Iranian Refuses to Judo with Israeli

Hey everyone,
I’m sure most of you who follow the Olympics would have noticed the news about an Iranian judo-ist who refused to spar against an Israeli because of his nationality. There are a lot of sources: http://news.google.com/news?hl=en&edition=us&ie=ascii&q=iranian%2C+olympics

Do you all think the Iranian athelete was right in his choice?


My view

No - I think the purpose of the Olympics is for nations to go beyond petty politics. If you didn’t want to share the stage with someone you disagree with, just don’t show up to the Olympics. I think the US did that in the 1980 (right?) Olympics that were in Moscow.

With that said, if the Iranian athlete was forced to snub the Israeli athelete by the Iranian gov’t, I can’t help but feel sorry for him (him = Iranian athlete). Iran isn’t one of those countries where you can openly snub the gov’t and expect to not pay for it.

:kommie:

I agree with kirupa, I mean, the whole point of the olympics is for an international and friendly competition. When you become an olympian, you drop your prejudices and whatever else you hold against someone, and you compete. He shouldn’t have come if he was so immature as to not interact with someone for his differences.

Hmmm…I’m starting to think that Kirupa and I share similar views on things…I seem to be agreeing with him more than contradicting him.

I also feel that way. The Olympics is about good old fashioned competition, where athletes from around the world come to compete for medals. Politics play no place in it.

It’s a shame. The countries in the most need of a good snubbing crack down on it. Whats the world coming to?

[ot] My air conditioner is making loud popping noise, though i don’t see any sparks. Doesn’t sound good…[/ot]

I’m palestinian myself, but I don’t exactly appreciate what he did. It’s sad this had to happen, and not at any competetion, but the Olympics, as, to me, they’re all about harmony and nations getting along with each other. Oh well, whatever floats his boat…

Well I’m Iranian but I don’t think that gives me any more or less validity here. Unfortunately it’s an international event which regardless of peoples hopes and wishes will be used as a political stage. I mean every country has a medals count… We’re all just trying to prove our countries better than yours. I like the olympics and all but it makes me laught to think about the armchair fans who don’t give a hoot about a US swimmer but when it comes time for the olympics they got the flag on the car window and are big ol fans.

Back on topic. If he just declined to spar with him then he made a slient protest. It would be a different thing had me agreed to spar him that spat on him or gave him a foul shot.

I think its his right, but he should be disqualified immidiatly.
It dosent matter if his country or he decided to do it.

It dosent matter, he is disqualified right away.

Olympics is where these things should be set aside to compete for the sake of the sport.

Iran needs to be ****en nuked of this planet there ***d in the head - they they buy weapons of north korea who are also f**kd and iran just need to go - Israil and the US need to invade Iraq for a safer world and the whole world needs to gang up on North korea and nuke the cunts !!!

NUKE IRAN NOT THE WHALES

Benny :lol: having a bad day?

Post deleted. . . :sigh:

Cant even get pass where hes from, why is he in the olympics anyway. The rings are links together to show that we’ll are the same and seeing what values and skills we have are more important than where we are from and what we do.