[throwawaysea]

I’m with you - no one has even mentioned the Olympics to me in any way this time around. I saw the waning interest coming with the last couple Olympics as well. I think many factors contribute to this trend:

1. We have other ways to connect globally thanks to the internet, so we don’t need the Olympics to see a shallow representation of each country. YouTube is a better view into other cultures.

2. We are more aware of the impact and drawbacks of the Olympics, like the costs and associated corruption. It is incredibly irresponsible for any city to volunteer to host it.

3. The politics of the Olympics is not new but it is much more visible and easy to recognize, and that turns viewers off. Things like China having a female Uyghur light the Olympic torch.

4. We have other, better forms of entertainment that use up our limited time.

5. I think collectively there’s a pullback from broadcast sports even as there is a renewed interest in participating in sports personally. It’s not just the politics of it, although that has become a focus even outside the Olympics (NFL NBA etc). It’s that there is an absurdity to caring about what someone achieves when they throw away the rest of their life and just focus on a sport. Someone with that kind of focus in the interest of science is capable of producing lasting impact and move humanity forward. But with mass sports it’s just entertainment and vanity. I think there’s a rising consciousness around this aspect.