EDITORIAL - A sports program running on PR
Do you know why nobody was surprised when Philippine taekwondo jin Tshomlee Go bowed out of the competition right in the very first round? Because Philippine taekwondo officials have been boasting that he would redeem the country's image by winning the gold.
The same held true for Filipino boxer Harry Tañamor. When he was grossly outclassed by an African, the entire
That is half of how Philippine sports programs are being run. We are the only country on earth whose entire sports program runs on only two things — PR and gambling. If we are not heaping praises on our athletes before the game, we are betting on the outcome with millions.
That's right. That is what all those millions of pesos in reward money all add up to — as enticements that are no different from winnings in a gambling game. Never mind decent and proper training. We believe it is much faster to train athletes by tempting them with money.
Actually PR and reward money must go together. For how can any poorly trained athlete measure up to the exactingly high standards of world class competition unless he was psyched up by glowing lies about his chances and visions of quick cash.
But Filipinos are not blind to these things. They know they are being hoodwinked. That they have not risen up in protest thus far is only because it seems counter-productive and unpatriotic to be critical at the very moment of competition.
Yet how long are we going to put up with this charade. As this article was being written, the Beijing Olympics was already nearing the end, with the
Outside our own self-deluding perspectives, however, the rest of the world is measuring up. As of yesterday, even
Many severely disappointed Filipinos cannot help but wish that if only congressional inquiries and people power uprisings can only produce top caliber athletes, the
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