There has been recent debate on whether the Paralympic and Olympic games should remain as they are as two individual sporting events, or whether they should merge into one mega-event to become ‘truly inclusive’. Ferdman and Deane (2015) state that inclusion involves both being fully ourselves and allowing others to be fully themselves in the context of engaging in common pursuits. DePaw and Gavron refers to disability sport as ‘Sport that has been designed for or is specifically practiced by athletes with disabilities. You are disabled under the equality act 2010 (www.legislation.gov.uk, 2017) if you have a physical or mental impairment that has a ‘substantial and ‘long term’ negative effect on your ability to do normal daily activities. …show more content…
Smith states that delivering the Paralympics to the public is best done by media exposure, and the greatest way to get your message out is by mass media – TV, radio and newspapers – which the vast majority of the public, no matter what languages they speak, consume daily. Thomas and Smith (2008) state that media coverage be really – including print and TV coverage – of the Paralympics has increased since the 1980's. The press treatment and social significance of the sporting performances of disabled athletes remains considerably lower than that afforded non-disabled athletes, and global sporting events such as the Olympics and world cup. Reflecting on this, whilst Paralympic viewing figures are considerably lower than those of the Olympics, they have continued to rise over recent years. Data gathered by Nielsen sports suggests that 4.1. billion people around he world watched the 2016 Rio Paralympic games – making it the most viewed in the events history. Whilst viewing figures show the height of public engagement, the focus should maybe be less on viewing figures and more on the confirmation that people are indeed engaging with the Paralympics, therefore, justifying they are of importance and they have their place in the world of Sport. Pardue states that ‘The sporting performances of Paralympian’s at The Paralympic Games are deemed to have the potential to heighten awareness and knowledge of Paralympic sport as well
It is evident that hosting the Olympics games is no walk in the park. The countries trusted with this task have to spend billions to make the games a reality. Some people believe that the countries, even after spending billions of dollars benefit from the games, while others believe that the money can be spent elsewhere more efficiently. To reach a conclusion, one must study all of the different impacts in all of the different sectors the games have.
The Olympics have shown over the decades that they can be affected by political conflict. However, it seems that this is the point of the Olympics, to illustrate national pride, by competition. Bloodshed should not be the way for pride of one’s country to be shown, but it should be shown through competition, in the words of the founder of the modern Olympic movement, Pierre de
Ever since its inception in 1896, the Modern Olympics has hosted an invisible sport: politics. The Olympics calls for “a halt to all conflicts … [and to] strive towards a more peaceful world,” but politics soon spoiled its biennial message. “As the Olympics continue to dissolve into … a political competition … they no longer … justify the time and trouble,” Dave Anderson, Pulitzer Prize winner for his sports column, wrote in the New York Times in 1984. The Olympic spirit has routinely been used as an outlet for political agendas. With political and Olympic ambitions intersected, the great international sports festivity negatively affects all nations involved.
The movie Murderball, is a documentary about the crazy sport called " quad rugby”. This sport can be very dangerous to most of the players since they are Quadriplegia which means most of the players are wheel chair bounded and have partial or total loss of use of all their limbs and torso. That doesn't stop the players who strive for the intensity, and thrill of the game of rugby. The movie goes into detail about how the main characters became quadriplegic, some were born with an illness, other became quadriplegic from horrible accidents. However, their disability does not stop them from striving to be amazing athletes, and pursuing gold medal in the Olympics.
My gut reaction to hearing a film about wheelchair rugby was one of pity. I thought that as soon as I saw the players I would feel sorry for them not being able to play the sport the “right” way, or the traditional way. My unconscious bias towards disabled people seemed hard-wired into my brain. I was expecting less of them athletically but after sitting through the 88-minute documentary on wheelchair rugby I was proven wrong in the best way possible.
Stories become a great influence on people as they view other people either on television or through a book as they explain their struggles or experiences. They should not view them as a negative perspective because of the media. In the article, “ Slippery Slopes: Media, Disability, and Adaptive Sport,” the author William Peace notes how the media shows disability out as “something to be miraculously and inspirationally ‘overcome’ with real consequences”(Peace 676). When taking a gander at somebody with an incapacity, people tend to believe that they are not ready to do the things that individuals with abled bodies can, which is false. While having an incapacity there are approaches to work around things. People don't have to surrender and
THESIS: The media must take significant strides towards reforming the way they portray sports to change the current system of altering the ideals of athletes and diminishing the prestige of modern sports.
