Does anyone think that the paralympics has anything whatsoever to do with the real olympics? Sure these guys train, and have fun, but the purpose of the paralympics is to give the handicapped some goals and to encourage physical activities. The scope of differences in degree of handicap makes the results of any contest meaningless. A totally blind individual competing against one who is only legally blind are not at all comperable. Differences in paralysis level makes huge differences in how much residual function exists. And anyone who thinks the participants of the paralympics practice 1/10 what Olympic athletes do is deluding themselves. So basically some want to take a very worthwhile endeavor and fund it equally to a totally different situation. What a bunch of jerks.
[quote]
Hollonbeck said the United States has fallen from first in Paralympic medals to sixth, trailing smaller countries like Canada. **
From the article linked above.
For some reason, this amused me NO END. Of course, the fact that Canada’s the second largest country (and, as the song goes, “and if Russia keeps on shirnking, then soon we’ll be first… as long as we keep Quebec!”)
Have you ever been to the Paralympics? If so you’d know that your idea of giving people goals and encouraging physical activities is complete bull. These athletes are in amazing shape and can kick butt. I have several friends who compete in X-C and downhill skiing, and they certainly are completely serious about the competition.
There are many classes of disability to keep the competition meaningful and fair. If you had any concept of how hard and long these athletes train you’d realize how boneheaded your OP was. Have you ever met any Paralympians or are you just spewing ignorant drivel?
How on earth could you come out with filth like that? Oh excuse me I know the answer to that.
My wife and I have been active funder’s for the CT Para Olympics for many years. Those people have a goal an attainable one at that. To finish. This gives them the chance to do just that. To finish and gain a sense of accomplishment the outside world (Especially People Like you Obviously) never want to give them.
You appear to me the kind of person who would rather look away when someone with a disablility comes by. Never would you lower yourself to give one of these participants the time of day I bet, especially if they had trouble asking for it, huh? Your Op speaks for your itself. Asshole. Can you get anymore ignorant ?
I refuse to watch coverage of the Olympics because I know how many of these athletes live through the relatively huge royalties they get through advertising (figure skating, anyone? Gymnastics? Hockey? So long as it’s a sport that sells well, and they place well, they’ll get the money. Ask Michelle Kwan. Elvis Stojko)… and then I think of the Para athletes, who don’t even GET TO PARTICIPATE in the opening/closing ceremonies… who are kind of treated like “second rate citizens” of the olympic world, and it pisses me off no end. How come THEY don’t get the coverage? Huh?
Because there’s no money to be made off them there cripples, that’s why. They are treated like “human interest stories”, at best. Chicken soup for the Mysery Vampire’s soul. (with apologies to Riley O’Riley a nd the friends at Maimed Manor, thanks to John Callahan)
I’m sick of people thinking of the Para athletes and their sport as “cute” and somehow below par. Go see a wheelchair race, sometime - or better yet - go see a 100m dash with some athletes who have a prosthetic leg. They can produce times that are damned close to the “real” (!)(?!) athletes you admire in the “real” olymics.
So the paralympics are just a way to make disabled people feel good about themselves? It’s not in any comparable to the “real” olympics? Fuck you. These athletes train hard and long. They’re not just a bunch of disabled people from off the street who’re looking for goals to make their miserable lives worthwhile. They’re athletes who can’t compete in the regular olympics due to physical disadvantages and who are into sports and competitions. It’s not just a bit of fun, it’s serious training and sports. It’s also a serious time and money investment.
The degree of differences in their abilities makes the contest meaningless? Bullshit. How does a blind person running against a partially sighted person make any real difference? The best runner wins, and the best runner will be the one who has trained the hardest and has the most talent. Just the same as the olympics.
The paralympics are every bit as valid as the olympics.
