The Guardian Says Britain Does Not Have a Moral Leg to Stand On vis-à-vis Russia

So what?

El Keniano wrote:

And they're right.

https://www.theguardian.com/sport/blog/2019/dec/13/britain-moral-high-ground-london-2012?CMP=share_btn_tw

The Guardian article is very misleading and the journalist hasn't grasped the most obvious contradiction of his own atrticle.

The 2012 Games may well have had the greatest number of positive doping tests and stripped the most athletes of medals, but that fact only underlines that it was indeed the most successful Games in ensuring clean medalists.

No Olympic venue can claim that athletes going there won't arrive having doped! That is nothing to do with the Olympic organisers. All they can do is put in enough checks and robust testing to catch any of those that did indeed cheat. An organising body can only catch those within the perameters of the testing procedures and advances at the time. The fact that years later, more athletes have been caught and stripped of medals for cheating, is testament to how successful the organisers of 2012 were in keeping to their word and ensuring that the clean athletes (as much as scientifically possible for the time)eventually get the accolades and credit they deserve.

Using this journalist's definition of a 'Clean Games,' then surely Moscow 1980 were the cleanest ever, due to not one athlete being found guilty of doping!?

Uhhh, there's so much wrong with this I don't know where to begin, but there is now way in hell 90% of US sprinters are not doping and everyone knows that. In fact, they let convicted dopers run, time and time again. There is US doping in field events, and middle and long distance but nothing like the African/Middle East contingent. In a nutshell, methinks you put too much trust in the Olympic organizers, and if you think the are actually genuinely trying to ensure the Olympics are clean then I believe you are talking about some parallel universe.

What country are you from?

The Grauniad is a Marxist comic. And in case you missed it, Boris has expelled the Marxists. Ends.

Comic wrote:

The Grauniad is a Marxist comic. And in case you missed it, Boris has expelled the Marxists. Ends.

Daily Mail reader

For more quality journalism, see the racist, nazi-sympathizing, celebrity gossip obsessed, anti-anyone-not-white-british-and-middle-class-and-over-55, diet tips for anorexics, nasty rag that is the Daily Mail :-)

El Keniano -- are you trying to become an inverse Coevett?

I think British journalists generally hate their country and their national heroes.

This seems to be part of a larger self-destructive sentiment that extends even to British MPs and the British population, who can apparently only honor mediocrity driving them to commit all kinds of national self-flagellation.

Barney Ronay, while using a rather impressive vocabulary, has penned a poor example of journalism, at the very least, getting some basic things wrong:

- Anti-doping at Olympics is the responsibility of the IOC, not British Olympic organizers. British athletics officials, and London Olympic organizers cannot be held responsible for that.

- He compares the examples of Wiggins, British cyclists and swimmers, on thyroid and asthma medication, and Farah by association to Salazar (who has not been banned for doping any NOP athletes), to the lengthy history of doping, followed by extensive cover-ups, of the Russians. If Russians took thyroid and asthma medication, Ronay might have a valid point.

I actually agree with his sentiment with respect to a ban penalizing innocent Russian athletes, but as a journalist and as a Brit, this article is not one he should be proud of.

Well done Cleo.

You've at last proven beyond any doubt that the 0 positive Brits with a few noises about legal thyroid meds (and Farah) are worse than the countless cases of cynical cheating in Kenyan distance running.

Great victory there.

rekrunner wrote:

I think British journalists generally hate their country and their national heroes.

This seems to be part of a larger self-destructive sentiment that extends even to British MPs and the British population, who can apparently only honor mediocrity driving them to commit all kinds of national self-flagellation.

Hilarious but wrong.

trollism wrote:

Well done Cleo.

You've at last proven beyond any doubt that the 0 positive Brits with a few noises about legal thyroid meds (and Farah) are worse than the countless cases of cynical cheating in Kenyan distance running.

Great victory there.

Idiot.

not really wrote:

rekrunner wrote:

I think British journalists generally hate their country and their national heroes.

This seems to be part of a larger self-destructive sentiment that extends even to British MPs and the British population, who can apparently only honor mediocrity driving them to commit all kinds of national self-flagellation.

Hilarious but wrong.

Or ... sad but true. I don't say all the journalists, or all the MPs, or all the British population, but this cynical self-destructive not-holier-than-thou sentiment permeates throughout.

