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Anyone been following the olympics? I've been watching a lot, kind of an olympic junky. I have to admit though, if I had to choose which one to watch I would always 100% choose the summer olympics.
The Winter Olympics seem like they're mostly for rich white people, and certainly you don't see as many non-Whites, save the Asian nations, as you do during the Summer. And I've always associated power and athletics with events like track and field and Gymnastics.
The Winter Olympics has events like mogul, curling, and some weird cross country thing where they shoot targets. I haven't seen any winter events, even in last olympics, where I would be in awe like Usain Bolt's amazing record breaking performance in Beijing or Phelps road to destiny, also at the same olympics.
So, because I've always associated the Winter olympics with the rich and the not so athletic, I have a hard time getting excited as much as I am for the Summer.
 
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I always watch the Olympics because I feel the concept of it is wonderful(even though I don't like most sports and Bob Costas is a tool.) The reason the Winter Olympics may seem like a "rich white people" just seems like because there are limits as to where those particular sports can be played. I doubt most Africans are working on their Alpine skiing or curling, which is probably why the Jamaican bobsled team was such a big deal since they're from Jamaica.
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I think youre looking at it at the wrong way. its beacuse white people have snow. most others dont. Africa only has snow above a certain elevation along with south america. Asians have the koreans. much more of a coincidence that people cant play in the winter olympics because it wouldnt be popular or people just dont have that interest. Its all coincidence. i really despise people who always think thats something is racist instead of thinking that it might be other reasons. Sometimes things are genetic. Blacks have different kind of built muscles from whites. Whites have different muscles from asians. Asians have different muscles from latinos. Its kind of similar how in weight lifting there arent that many black people. black people have easy access to weights but yet they most of them arent in the sport. Why? because their muscles are different and work diffrently than white people so they wont be as good at the sport. There are exceptions where motivation breaks boundries but its rarely true.
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I still enjoy the winter olympics... but then again I'm from canada so its natural I suppose. I watch both of them generally.
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It feels to me like some of the Winter events are more gimmicky, extreme sports that they sort of just added a point system for difficulty and threw in there. I mean, Snowboard half-pipe? It takes skill and all but if you're going to have that you might as well have skateboarding in the summer.
I still watch them both, probably more than I should, but I prefer summer as well.
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Philadelphia, PA10406 Posts
I love both, but I think the Winter Olympics get a little less of a deal made about them, for several reasons, among them the lack of universal representation you mentioned.
I think they're another element, which is a lack of direct competition. There are all these events in the Summer Olympics, (Footraces, Swimming races, Team Sports, ect.) which feature all the competitors on one stage racing or playing at one time. Whereas the Winter Olympics has a lot of events (ski jumping, ice skating, slalom) which involve people taking turns competing. A little of the drama is lost that way.
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well it depends on the sport
haters gotta hate
skaters gotta skate
skating actually takes lots of skill though
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I like waffles' post...i mean come on, just because the sports need some equipment and the majority of the people are Caucasian doesn't tell us anything about how athletic it is. Theres more white people where theres snow in general.
what about synchronized swimming if you're going to front on snowboarding? The greeks who invented the olympics would prob have this stuff if they had the technology so w/e
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On February 15 2010 13:21 Waffles wrote:
I think youre looking at it at the wrong way. its beacuse white people have snow. most others dont. Africa only has snow above a certain elevation along with south america. Asians have the koreans. much more of a coincidence that people cant play in the winter olympics because it wouldnt be popular or people just dont have that interest. Its all coincidence. i really despise people who always think thats something is racist instead of thinking that it might be other reasons. Sometimes things are genetic. Blacks have different kind of built muscles from whites. Whites have different muscles from asians. Asians have different muscles from latinos. Its kind of similar how in weight lifting there arent that many black people. black people have easy access to weights but yet they most of them arent in the sport. Why? because their muscles are different and work diffrently than white people so they wont be as good at the sport. There are exceptions where motivation breaks boundries but its rarely true.
actually, what you just wrote might be construed as more racist than what i wrote since you started going into genetics and such. i was touching upon the fact that winter equipments relied heavily on gears, like skies, skates, helmets, bobsleds whereas the summer olympics it's just the person and whatever thin layer of clothing they have on.
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How can you consider yourself an Olympic junky and not even know what biathlon is?
