BLOG 215: Australia The Great

“Ever since, they have been inspirations to generations of athletes like myself, who can only aspire to their example of putting principle before personal interest.” A member of Canadian Olympic Committee

Well today is the last day of the Olympic games in London and partisan as I am (born in Westminster dahlinks it DON’T get more Lundin than that!) it has to be the best Olympics’ ever. London has more than risen to the challenge and has really put on a great show. Adding to the thrill is the fact that along with the home nation, most of my favourite nations have huge stashes of Gold Medals and are rather pleased they came.

Not  all my favourite nations have done ok. There has been a lot of talk about the demise of the Australian nations sporting prowess (half the amount of gold’s since the last one and the fewest since Barca 20 years ago!) I have to say our dear Ozzies do have a reason to hold their heads high when they think of all things Olympics.

Sometimes it is not about what you do today sometimes it’s about what you did yesterday that marks the pages of history forever.

And sometimes it’s not about how fast you ran, how magnificently you rowed, how amazing your seat on a horse…. Sometimes it is about a glove.

WHAT????

[Okay Jax has lost her marbles….official]

No. Seriously … honestly I have not gone nuts! To me the greatest Olympic moment of all time was about a glove. And yes… this is to do with the spirit of the Olympics and Australia.

It was a glove that was forgotten on the way to the podium… if an Australian did not get involved history would have recorded things differently… but bravery, compassion and empathy with the suffering of humanity meant things worked out just fine.

Go back in time to the Mexico City Summer Olympics, U.S. athlete Tommie Smith won the 200 meter race in a world-record time of 19.83 seconds, with Australia's Peter Norman second with a time of 20.06 seconds, and the U.S.'s John Carlos in third place with a time of 20.10 seconds. After the race was completed, the three went to collect their medals at the podium.

The world was not a pleasant place for the occupants of those two nations. Human rights was an ideal that neither nation had quite got a handle on at home. Quality of life was pretty much deemed in both countries by the pigment of skin among many other pre-ordained states of being. But it was a time of high ideals where people still believed that bad things happen because good people allow it. The key to change was seen to be civil protest – to allow those who govern “we the people” that “WE the people want change and NOW”.

So against that backdrop all three athletes went to the podium with the entire world watching.  All three athletes wore  OPHR (Olympic Project for Human Rights) badges. But this was not enough. Something big was planned. The American athletes had agreed to bring black gloves to the podium and wear one on their right hand and raise it as their anthem played. This overtly political move would let the world know that all was not well in their homeland and there were issues to be addressed… and pronto. But all was not going to plan. Carlos, it transpired, had forgotten his glove. Either Smith would have to go it alone or the gesture was not going to happen.

Then the Australian piped up.

In his homeland there was a mirror situation to the USA’s segregation policy, and in addition the White Australia Policy did its best to ensure that multi ethnic would not be a term that could be applied to the land down under. The silver medal winner– a white Australian – did not support his countries stance on these issues.

Peter Norman  totally supported what his fellow athletes had planned and did not want the opportunity to draw the worlds attention to these human rights issues to be squandered. He knew if Smith did the salute alone the world would view it as the act of one fanatic. It HAD to be bigger than that for it to register as an act of civil disobedience.

He advised Smith to give his left glove to Carlos and for Carlos to raise the alternate hand instead.

On 16 October 1968, the first humanitarian political gesture happened at the Olympic games. The last political gesture being Nazi Germany’s salutes in the 1936 Berlin games - so it was WAY overdue that the good guys got a chance.

Of course, the response was to punish the three brave athletes. Smith and Carlos were largely ostracized by the U.S. sporting establishment in the following years and, in addition, were subject to criticism of their actions. Normans sympathetic stance with his competitors' protest, resulted in him being reprimanded by his country's Olympic authorities and ostracised by the Australian media. He was not picked for the 1972 Summer Olympics, despite finishing third in his trials.

The tide turned in the new millennium as the three were finally recognised as heroes. Finally the world saw that these men had done a courageous thing to advance civil rights and they became globally recognised figures that drew attention to the need for changes that had to happen to change society for the better.

A member of the Canadian  Olympic Committee and the Head of the Canadian Equestrian Team was quoted as recently as 2011 saying the following:

"In that moment, Tommie Smith, Peter Norman, and John Carlos became the living embodiments of Olympic idealism. Ever since, they have been inspirations to generations of athletes like myself, who can only aspire to their example of putting principle before personal interest. It was their misfortune to be far greater human beings than the leaders of the IOC of the day."

But what about the men  - were they just united for that one moment? Was just a sign of the times or was this something deeper…something for life. Well all I will tell you is that in 2006 Smith and Carlos were pallbearers at Peter Norman’s funeral.

So yeah… London 2012 was not Australia’s finest moment. Even if they soared up the table to their usual slot though… it will never beat their true finest moment: When Peter Norman supported his fellow athletes in making those five interlocking rings truly stand for something.

Australia the great - Olympic Style.

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