Team GB’s athletes embody a pluralist national vision, while political GB show us the worst of ourselves
I accept that the Olympic Games leave some people cold. There are those who don’t like sports at all. There are those who are scornful about some activities that now qualify as Olympic sports. Then there are those who insist it is all a waste of money, those who think it’s been poisoned by drugs and politics, those who bridle at the parochial media coverage and those who seem reflexively determined to dislike anything popular.
I’ll admit there have been times, especially during the cold war and the drug scandals, when I dallied with some of those thoughts about the Olympics myself. But London 2012 blew them out of the water. That experience was almost universally positive. It was also unambiguously good for Britain. It would have been churlish and out-of-touch to ignore the shared pleasure that surrounded those games. This year, in very different and more difficult circumstances, Tokyo 2020 has confirmed that conversion. These games have also been a global affirmation. Most of the public is captivated. And the experience has been good for a battered Britain, too.
