New London Olympics Logo

 

The above was sent to me by Byter Leo. 

At first I found it funny and no doubt many others will as well.

But the more I thought about it, the more I came to realise that it is also sad.

Remember back in 1999 when we were all hoping for the best with the 2000 Sydney Olympics?  There was concern at getting everything finished in time and as to whether the budget would go into the red or whether we would break even.  Would people travel the distance to Australia, would there be massive traffic jams, would we be able to host an Olympics that we would be proud of, would we be left with a large debt afterwards. 

Now, imagine that in 1999 Sydney had been the scene of large scale riots, looting and violence.  Imagine that public facilities had been destroyed and that substantial amounts of public money and personnel needed to be diverted  to the reisntatement of those facilities.  Imagine that the Olympic facilities timeframe was seriously affected, that the budget for the Olympics was in strife and that the same thing had happened in other towns and cities nearby, some of them also hosting Olympic events.  Worst of all, our Olympics, our endeavours and our hopes in relation to those Olympics had ruined by the actions of hoons and yobs.

Tarnished to the point that even the Olympic logo was used to make fun of our situation.

Sad.