Do Not Mistake Warm and Fuzzy for Just and Fair
By SELENA ROBERTS
Published: August 22, 2004
ATHENS
THE South Koreans have a problem: Wisconsin's adorable Paul Hamm has already gabbed about apple pie, gold medals and high-bar miracles while seated within the halo's glow of Katie Couric.
How is South Korea supposed to taint that pristine vision with pleas of fairness? How can their Olympic officials reverse the work of angels and stardust with the truth about the men's all-around championship?
Sure, the South Koreans have math on their side. As the officials of the International Gymnastics Federation agreed yesterday, a scoring mistake wrongly awarded Hamm the gold medal over Yang Tae Young, who was left with bronze.
Too bad, so sad, officials said. Three judges were punished for the unfortunate error, but the instant Hamm went from fourth to first with the high-bar act of a lifetime Wednesday night, he remained an indelible image of inspiration on NBC. To be almost certain, the network of the Olympic soft lens does not employ folks to edit cuddliness from its promo reels.
The South Koreans need a strategy. They need Canada on their side.
It just so happens that shared gold medals at the Olympics do come true when there is a precious Canadian involved. In the 1992 Barcelona Summer Games, Sylvie Frechette of Montreal was cruelly undone in synchronized swimming when a judge mistakenly punched an 8.7 rather than a 9.7 for her score, according to "The Complete Book of the Summer Olympics" by David Wallechinsky.
The error left America's Kristen Babb-Sprague with the gold medal. However, a year later, after heavy protests led by Canada's International Olympic Committee grand pooh-bah, Dick Pound, the decision was overturned. Frechette was awarded a duplicate gold medal as a perfect match to Babb-Sprague's trinket.
Going dutch is a Canadian tradition, as perpetuated in the 2002 Salt Lake Games. In the figure skating scandal that consumed the Winter Olympics, there were Western-world cries of impropriety when a French judge wrapped in a mink dared to mark the Russians ahead of the dimple-cheeked Canadians in the pairs final.
Under the glowering of her unctuous peers, in a sealed-off meeting area that screamed interrogation room, the judge Marie Reine Le Gougne admitted to being pressured to side with the Russian duo of Anton Sikharulidze and Yelena Berezhnaya. In truth, Le Gougne said immediately, she voted with her heart in the 5-4 decision. It was too late for recants, though. The Canadians were outraged; America was outraged; and, more importantly, NBC's Scott Hamilton was outraged.
"There was going to be rioting in the streets," Pound said yesterday. "Public opinion never does any harm."
Jamie Salé and David Pelletier courted Western sympathies by drying their eyes on the suspenders of Larry King as they stormed the talk-show circuit. The I.O.C. couldn't take the sob story any longer.
As it turned out, Dr. Jacques Rogge's molecular structure changed under heat. As the I.O.C.'s president, Rogge fancied himself as a break from the collection of smarmy Olympic leaders, as a conflict-free change from past controversial caretakers, as a man of principle.
But the righteous Rogge revealed a dark compulsion: He loathed untidiness. At Salt Lake, Rogge quietly ordered a quickie investigation of the judging fix by the International Skating Union.
Four days after the final in question, the Canadians were awarded a medal dipped in duplicate gold despite an unresolved investigation, with one pivotal question left unanswered: How could one judge have fixed an outcome unless the scores of the other eight judges on the panel were known in advance?
Loose strings didn't matter. Rogge demanded that the ends be tied up in a nice bow.
Given this recent history of shared gold, surely Rogge would step in to help the poor South Koreans in a far simpler situation. "In Salt Lake City, it was a decision from the federation to change the ruling," Gilbert Felli, the I.O.C.'s executive director, told The Associated Press yesterday. "The I.O.C. never changed any results on its own."
What a disingenuous response. In Salt Lake, Rogge leaned on the skating union to produce a fan-friendly resolution when the pressure of the public reached the V-neck of his cardigan sweater.
Now, when a clear error has been made in Athens, Rogge is nowhere, attempting to distance himself from the fray.
"This is bad luck for Korea, and we understand this," Nikolai Burnmanov, a Russian Olympic official, said yesterday. "It's their time to get a trial. We will see."
The South Koreans may already know the answer to their grievance. In Salt Lake, they seethed when the American Apolo Anton Ohno won a gold medal after their speedskater was disqualified in the 1,500-meter race. Their rants changed nothing.
The South Koreans have a problem: They don't speak English.
Their charms don't translate on the tube in the Western world. Without public opinion from the powerful West, without Olympic outrage en masse, Rogge isn't likely to broker a fair split of the gold.
Imagine if Rogge actually righted the medal distribution according to the actual score: Yang with gold, Hamm with silver and South Korea's other star, Kim Dae Eun, with bronze.
What's worse for Rogge: Korean dissent or infuriated Americans? The latter; no question. There is one solution to this controversy that would not sully anyone's reputation. In a made-for-NBC moment, the adorable Paul Hamm could look into Katie Couric's sympathetic eyes and say: "Katie, I'm giving the gold medal to Yang. He won; I didn't."
In one instant, Hamm would solve South Korea's problems while creating a fuzzy Olympic moment that would last forever on the NBC highlight reels.
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아무리생각해도 양태은 선수의 메달은 금으로 다시 받아야 할것같은데
왜 우리는 국가적으로 아무말도 안하는거죠-_-?
타임지의 The South Koreans have a problem: They don't speak English.
이말.. 정말 진심으로 공감해요-_-
오노한테 뺐겼을때도 그렇고 말하는 사람은 오직 네티즌뿐~
미국에서는 이렇게 생각하는데-_-; 우리 바보에요??.. 아 짜증나-_-;;