IF JERRY SPRINGER HOSTED THE OLYMPICS

No one is watching the Olympics.

It amazes me, because the Olympics have always been a must-see for me. It is full of stories about how the body, mind and spirit can reach new heights and achieve amazing things. The discipline and dedication these athletes possess is not just admirable, it’s inspiring. From injured players working through the pain just to finish to athletes coming from behind to realize their dreams; the Olympics has always held a drama that’s compelled me. Watching the Olympics leaves me wanting to work a little harder myself, push myself to do better, to persevere and to dream big.

Yet ratings for the Olympics are down. No one cares. It’s just so boring, I’ve heard people say. Just like it was last time, others have said. They should do something to make it more exciting, people tell me.

How fucking ridiculous! It’s not like the Olympics happens all the time people! It happens once every four years, the same amount of time it takes us to elect a new president after they manage to screw up the country bad enough no one can fix it. The Olympics is history in the making … the BIG PRIZE. This is the chance for your country to stomp all over other countries. This is the time for you to cheer and to have some American pride (or Canadian pride, for my canuck friends.) It’s a chance for you to appreciate beauty, strength, athleticism and hard work … things that separate us from single-cell amoebas and make ordinary men and women great.

How do you propose we should make the Olympics more exciting? I suppose if we made it a video game, that would make it more entertaining for our ADD society whose thumbs are the only well-honed parts of the body. Or maybe we could make a reality show out of it and put some of the athletes in one apartment for a month and have them vote each other out? Or maybe we could have the Olympics on a deserted island and have wild animals or blood thirsty killers hunt people down? The athlete who can run the fastest and dodge the most bullets while wresting a tiger to the ground would win.

I heard on the radio that the most exciting part of the Olympics was when people crashed and burned. Given that, maybe we should make more of an effort to get people to crash and hurt themselves. For every bone broken athletes would receive one point. Severed limbs would of course be a perfect 10. We could even rename the Olympics the EXTREME Olympics.

<p>Our society has gotten so apathetic towards EVERYTHING. Great and important things are no longer great or important enough to hold our interest anymore. It’s pretty sad when real drama is considered boring because we haven’t Jerry Springered it up enough.

Comments

[cookiebitch]

From Maringuy:

Excellent points - not to mention the compelling stories behind each one of these incredible athletes. We've grown accustomed to the off-field histrionics of our American professional athletes to the point that without a murder trial or allegations of rape, we're just not interested anymore. Sad commentary indeed.

[cookiebitch]

From Joe:

I'd respond but I just can't be bothered.

[cookiebitch]

From dietchilicheesefries:

so true... i'm guilty of the ADD thing, and i hate it... can't imagine kids these days sitting through an episode of Leave It To Beaver or the Brady Bunch, it would bore them to death... can't imagine what its gonna be like in 100 years, nor do i care to be here to find out... ick

[pagmunky]

I think we should combine ice dancing and biathlon. I'm not talking real figure skating, with the jumps and the knee bashing and the pouting, we're talking ice dancing, people. It's like ballroom dancing on ice. How is that a sport? (And yes, I know that ballroom dancing will be a demonstration sport at the next summer games. I'll deal with that one later). Anyway, back to the ice dancing/biathlon. Here's how it would work. While a couple is ice dancing their little hearts out, a cross country skier with a rifle (OK, it can be a pellet gun or a paint ball gun if you insist) would have to ski into the arena, flop down at a shooting station, and pop the couple. Points would be given for multiple hits with one round, and scoring could be on the artistic merit of the chalk body outline. Then, off goes the skier, perhaps to take a shot at one of the aerial skiers as he or she does a triple lindy with a half-gainer onto Jonny Mosely's head.

Just a thought.