How else to explain an article which suggests that, on the aggregate, Brits are similarly as bad as the Russians, for taking WADA legal medication in a WADA legal way? This is also sad, because the tactic used to bring down the Brits does so by diminishing the severity of Russian violations by attempting to equate them to WADA legal non-violations. It's a lose-lose situation, except for Russia. If it didn't appear in the Guardian, I would dismiss Barney Ronay as a Russian agent or troll, or maybe someone just highly unknowledgeable about athletics.

I guess that was a message for El Keniano, and not me.

trollism wrote:

Well done Cleo.

You've at last proven beyond any doubt that the 0 positive Brits with a few noises about legal thyroid meds (and Farah) are worse than the countless cases of cynical cheating in Kenyan distance running.

Great victory there.

rekrunner wrote:

not really wrote:

Hilarious but wrong.

Or ... sad but true. I don't say all the journalists, or all the MPs, or all the British population, but this cynical self-destructive not-holier-than-thou sentiment permeates throughout.

How else to explain an article which suggests that, on the aggregate, Brits are similarly as bad as the Russians, for taking WADA legal medication in a WADA legal way? This is also sad, because the tactic used to bring down the Brits does so by diminishing the severity of Russian violations by attempting to equate them to WADA legal non-violations. It's a lose-lose situation, except for Russia. If it didn't appear in the Guardian, I would dismiss Barney Ronay as a Russian agent or troll, or maybe someone just highly unknowledgeable about athletics.

Rekrunner is correct. No way you can compare low levels of individuals doping in the UK with the massive systemic, government-supported cheating by the Russians.

Only the Grauniad, with it's self-hating anti-western pro-snowflakey liberal fascist sentiments would be stupid enough to suggest such a thing.

Its not a scale. Russian doping isn't being weighed against British athetes doping. Russia has a program of state sponsored doping and has taken steps to inhibit testing including deliberate lying and falsifying results. Actions by Brits have no impact on Russia's ban. There are a set of rules and Russia has to follow them to the t in order to be allowed to compete internationally. What any other country does will not affect whether Russia can compete. This is about Russia, not whataboutism on all the other countries with successful athletes. If I were in charge of sport on Russia, I'd fully cooperate with Wada, develop a strong antidoping culture, and develop a strong testing environment in which results are immediately made public and fully cooperates with international agencies. This is because I use logic and common sense though. Russia's response to their ban will likely be to cheat more, dope more, and try to use logical fallacies to throw people off. The Russians who come on letsrun are paid (maybe thats the best job they can find after studying english, maybe it just pays well) and have a script or outline which I doubt they even believe. I'd feel sorry for them if they actually believed the stuff they post.

british athletes take steroids,and whatever else they can get their hands on.im also pretty sure their cyclists,weightlifters,bodybuilders,rugby players and rowers are drugged up out of their skulls,and some of their swimmers as well.in athletics (apart from sprinting) their drug use isnt as systematic as russia's was,but its still pretty bad..

The Russians believe you can not be successful without doping...period. This goes way back to their Soviet days (nothing new there). Their primary objective is to DOMINATE the Olympics & WC. Were you old enough to remember Soviets in the 80s:

This:

"Russian three-time Olympic silver medallist Tatyana Firova has argued that athletes should be able to take banned substances, saying they would not “achieve high results” without them."

And this:

"Systematic doping in Russian sports has resulted in 43 Olympic medals were stripped from Russian athletes—the most of any country, more than four times the number of the runner-up, and more than 30% of the global total."

"43" freaking medals?!? Just thinking of that number is mind-blowing. It's a culture of doping like never seen before.

1) Farah is not British.

2) All East-Africans dope. No exceptions. All Kenyans and Ethiopians are juiced to the gills. We need country wide bans.

Igor wrote:

The Russians believe you can not be successful without doping...period. This goes way back to their Soviet days (nothing new there). Their primary objective is to DOMINATE the Olympics & WC. Were you old enough to remember Soviets in the 80s:

So do Americans. The corruption of anti doping authorities in this issue is being ignored.

El Keniano wrote:

And they're right.

https://www.theguardian.com/sport/blog/2019/dec/13/britain-moral-high-ground-london-2012?CMP=share_btn_tw

No, in fact, they are wrong. Russia and Russians are disgusting and amoral.