Todd: IOC gets gold medal for cowardice in barring Ukrainian athlete
It was an epic fail on an epic stage.
Given an opportunity to display its humanity, to humbly acknowledge the horror show that is going on in Ukraine as we speak, to remind the world there is a reason Russia and Belarus are barred from the Milano Cortina Olympics, the International Olympic Committee crashed like Lindsey Vonn, but with a more enduring effect on the Olympic movement.
Vladyslav Heraskevych, a skeleton athlete from Ukraine, might have hurtled headfirst down an icy course on his sled unnoticed if not for the tone-deaf reaction of the IOC to his helmet. That helmet bore the images of athletes and coaches (some of whom Heraskevych knew personally) killed in the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
A simple, touching remembrance. A very mild reaction, given that Russia is even now murdering Ukrainians and creating a humanitarian crisis by knocking out power stations and leaving the residents of Kyiv to freeze in the dark in the midst of winter.
The wise course would have been to leave it alone. Instead, the IOC came lurching in with all the wit and finesse of a drunk on a four-day bender and barred Heraskevych from the Winter Olympics for a supposed political act. It was, initially, a complete ban. The Ukrainian athlete (a genuine medal contender) was forced to surrender his credential and barred even from remaining on hand to support his teammates.
Heraskevych took his appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport and the IOC on Thursday relented, to the extent that it reinstated his credential so that he can cheer from the sidelines — but the damage done is already incalculable.
As the first test of newly minted IOC president Kirsty Coventry’s ability to make decisions on the spot while the Games are in progress, it was enormously discouraging. To her credit, Coventry met with Heraskevych, but she still met the moment with all the cowardice of her mentor, former IOC president Thomas Bach.
“Sport shouldn’t mean amnesia,” Ukraine president Volodymyr Zelenskyy said in condemning the decision, “and the Olympic movement should help stop wars, not play into the hands of aggressors.”
There is no graceful way for Coventry to extricate herself from this mess. Try as it might, the IOC cannot bar politics. It will always be part of the Olympic Games. It’s in every garish stars-and-stripes outfit worn by American fans with their obnoxious chants of “U-S-A! U-S-A!” and in the absence of the Russians. It’s in every list of medals by nation and the anthems played at medal ceremonies, reminders of the virulent nationalism that divides us all.
Should Canada and the U.S. meet for the gold in men’s hockey (a collision that is far from inevitable) it will be another proxy war, akin to the 4 Nations Face-Off at which Canada prevailed, but on a far bigger stage, with more at stake.
With Canada under constant and erratic threats emanating from the White House, with “elbows up” on the Canadian side and with the Tkachuk brothers sharing a brain for the Americans, any such meeting has the potential to turn ugly — in the arena if not on the ice.
American GM Bill Guerin gave a clear indication of how he wants such a game to go when he
disdained young Canadiens stars Lane Hutson and Cole Caufield
because they don’t bring the thug dimension, even though both are ideally suited to the 3-on-3 overtime that could decide a gold-medal game.
Canadians Connor McDavid, Nathan MacKinnon, Nick Suzuki and (especially) Sidney Crosby can be counted on to cool things if they get heated — but what if Brady Tkachuk crashes into goalie Jordan Binnington, who isn’t exactly known for his even temper? What then?
How is Coventry going to patrol that game, if it happens? Will she ban the “U-S-A!” chants and have the perpetrators escorted from the building? Of course not. As always, it’s not whether a particular act is political, but who is responsible for that political act.
Heraskevych, as one lone athlete, has an economic impact on the Olympic Games that is virtually nil. NBC alone, meanwhile, has a US$7.75-billion broadcast contract with the IOC that runs through the Brisbane Games in 2032.
Like it or not, the real world does not go away. Those who shriek “keep politics out of it” are usually first in line when it comes to rolling out a flag the size of a football field and getting all teary-eyed over yet another display of military might during the anthem.
Heraskevych introduced a notion into the debate that clearly makes the IOC uncomfortable: the concept of right and wrong. An unprovoked invasion of your neighbour is wrong. Slaughtering civilians is wrong. Destroying civilian infrastructure is wrong. Targeting schools and hospitals is wrong.
Opposing all that is right, a fact the IOC itself explicitly recognizes through the bans on Russia and Belarus. Yet when it came to showing the courage to support one Ukrainian athlete in his lone quest to remember a handful of the dead, the IOC failed Ukraine — and the world.