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I like waffles' post...i mean come on, just because the sports need some equipment and the majority of the people are Caucasian doesn't tell us anything about how athletic it is. Theres more white people where theres snow in general.
what about synchronized swimming if you're going to front on snowboarding? The greeks who invented the olympics would prob have this stuff if they had the technology so w/e
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I am a huge fan of sports so I love both the summer and winter olympics. I can understand why many people (in the us) don't enjoy the winter olympics as much, probably mainly because the usa is less dominant and some stuff is "boring."
With that said, if you appreciate the spirit of competition, both are great!
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I love watching both the summer and winter. Summer is probably best overall, but short track speed skating is my favorite event. Swimming close second. Short races are the most fun to watch.
I can appreciate gymnastics and figure skating as taking a lot of skill, but I only watch them because of the hotties.
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On February 15 2010 14:00 buickskylark wrote:Show nested quote +On February 15 2010 13:21 Waffles wrote:
I think youre looking at it at the wrong way. its beacuse white people have snow. most others dont. Africa only has snow above a certain elevation along with south america. Asians have the koreans. much more of a coincidence that people cant play in the winter olympics because it wouldnt be popular or people just dont have that interest. Its all coincidence. i really despise people who always think thats something is racist instead of thinking that it might be other reasons. Sometimes things are genetic. Blacks have different kind of built muscles from whites. Whites have different muscles from asians. Asians have different muscles from latinos. Its kind of similar how in weight lifting there arent that many black people. black people have easy access to weights but yet they most of them arent in the sport. Why? because their muscles are different and work diffrently than white people so they wont be as good at the sport. There are exceptions where motivation breaks boundries but its rarely true. actually, what you just wrote might be construed as more racist than what i wrote since you started going into genetics and such. i was touching upon the fact that winter equipments relied heavily on gears, like skies, skates, helmets, bobsleds whereas the summer olympics it's just the person and whatever thin layer of clothing they have on.
it is kinda racist in a way but each race has its own advantages. everything has its drawbacks. if you say genetics between races dont matter youre just hiding in a little box.you have a black man in the sun for 9 hours a day and you have a pale white guy in the sun for the same amount of time and see who gets skin cancer first. Genetics shouldnt matter because if an athlete tries hard enough and puts enough of an effort they will acheive. but certain races can put less effort because of the way their genetics were built. if you think this is still racist then ignore this paragraph.
what im trying to point out is that race sometimes isnt the issue that is suppose to be looked at.
instead look at other people's culture and what they appreciate and what they dont. some cultures have somethings unacceptable and something acceptable. some whites think that things like ice skating is fun while blacks may find fun in other sports.
i know countries that arent in the olympics have people that have intrests in "white" sports. but just look at yesterday's results. 18-0 on slovakia(?) from canada. that kind of ridiculous sweep shouldnt be what sports are about therefore they dont particpate. its that simple.
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I gotta admit I don't care much at all about the winter Olympics. I really enjoy the summer Olympics though.
But what is really important is.....
the World Cup coming up soon!
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United States13896 Posts
The man above me sums up my views to a T.
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I prefer the winter Olympics, but that might be because I am an upper middle class white guy from Canada so I have always done a lot of winter sports. Skiing and snowboarding are so much fun and I enjoy watching them a lot more than anything in the summer Olympics. There is a lot more skill in those sports than just running as fast as you can.
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Feel the rhythm! Feel the rhyme! Get on up, its bobsled time
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Well you have to take into consideration that weather plays a huge role in how the olympics will be in winter sports. Most of the summer olympics are in controlable enviroments. But I agree, I enjoy the summer olympics more, but who doesnt?
I eagerly follow the Biathlon (some crazy shooters and skiiers, tho the last race was pretty much ruined by the weather), Cross Country skiiing, aswell as speed skating and Icehockey!
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winter olympics are for losers.
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Germany2762 Posts
i prefer summer olympics by far. main reason is that i'm not that interested in most of the sports included in the winter olympics. only exception is ice hockey, what i really really enjoy 
but stuff like ice dancing, or downhill skiing is just boring to watch.
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Both are really nice. I watch it like none stop.
A bit more for the summer since I was doing track & field during 6 years.
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On February 15 2010 16:23 Jonoman92 wrote:
I gotta admit I don't care much at all about the winter Olympics. I really enjoy the summer Olympics though.
But what is really important is.....
the World Cup coming up soon!
^
this
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snowboard and ski cross are the best spectator sports among the olympic sports.
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My own feelings are for curling, and especially figure skating. Plus the countries which attend the Winter olympics are actually countries you can root for.