No. Para-Olympians set goals, train, train some more, then a little more and they are constently trying to attain those goals. Getting to the para olympics is the first hurdle and for a people who have more hurdles to over come than most without disabilities that is a feat in itself! In my eyes nothing they do is meaningless. It all has meaning even if the meaning is just being somewhere where the people there are there to see you. As I said my wife and I have been active funders for the CT group that goes to the Para-Olymics for a long time. Please don’t drag me into a mud throwing contest when it comes to how meaningful the para-olympics are to those who participate. It would be fruitless on your part if you believe the games are meaningless now. Sad too.
I never said nor meant to imply that the training that goes into competing, or the attainment of personal goals was meaningless to those who participate. What I said was that since the degree of physical disability varies within the same contest it is not likely that the most skilled or hardest working athlete will win, rather that will go to a the contestant with the best combination of training, effort, and disability. Although it is only a guess, I would imagine it impossible for someone with bilateral BK amputations to win a footrace with someone with a single limb missing. The differences in abilities for those with Trisomy 21 are hugely different. A T-3 paralegic would have little chance against a T-12 no matter how hard they work, and I am sure that the groupings are not that well defined. I was friends with a woman who went to the Atlanta para-olympics and made it to the semi-finals. She did train hard, but her hard training was probably a warm-up for those that made it to the semi’s in the same events two weeks before.
And of course I am an ass. I never met anyone who was not an asshole. But I don’t think my OP defined me as one.
I take matter’s of this nature very seriously. Both my wife and I are hard line advocates for those who do not get the things they deserve. Be it a chance to go to the para-olympics or proper care in an institution. Thank you daurbach for your clarifications. I rescind my calling you an Asshole.
Tho I do not agree everyone is an asshole, I will agree that everyone has the capacity to be one.
I think some people (not necessarily people posting here, but people I have talked to before) get confused between the Paralympics and the Special Olympics.
Sure, in the Special Olympics, the only goal is to participate. Everyone gets a ribbon for finishing, etc…
The Paralympics are completely different. They are like the Olympics. These athletes train long and hard, and often their results are not far off from those in the “real” Olympics. Paralympic athletes are elite athletes, not just people who are trying to get in shape and have fun.
Also, dauerbach, when you say things like the following, it makes it hard for me to take your opinion seriously.
This shows that you really aren’t that well versed on the subject. I am a physical education students (although I don’t plan on being a teacher, I’m more into the sports medicine/kinesiology/research aspects), and I have taken numerous courses that have discussed the Paralympic movement, including their medical classification schemes. I won’t reproduce it all here, but go to www.paralympic.org for more information.
On that website, go to the “Sports” drop-down menu and pick “Classification”. It goes into great detail. And yes, there is a HUGE difference between a T3 and a T12 quadriplegic. There is no way they would be competing against each other. For example, for athletes with spinal cord lesions, there are three classifications just to distinguish between thoracic-level lesions:
In recent years there’s been a movement away from classifying athletes based on their exact injuries (strict medical model) towards classification based on functional abilities. However, this does not mean that an athlete with a single lower leg amputation would have to run against a double below-the-knee amputee (to use another one of dauerbach’s examples.
I stand chastised. First, I had no idea the para olympics WAS so specifically delineated. Second, I had lumped the Special Olympics with the Para Olympics together. I will shut up now and request no new thread be started on assholes who rant about things they think they know about but really don’t.
And interestingly, when I googled Para-olympics before my OP I did not get the official para olympic web site on either of the first two pages, but rather sites that went into both the special olympics and para olympics.
No problem, dauerbach, and thinking about my post a little while after I submitted it, I may have come off as somewhat condescending or snooty. That wasn’t my intention.
And don’t worry about the misunderstanding - “fighting ignorance” and all that. I think the Special Olympics/Paralympics confusion is quite widespread actually.
Also, if you google as “paralympics” instead of “para olympics” or “para-olympics”, the first hit is for the official website. I think it’s kind of confusing though, because “paralympics” is a wierd word and it always looks “wrong” somehow. It never looks like it’s spelled right.