Guns And The Olympics - proposed introduction of practical shooting as an Olympic sport causes political backlash
Scott Farrell
A Combination For The history Books
Every four years, athletes gather from around the world to compete in the Olympic Games, a celebration of the spirit of peaceful competition that embodies all sports. Even for competitors who don't participate of Olympic sports -- like football or golf, for example -- the Games embody international unity and teamwork. When someone is up on that platform with a gold medal around his or her neck, they represent every person who has ever run a race, or thrown a ball, or swam a lap.
For those athletes whose sports aren't included in the actual Olympics, there are "exhibition games" -- non-medal events which allow everyone the dream that their sport, no matter how obscure, might someday be part of the Games.
Recently, however, the specter of "political correctness" has cast a shadow over the Games. When the International Olympic Committee announced last month that practical shooting would be included as an exhibition event in the 2004 Games in Athens, Greece, a powerful outcry arose to eliminate the event. Critics claimed tbat a sport involving firearms was an insult to the spirit of peace and friendship in which the Olympics were founded.
Detractors from all sides rapidly took issue with the IOC's decision to include this event in the Games. Naomi Paiss, a spokesperson for Handgun Control Inc., said, "This type of shooting is for military maneuvers in NATO. An organization that is supposed to celebrate peace should not be sponsoring military shooting."
The Los Angeles Times observed, "Competitors shoot from behind walls with cutout windows and doors and around corners. Shooters get higher scores when they hit spots where the head or heart would be in a person."
Philip Alpers, a researcher for the antigun Violence Policy Center, said, "This is not a game. ... There is a very serious political purpose behind this, and that is to legitimize the civilian ownership of lethal firearms which are normally kept only for battlefields and SWAT teams."
Josh Sugarmann, the executive director of the Violence Policy Center, observed, "Combat shooting doesn't just violate the goals of the Olympic charter, it's an effort by the gun industry and the gun lobby to entice kids and help create a youth gun culture."
Such criticism, typically, is tragically short sighted and shows a distinct lack of respect for the true spirit of Olympic competition.
Consider the events of the Modern Olympics. Rifles, pistols and shotguns are already included in target shooting, trap, skeet, and biathlon events. The firearms used in these sports are just as potentially lethal -- if put into the wrong hands -- as the ones used in IPSC shooting.
Events like archery, javelin, hammer throw, discus and shotput boast origins every bit as militant as combat handgunning, and harken back to an age of warfare far more savage and brutal than anything seen on a modern battlefield. Other sports trace their roots to a style of combat which was employed on the battlefields of old when projectile weapons failed -- judo, wrestling, boxing and fencing utilize tactics designed for military maneuvers among ancient warriors.
Even events which seem to be completely free of association with combat bear a martial pedigree. The event whose name is nearly synonymous with the Olympics, the marathon, is named for a battle in 491 B.C. in which a Greek army massacred about 5,000 Persian warriors. The L.A. Times itself acknowledges that the pentathlon, the only remaining event which dates to the Olympic games of antiquity, is, "a sport rooted in ancient civilizations' military messengers, (which) requires competitors to shoot at stationary targets, fence, swim, ride horses over jumps and run a 3,000-meter country course."
Perhaps the most militaristic of all are the equestrian events, which originate in the Middle Ages when armored knights put their most fearsome "assault weapon" -- the war horse -- to a test of precision and stamina in the sporting arena. This was certainly an attempt to "legitimize the civilian ownership of lethal weapons which are normally kept only for battlefields."
The noble spirit which surrounds the Olympic Games isn't based on a peace created by just imagining a world without war. Instead, the Olympics celebrate peace by demonstrating that the weapons of combat can be turned to a higher purpose. The Olympics are a testament to the idea that the implements and skills used by soldiers throughout the ages can also inspire athletes and sportsmen to push themselves toward the Olympic ideals -- farther, faster, better.
The Olympics should enthusiastically embrace the game of practical shooting, which can turn the weapons of the modern battlefield into tools of sport just as the ancient Spartans and Athenians did with their spears, swords and bows. Far from being a violation of the goals of the Olympic charter, practical shooting is the very embodiment of that charter.
Perhaps, someday we will look upon a world completely united and at peace, where rifles, pistols and shotguns are used only in sporting events -- including practical shooting -- and recall the day when the Olympics gave men and women a use for their firearms other than battle. We can only hope the organizers of the Olympics have the courage to imagine such a day as well and not be deterred by the petty foolishness of those who can't see the difference between sports and war.
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