In 1890, French aristocrat Pierre de Coubertin reinvented the Olympic Games in the name of international goodwill and amateur competition. As noted by Robert Tombs for The Spectator, ‘Inherent in Coubertin’s vision of the regenerative power of strenuous exercise was the amateur spirit – “not the winning, but the taking part”.’ This is encapsulated in the Olympic motto Citius, Altius, Fortius (Faster, Higher, Stronger). Who could forget the story of Harold Abrahams and Eric Liddell of the Paris Olympics 100 years ago which inspired the classic film Chariots of Fire? However, as Tombs tells us, ‘This soon became a polite fiction, as national rivalries dominated.’

Post-war Olympics editions (both summer and winter) have been plagued by boycotts, bribery, doping scandals and cost blow-outs. What was supposed to be a celebration of sport to bring the world together – as per the ancient Olympics when warring city-states declared a truce – is now nothing more than a sick joke.

Apart from Seoul in 1988, Barcelona in 1992 and Sydney in 2000, it’s clear that hosting the games doesn’t pay. Tokyo’s Games, for example, were initially expected to cost $US7.3 billion; the actual total ended up being closer to $US28 billion. Host cities end up being saddled with debt for years afterwards, along with the cost of maintaining abandoned facilities.

On this score, most Olympics are a five-ring circus of white elephants. Construction and security contracts create short-term jobs and growth, but stadiums are notoriously unreliable economic contributors. The unique design requirements render many of the special purpose venues unusable afterwards and the quickly fall into disrepair. Recall the eerie images of the abandoned and graffitied Sarajevo bobsleigh and luge track.

In the lead up to the Athens Summer Games in 2004, there was widespread concern, if not panic, that they would not go ahead, since construction and preparation works were way behind schedule less than six months out.

As it turns out, the Athens Olympics cost about $US11 billion, at least double what the Greek government had initially budgeted – and that doesn’t include the money the country has spent trying to maintain its rarely used Olympic facilities ever since.

I was in Turin in 2003, some three years before that city hosted the Winter Olympics. The place was a huge construction zone thanks to an underground metro line that was being built, which many frustrated locals saw as a huge waste of money since previous such proposals were deemed economically unviable and shelved. As far as they were concerned, it simply wasn’t worth it.

In a 2021 report before the Tokyo Olympics, Reuters noted that Rio de Janeiro lost $US2 billion in hosting the 2016 Games. In a clear warning to Brisbane for 2032, the report cites a 2016 article in the Journal of Economic Perspectives by Robert Baade and Victor Matheson, which states, ‘When bidding countries are appropriately compared with countries that are otherwise similar but did not bid… the significant Olympic effects on trade, consumption, investment, and income all disappear.’

The awarding of the 2008 Summer Olympics and 2022 Winter Games to Beijing served to confirm – if confirmation was needed – that the integrity of sport matters little to the IOC, and nor does its supposed commitment to human rights Let’s also remember the IOC declined to investigate the 23 Chinese swimmers who tested positive for a banned drug seven months before the Tokyo Games. The World Anti-Doping Agency had accepted Chinese officials’ explanation at face value that the drug came from a contaminated kitchen at the athletes’ hotel. Three of these swimmers went on to win golds. At the same time, the IOC still leaves the door wide open for men claiming to be women to compete in women’s sports. Even after the Laurel Hubbard and Lia Thomas furores, its framework on ‘fairness, inclusion and non-discrimination’ dropped policies that required competing athletes to undergo ‘medically unnecessary’ procedures or treatment.

Politicians often find the Olympics to be a pleasant distraction and a convenient call for national unity, thus detracting from the spectacle of the athletes. French President Emmanuel Macron had no hesitation in commandeering the Olympics as part of the vanity project that is his presidency. Accordingly, he insisted that Paris 2024 host the largest opening ceremony in the history of the Olympic Games. More on that fiasco in a minute.

Despite spending millions of taxpayers’ euros trying to clean up the Seine, Macron has not fulfilled his promise to swim in it to prove it is safe. His crazy marriage of convenience with the extreme left in the recent elections – and its consequences – will soon come to the fore after his declared political truce for the Olympics concludes and the French remember they have no government – and the Seine will return to being an open sewer.

As for the opening ceremony, Macron ordered Thomas Jolly, his personally selected director, to outdo London 2012. What we got was a macabre excuse for a spectacle, topped off with its mockery of Christianity in the tableau entitled ‘Festivity’ which appeared to depict Leonardo da Vinci’s painting of The Last Supper, showing Jesus Christ with his apostles, where singer Philippe Katerine was painted blue and almost naked while surrounded by drag queens and gender-fluid people. This puerile stunt exposed the glaring hypocrisy of so-called progressives, who would never dare to satirise Islam. This is the same city of the Charlie Hebdo massacre. Instead of a celebration of sport and French history, Jolly chose blasphemous undertones for a fundamental aspect of Christian worship – the Eucharist.

These Olympics naturally pay homage to the climate cult, with cardboard beds and vegan meals. In response to protests from furious athletes, red-faced officials announced they would be ordering more meat and eggs to meet the understandable nutritional demand.

With temperatures set to soar in Paris – it is the height of summer, after all – the lack of air conditioning in the Olympic Village has been justifiably criticised. The socialist Mayor of Paris, Anne Hidalgo, with typical arrogance, in her Marie Antionette moment, previously dismissed such concerns stating, ‘the athletes will be “very comfortable” when they will have discovered the virtues of the “natural air conditioning”.’ It’s clear the Olympics have become the plaything of globalist elites.

For some years, there have been numerous calls to abolish the Olympics. Even the Atlantic and the New York Times have decried them as synonymous with overspending, corruption, and autocratic regimes.

Coubertin’s noble purpose in re-establishing the Olympics has been distorted beyond repair. The ancient Greek Games were abolished in 396AD as a pagan abomination. It’s time the modern version was abolished simply as an abomination. Period.