Has the Olympic games ever banned colored sportsmen/sportswomen ? Has it ever been a game for the racists ?

Question

we are probably talking about Olypmic games before WW2 .

Answer 1

The modern Olympic Games were the idea of the Frenchman, Baron de Coubertin, and first held in Greece in 1896. Coubertin was a tremendous snob and felt the competitors should be drawn from the upper classes (e.g. the British team from Oxbridge and the Americans from Harvard & Yale). In fact no-one paid any attention to the silly old duffer and all classes of sportsmen and coloured athletes were always allowed to compete. Much of the ceremony we have today was in fact started by the Germans at the Berlin Olympics in 1936. Hitler, of course, was not very keen on Jewish competitors however those Games are best known for the exploits of the American negro, Jesse Owens. Hitler accussed the USA of fielding 'black auxiliaries' - meaning it was OK for negros to compete for America but they were treated as second class citizens as soon as they went home. This was rather too close to the truth and caused great offence in the USA.

Answer 2

Haggis Basher is wrong. The 1936 Munich Olympics were 3 years BEFORE ww2. The war put a stop to the Olympic games for obvious reasons. A nation cannot ban anyone on the grounds of colour. Hitler didn't want to ban black athletes in 1936 - he wanted to defeat them to prove white athletes were superior, but he got his eye wiped when black American athlete Jesse Owens won four gold medals. Hitler refused to shake hands with any non-German medal winners.

Hitler came to power in Germany in 1933, after the IOC had already selected Germany as the hosts. If Hitler had been in place when the decision was made, they would not have been awarded those games. The Olympiads of 1940 and 1944 were not held for obvious reasons. The games of 1948 were meant to be held in Japan, but since its devastation in WW2 it was deemed not ready to fulfill the commitment, and the 1948 games were given to London, who offered an 11th hour rescue package. This was seen as instrumental in awarding the 2012 games to London rather than Paris. London felt it had done the IOC a favour and was calling it in.

Answer 3

The re-invented Olympic Games in c1908 certainly were racist and class ridden as well. There were no black competitors only white middle class gentlemen.

It gets even worse.

Most of the ceremony surrounding the Olympic games, including the circles, owes its existence to the Nazis. They invented the lighting of the flame on Mount Olympus in Greece and the lighting of the flame in the Olympic Stadium.

None of what happens at the Olympic Games today really has very much to do with the original Classical Olympics in Greece. The first 'games' had only one event, the foot race, the sprint. The games were always named after the winner of this race. So, we did not have the London Olympics etc, we instead had the "Socrates Olympics", or whoever the athlete was who had won the sprint.

It took the Greeks another 60 years to add other events and another 100 to add more, including such as chariot racing. Pity we don't have that today really. Terrifying really.

Back in the days of the Classical Olympics, the boxing was probably the most dangerous of all events. The boxers wore heavy leather hand protection which cut the faces of their opponents to ribbons.

Really we're talking about a bunch of athletes who were really warriors in the strict sense of the word. Soldiers if you prefer. People got killed.

I guess the most racist Olympic Games were the Berlin Olympics of c1936. Jessie Owens, the world famous Black American athlete won so many events. Adolf Hitler refused to hand him his medal[s] at the award ceremony and stormed out of the stadium.

What Jessie Owens had done was to literally tear up the Nazi ideology of a superior arian race. Good for him.

In my humble opinion, the only good thing about the Olympic Games, is that no matter where it is held, the Greeks enter the Stadion to thunderous applause first. Quite right.

Jessie Owens, Olympian - we will remember you for ever.

Answer 4

haggisbasher came close to getting her info right however there were no olympics during world war 2 closed for the duration the games she is thinking of were in 1936 and the runner was jesse owens he proved hitler wrong about the master race by winning 4 gold medals.
To the best of my knowledge the olympics has never banned anyone due to the colour of their skin. I mean its against all that the games stand for.

Answer 5

Athletics have been in the Pre WWII and JC Ownes was one
of the most famous athlete. He won 4 gold medals and Hitler
would not shake his hands with him.....A slap in the face for
Hitler.

Banning is done only when the athlete has problems with
drugs and related issues. Even after winning, athletes have
been stripped of medals (famous one from Canada's 100 m).

I hope racism never comes to Olympics, but there will always
be bureaucracy. Racism is the mother of all illness in humanity.

Answer 6

During WW11 the Olympics were heard in Germany, Hitler was against any Jewish or black sports persons taking part, but the Americans sent a black runner who did in fact win his race and Hitler refused to shake hands with him.

Answer 7

in 1936 the games were held in nazi germany ....where hitler hated the fact that jessie owens humped his his own master class of athelete's,,,,,,,,,,,,thats about all ah can think of that you might mean.....hope that help's

Answer 8

No, but they used to ban women.

Answer 9

If they banned a white person what would that be?

Answer 10

No I don't think so.
http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-59611/Olympic-Games