perfectly fine host in 2009 would fall apart in the next 7 years.

Immediate disqualification for use of relevant facts and sound reasoning.

Fair.


But its true we are looking at a games where three a real risk of stadiums not finished, and a somewhat less polished event.

Sports risks are one thing but being mugged outside of athlete residences is quite another. If the hosting city can't even ensure basic security on-site, they're going to potentially have real problems later.

http://www.cnn.com/2016/06/21/americas/australian-paralympian-mugged-gunpoint-brazil/

 d-usa wrote:

Of course Brazil of 2016 is different than Brazil of 2009: different economy, different global events, Zika, etc. You can't predict that a perfectly fine host in 2009 would fall apart in the next 7 years.

Brazil has fallen on hard times, sure. But whether it's bad luck or bad management or both, there is no way I would go to Brazil for these Olympics. They "Why is it like this?" isn't as important to me as the "Holy gak, this looks bad!' is right now.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Polonius wrote:
Reading articles about how the host city isn't ready for the Olympics are a quadrennial tradition. It's basically a cliché, although admittedly this is probably the worst it's been.

I recall the hooplah about how the smog in China was so bad they were worried about the athletes' and spectators' health. But I don't recall 1 month out their stadiums being so far behind that they likely weren't going to finish them all, or flesh eating bacteria being round in the swimming/rowing lakes, or mass mugging!

I'll be happy to watch it all go down from home!

China ended up throwing people and tech at their Olympics to make it ready: seeding the clouds and turning off factories to clean up the air and water, sending a small army of people to clean up the beach, etc.

I can't see Rio doing the same.

Also took a good chunk of bejings cars off the road for it to help clean the air up.

They had there faults but they did clean the city up big time for the olympics. They lived up to there promises.

 kronk wrote:
I admit, I will be watching for the schadenfraud, but there is no way would go to this...

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/03/opinion/sunday/brazils-olympic-catastrophe.html?_r=0

1 month out: stadiums with no seats, stadiums with no fields, stadiums with no restrooms or other facilities, toxic waste in the rivers, lakes and ponds, body parts washing up on shore, shootings near venues (gang/ organized crime violence), kidnappings, mass transit not complete, hotels not complete, mass hysteria.


Would you go?

Wait are you talking about Rio, or Chicago/Houston?


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 agnosto wrote:
Sports risks are one thing but being mugged outside of athlete residences is quite another. If the hosting city can't even ensure basic security on-site, they're going to potentially have real problems later.

http://www.cnn.com/2016/06/21/americas/australian-paralympian-mugged-gunpoint-brazil/

Nah, thats just an extra bonus event "the tourist airport to motel gauntlet of death!" They could see seats to the event.

I am so glad that Chicago did not win the 2016 Olympic bid. Traffic sucks ass enough now as it is.

I belive there are bigger issues than Zika..
Take for instance the fact that law enforcement and firefighters don't get paid.
Hospitals have little to no supplies..
I've seen the photos from the airport in Rio with firefighters welcoming the olympians with slogans explaining the chaos that is Rio..

 gorgon wrote:
I can't help but think some of this is us in richer countries looking down our noses at poorer ones trying to put on an Olympic Games.

The title already had me wondering, I was 2-3 posts into the thread before I was pretty much sure of it.

Thread suggestions for "countries with appropriate infrastructure"
- USA
- UK
- Europe

hmmmmmm?

Well I certainly don't want the Olympics in the USA. Its a money pit, and turned into a gigantic revolving scam. Let Greece and Norway have the summer and inter ones respectively if they want. I just don't see why taxpayers should pay out billions for this scam.

 Frazzled wrote:
Well I certainly don't want the Olympics in the USA. Its a money pit, and turned into a gigantic revolving scam. Let Greece and Norway have the summer and inter ones respectively if they want. I just don't see why taxpayers should pay out billions for this scam.

Oh, I agree. And I think it'll be a long time before Greece takes on another OG, unless the economics of the thing can be changed. They spent like $1 billion just on security, mostly to protect Westerners who never came anyway. The math doesn't make sense for a bigger country, let along a really small one like Greece. If a country needs/wants the most expensive PR junket ever (see Sochi, etc.) then I guess you can justify the cost, sorta.