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On February 15 2010 23:27 MoltkeWarding wrote:
My own feelings are for curling, and especially figure skating. Plus the countries which attend the Winter olympics are actually countries you can root for.
-.-
Summer >>>>>>>>>>>> Winter.
Badminton, handball, basketball, gymnastics, judo, Bolt etc...
yay ~
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alpine skiing is mostly reserved for European nations imo
Downhill, Super G, slalom, Giant Slalom usually all go to Swedish or Austrian skiers
The Nordic almost NEVER goes to americans (Finn's French or Austrian)
The snowboard half pipe and x cross almost always go to americans
(damn you jacobellis)
but figure skating is all about the russians and chinese now
Short track is a korean/us thing
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You can't say Winter Olympics has some stupid 'sports'.
Summer has synchronised swimming...
And it also has shooting (which you mentioned)
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To be honest, as long as e-Sports are not considered an Olympic discipline, I could hardly care less about either Olympics. 
But Summer Olympics are generally the bigger event, both due to the fact that more countries can participate and due to the fact that it is more historically connected to the Olympics in Ancient Greece.
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On February 16 2010 00:02 Cheeseball wrote:
You can't say Winter Olympics has some stupid 'sports'.
Summer has synchronised swimming...
And it also has shooting (which you mentioned)
i agree that there are a few summer olympics i could do without, synchronized swimming is one of them. But even synchronized swimming is way harder than most Winter Sports. Staying put upside down in the water while timing yourself and others around you to be in congruent shapes is perhaps much harder than we give it credit for. i also really dislike Trampoline. Seriously, it's such a farce of a sport.
but i just realized one of the biggest reasons i dislike the winter O is because so much of it comes down to subjective scoring. Sometimes two athletes show the same performance but receive different scores or one is slightly better than the other, but due to the human factor, the wrong one gets credit with a win. it's a bit gimmicky that way.
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well I think the reason is because the winter olympics is every 2 years and the summer olympics are every 4, the more build up it gets the more people deem it to be "special" or at least thats how i see it. When the summer olympics come on everyone hypes it up and talks about it cause its every 4 years yeh noe? whereas the winter is fun to watch and there is amazing talent yet its not as long as a hype imo so thats why i watch it but more or less go ehh.. when i see it haha a=D
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On February 15 2010 23:33 Boblion wrote:Show nested quote +On February 15 2010 23:27 MoltkeWarding wrote:
My own feelings are for curling, and especially figure skating. Plus the countries which attend the Winter olympics are actually countries you can root for. -.- Summer >>>>>>>>>>>> Winter.
Badminton, handball, basketball, gymnastics, judo, Bolt etc... yay ~
Sorry, Hockey > all of that put together.
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On February 16 2010 05:23 OhThatDang wrote:
well I think the reason is because the winter olympics is every 2 years and the summer olympics are every 4, the more build up it gets the more people deem it to be "special" or at least thats how i see it. When the summer olympics come on everyone hypes it up and talks about it cause its every 4 years yeh noe? whereas the winter is fun to watch and there is amazing talent yet its not as long as a hype imo so thats why i watch it but more or less go ehh.. when i see it haha a=D
Sorry for double post.
It's every 4 years for both... what're you talking about? When was the last Winter Olympics? Turino 2006, it is now 2010.
2010
-2006
--------
4
 Hope that helps... LOL.
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I tend to enjoy the winter Olympics somewhat more: I quite simply find the sports much more interessting (save for figure skating  )
Although quite frankly it depends on the sport. But you have to admit that ski/snow crossis awesome.
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On February 16 2010 05:27 hahaimhenry wrote:Show nested quote +On February 16 2010 05:23 OhThatDang wrote:
well I think the reason is because the winter olympics is every 2 years and the summer olympics are every 4, the more build up it gets the more people deem it to be "special" or at least thats how i see it. When the summer olympics come on everyone hypes it up and talks about it cause its every 4 years yeh noe? whereas the winter is fun to watch and there is amazing talent yet its not as long as a hype imo so thats why i watch it but more or less go ehh.. when i see it haha a=D Sorry for double post. It's every 4 years for both... what're you talking about? When was the last Winter Olympics? Turino 2006, it is now 2010. 2010 -2006 -------- 4 Hope that helps... LOL.
haha youre right =D i just thought it was every 2 years hehehe. its actually 4 years also and follows two years after every summer olympics thats where i confusedd myself T_T thanks!
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EPT