The popular media example we chose discusses how Rosie MacLennan had the pressure to defend her Olympic gold, and how she recovered from her concussion. It talks about how she had to change her training to accommodate her injury. As trampoline routines involve twists and flips, it took Rosie awhile to fully recover from her concussion. Due to the concussion impacting her negatively, she had to seek help to improve “her balance, timing and focus.” Rosie had to practice one step at a time, as she did not want to reinjure herself. Overall, this discusses the pressure on Rosie since her goal was to win an Olympic gold, while struggling with an injury.
According to Disabled Spots USA, “National Handicapped Sports and Recreation Association renamed Disabled Sports USA in 1994. It has 91 chapters and 36 states in the United States. It gives sports and recreation programs not only the military people who get serious physical disabling because of their mission, but also people who have disability.” There are 303 million people, who have either mental disabilities or physical disabilities, living in the United States. “Disabled Sports USA provided sports and recreation programs to over 60,000 youth and adults who have some disabilities now according to Australian Paralympic Committee. ” Disabled people, who do some physical activity, are possible to spend happy life compare with disabled people, who did not do any activities. According to Disabled USA’ survey said, “The survey found that DSUSA Chapter Participants (CP) are twice as likely to be employed as the general population of adults with disabilities (68% vs. 33%). ”
As a sporting mega-event, the Olympic Games have numerous social impacts on the people, not only on those from the host country, but on individuals all over the globe.
Abstract: The Special Olympics not only give special athletes athletic skills, they offer more opportunity, encouragement, and dexterity to survive in society than the public school system alone. To understand the differences and similarities between handicapped athletes and their non-handicap peers is the first step in creating a program that best meets the child's needs. There were no community programs that catered to the mentally and physically challenged, so Eunice Kennedy-Shriver created "special games" in her back yard for her handicapped child. Shriver established the Special Olympics in 1968. Today there are more than one million special athletes competing in 140 countries. There are some problems with relying on the
The 2018 Winter Olympics are here, which means that snowboarders, skiers, sledders, and many other people get to show off their skills in the most prolific sports events of all time. Winning gold is every athletes’ goal and dream, but just making it into the Olympics is a great achievement itself, and shows how skilled you are. The events, competitors, and history of the Olympics are all huge topics that can be explored and elaborated on endlessly. A single event can be used for many essays and reports, which this essay is an example of.
With the multi-billions of dollars that the Olympics earn and spend, it’s certainly is in the best interest of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) to remain under the circumstances of keeping sport open to professional athletes, not only financially, but as well as the majority of their viewers. In this position statement, I will use historic International Olympic Committee guidelines (1964) and official IOC reports as a basis for proving that professional athletes should be allowed to participate in the Olympic Games.
Are the Olympic Games a waste of money? The Olympic Games are an international event where athletes from every country come together to compete. Many fans and spectators attend this event to cheer for their country. The number of spectators keeps on increasing every four years as the event gets more popular. As this is an international event the cost of hosting it is huge. The total output of the 1976 Montreal Games was $1.48 billion whilst the 2012 London Games was a total of $14.6 billion. Stadiums are built for different disciplines, national representatives are invited to perform in the opening and closing ceremony, as a result the stadiums need a high level of security. Where the hosting country receives the money from, whom it will benefit and what it does to the country, will be the three main points I will be covering in this essay.
For young people with a disability leisure activities take on added meaning. Participating in the Melbourne Cup stay offered a chance to share in community life, develop a meaningful social role, and acquire new skills to push the boundaries of their personal limitations (Patterson & Pegg, 2009, p. 387). Socialising with peers helped the group share common interests with non-disabled youth and break down negative attitudes and social stigma towards disability (Patterson & Pegg, 2009, p. 392). This in turn nurtured a sense of normalcy and contributed to social acceptance and belonging (Lundberg, Taniguchi, McCormick, & Tibbs, 2011, pp. 207, 212, 213).