 MarsNZ wrote:

 gorgon wrote:
I can't help but think some of this is us in richer countries looking down our noses at poorer ones trying to put on an Olympic Games.

The title already had me wondering, I was 2-3 posts into the thread before I was pretty much sure of it.

Thread suggestions for "countries with appropriate infrastructure"
- USA
- UK
- Europe

hmmmmmm?

I've seen traffic in Bangkok, yeah some countries really do have better infrastructure than others. Though, the BTS was nice and it still wouldn't have the capacity or ability to move that many people to where they needed to go without massive additional work.

I have read stories about Athletes backing out because of the concerns regarding Brazil. Has any game previously had athletes not show up because the venue was believed to be this unsafe?

Not just the water pollution, the public officials on strike but the fact that Brazil is currently facing a huge outbreak of Zika virus.

SemperMortis wrote:
I have read stories about Athletes backing out because of the concerns regarding Brazil. Has any game previously had athletes not show up because the venue was believed to be this unsafe?

Not just the water pollution, the public officials on strike but the fact that Brazil is currently facing a huge outbreak of Zika virus.

Berlin 1936? Russia boycotted it.

Not Olympics, but lots of people boycotted Indian Commonwealth games due to problems, similar thing.

 MarsNZ wrote:

 gorgon wrote:
I can't help but think some of this is us in richer countries looking down our noses at poorer ones trying to put on an Olympic Games.

The title already had me wondering, I was 2-3 posts into the thread before I was pretty much sure of it.

Thread suggestions for "countries with appropriate infrastructure"
- USA
- UK
- Europe

hmmmmmm?

As I clearly mentioned in my posts, I'm glad Chicago didn't get it as I live here and the traffic would be horrendous. i doubt we could have done anything to fix congestion had Chicago won the bid. IL is broke as a joke, right now.

NOTHING in my post points at Brazil itself being a gak bucket. Instead, I mentioned all of the issues they are having, either from gross mismanagement, poor planning, or funds drying up.

Before calling me out for being from a "rich nation looking down on poor countries", please check yourself. That is not happening in this thread.

Thank you.

I'm really hoping LA doesn't get it. Maybe we can foist it back to Chicago or Dubai or some other idiots.

think most cities in the US have gotten smarter about not wanting to host the Olympics since it costs way much more then you will ever see in returns, as to Brazil, got a very bad feeling about that one, the local police are telling tourists they cannot protect them, a super bug is in the water thanks to spill off from a hospital, the Zika virus is nasty and may cause issues with people returning from Brazil, lets just say its not a good time to go to the Olympics.

Might actually be worth watching the Olympics this year, just to see aquatic sports with turds floating around, or people getting mugged during track & field events.

 MarsNZ wrote:

 gorgon wrote:
I can't help but think some of this is us in richer countries looking down our noses at poorer ones trying to put on an Olympic Games.

The title already had me wondering, I was 2-3 posts into the thread before I was pretty much sure of it.

Thread suggestions for "countries with appropriate infrastructure"
- USA
- UK
- Europe

hmmmmmm?

I listed countries and regions that have previously hosted olympic games and done so successfully without having independent testing done by the Associated Press result in finding raw sewage and other contaminants in water that athletes have to compete in. I'm not setting the bar terribly high by asking host countries to provide clean venues for the athletic events.

who knows maybe Brazil did this intentionally so all other countries would not attend and Brazil would make a clean sweep of the events?

 agnosto wrote:

SemperMortis wrote:
I have read stories about Athletes backing out because of the concerns regarding Brazil. Has any game previously had athletes not show up because the venue was believed to be this unsafe?

Not just the water pollution, the public officials on strike but the fact that Brazil is currently facing a huge outbreak of Zika virus.

Berlin 1936? Russia boycotted it.

True, and the US boycotted the Soviet games in the 80s I think, but those were for political reasons not because the athletes feared for their health and safety.