The Seine, a spectacle watched over by 75,000 security guards, military drones, snipers on the roofs and armored vehicles in the streets for a nautical show and concerts with big stars like Lady Gaga and Céline Dion. The Paris Olympics opened on Friday. And it has already been hours since France suffered organized sabotage of its high-speed train network, causing massive cancellations and delays. The sabotage has particularly affected Paris, causing serious traffic problems opening of the Olympic Games and on special days for leaving and entering holidays.
The Tokyo Covid Games were a kind of ghost ship, represented before empty plastic mega-dreams. Paris is somehow on a mission to fix this. The Olympics always need more heroes, new moments, new content. The next two weeks are crucial for that. The Olympics need the Olympics. And the Olympics need good Olympics.
These events are, in their own way, part of classical Western cultural imperialism. The modern Olympics emerged from Europe’s industrial boom of the late 19th century, a forum for the display of power, initially presented as a world’s fair of science, art, military might, and human splendor.
The world has changed. The way people consume entertainment has become atomized, less centralized, and more skeptical. Even the nature of Olympic competition—watching the canoe, enjoying the obstacle course, from another era—seems increasingly alien in an on-demand world.
The Games are always global. The biggest gamble is the amount of money invested in the clean-up of the Seine. Despite all the excesses, the show will always go on, but the next two weeks could be crucial in determining exactly how.
In the words of Étienne Thobois, quoted by The Guardian, executive director of Paris 2024: “We want a big party. And we want that party to be extraordinary.” It began with a flotilla of boats carrying thousands of athletes along the Seine, cheered on by hundreds of thousands of spectators, 220,000 of whom were free. Athletes will complete a 6km route along the river, passing the city’s most famous landmarks, while contemplating what organisers say is a “unique multi-sensory spectacle”.
The biggest and boldest opening ceremony in history ends with the official welcome in the Trocadero, with the Eiffel Tower in the background. It is a declaration of intent.
On the positive side, for the first time, female athletes will have equal places at the Games with men. In particular, the women's marathon and basketball finals – and not the men's final, as is traditional – will end these Games.
On the other hand, 20,024 people will have the chance to run the Olympic marathon on the same day as the best in the world. However, there is no escaping the high price of most tickets. Athletics, for example, costs 990 euros for “First Category” seats during the afternoon sessions, and 690, 385, 195 or 85 euros for AD category tickets. That said, one million tickets – about 10% – were sold for 24 euros.
And the brotherhood? This is where the greatest gap exists between words and harsh reality. The message of the International Olympic Committee has always been that the Games are the only event that brings the whole world together in peaceful competition. As usual, there will be an Olympic truce. Another thing is whether anyone will respect it.
As Michael Payne, the IOC’s senior marketing manager for multiple Games, told The Guardian: “It’s been decades since the Olympics have been held against such a conflicted backdrop. In many ways, the Palestinian issue is as delicate as the Ukrainian one. And there are several groups, who wouldn’t get much oxygen without the magnifying glass of the Olympics, who will try to do something. And that’s before we talk about the potential fallout from the French election or the controversy surrounding the 23 Chinese swimmers who were cleared by the World Anti-Doping Agency after initially testing positive.”