Something interesting came to my attention yesterday. I'm sure you may have heard, but in our country, for the 2010 games, the olympic medal winners are given monetary awards for reaching the podium. Yes, not a whole lot but that seems beside the point. It's financial recognition of their accomplishment. "A monetary award is given to all Canadian Olympians for each individual medal that they win at the Games: $20,000 for gold, $15,000 for silver and $10,000 for bronze" (http://www.olympicfoundation.ca/).
None of this is shocking so far. Until you find out what I did yesterday...
Did you know, we are rocking the Paralympics? 3 Gold, 3 Silver and 2 Bronze. None of these athletes will get any olympic money award. What?? Yup. That's right. Zip. Zilch. Nada. Now, I am not the first to address this injustice. CTV.ca even wrote a small article on it that no one seems to have taken much notice of. The question is WHY? Possible answers:
- Paralympians are not Olympians, because they are missing the letter "O" from their title
- Paralympians do not qualify because they participate in the Paralympics not the "O"lympics
Because otherwise, they fit into that quotation statement above "All Canadian Olympians".
I just feel like this is unfair. There is no other description that suits as well as just freaking unfair. I'm sure they train just as hard, in fact they overcome their physical barriers to prove to everyone they are international competition level athletes!
I would just like to end this with a suggestion. I understand that this payment does not come from the IOC. In fact many countries do not offer their athletes any sort of monetary gift for their podium accomplishments. BUT Canada is offering it - just not to everyone. I think that this is the perfect opportunity for a Canadian to step up to the plate. Canada AM was mentioning Jim Balsille of RIM and his never ending quest for NHL.... how about he put some of those funds he's so desperately trying to toss in the toilet towards recognising our amazing paralympic athletes? I'm sure he's not the only proud Canadian with funds that could help support our athletes, at least to some degree.
But dont worry, our government is focusing on more important issues.... like rewording the national anthem that everyone loves exactly the way it is. GOOFBALLS.. lol
Nice Leslie! A little investigative reporting!
ReplyDeleteApparently the Russian hockey players would get a new car + money if they got a gold or something. Might have to find the article I read again.
The Harper's, I mean Tories are goofballs.