Friday, February 14, 2014

Where Countries Come together, to Hate Each Other in the Name Of Sport



The Olympics medal rankings and which country is "winning" is truly stupid, yet fixable. The total number of medals should not define a country's overall performance. Just being pretty good -- albeit on an exceptional level -- all around shouldn't amount to the same thing as being unquestionably great. Six pennies plus 3 nickels plus a sole 10-cent coin equal 31 cents; Six dimes plus 3 nickels plus a single penny equal 76 cents. I made you math.

It's ironic that the value of precious metals is easily disregarded every 4 years. Norway (6), the United States (6), and the Netherlands (5) currently have more bronze medals than they have golds, yet they sit, at least on Yahoo! as the top 3 "winners" so far of these Olympics. I find this very petty, like a child going around picking up detritus just so he can say he is its sole owner. To paraphrase the man, you can't turn shit into Shinola. There is much to respect in an Olympic participant: the skill he possesses, the dedication; but to reward in a 3rd -or 2nd-place Olympic athlete the same as a Gold Medalist (proper noun) is wrong. I'm all for equality, but not at the expense of cheapening greatness.

So, how to judge each country based on its medal count? It's easy, like Sunday morning and shoplifting. If you've ever played Mario Kart or have a logical working brain, you would assign points to medals as follows:

Gold: 3
Silver: 2
Bronze: 1

Based on this radical supposition, here is the true Sochi Olympics current rankings (top 5):

Germany: 26 pts*
Norway: 24 pts
Netherlands: 23 pts
Canada: 22 pts
Russia: 20 pts

* Germany collected 7 gold medals in like a day or two (!), yet the Western media, as far as I've seen, have been dumb on the achievement. That shit ain't right. Credit where it's due!

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