Episode 213: Unforgettable 2020/21 Olympic Moments
In this episode, Lindsay Gibbs, Amira Rose Davis and Brenda Elsey discuss their favorite moments of the 2020/21 Tokyo Olympic Games. From their favorite couples to World Record finishes to many athletes breaking the mold of what athletes "should" do or who they "should" be, the team revels in a little bit of Olympic joy and also dig into the darker moments of the games.
Next, they burn all the garbage in sports this week on the Burn Pile. Then they celebrate those shining light and changing sports for the good, including Torchbearer's of the Week: Women's Canadian Soccer Team Gold Medal Champions! We are so happy for you. They wrap up the show with what's good in their lives and what they are watching in sports this week.
This episode was produced by Tressa Versteeg. Shelby Weldon is our social media and website specialist. Burn It All Down is part of the Blue Wire podcast network.
Transcript
Lindsay: Hello, hello, hello flamethrowers. This is Lindsay here. Welcome to this week's episode of Burn It All Down, the feminist sports podcast that you both want and need. I am joined today by Amira and Brenda. Once again, me and the professors! I love when this happens, [Brenda laughs] and I feel like it happens a lot when I'm hosting, [Amira laughs] you know. It’s just like, Lindsay, if you're not neurotic enough about your lack of degrees, host the conversation with the professors every single time you're host! [laughter] But anyways, that's my own business. [laughs]
Brenda: Not anymore. [laughter] [Lindsay groans]
Amira: Not anymore!
Lindsay: But anyways. Hi! We're so glad you're here. This week we're gonna do a little Olympic roundup, even though, disclaimer, we’re recording this on Saturday morning so there are a few events that have not wrapped up. So, it is what it is.
Amira: But hell, we've survived 16 days of the Olympics. We're going to go ahead and call it!
Lindsay: We're going to do it. We're going to do it.
Amira: It’s over. Congratulations.
Lindsay: First of all, we want to thank our patrons, patreon.com/burnitalldown. If you want to support us, that is the way to do it. I think one of the tiers is like $2 a month, and you get access to some behind the scenes stuff, to some special pop-up events. I want to get right into it though. This week, we're going to be going through some of our favorite moments from this Olympic games. And then we're going to be having some conversations on like mental health and also, you know, the dark side, the bad side of the Olympics, and remembering to put this all into context. But first, look, the Olympics, there's a lot of hot people competing in the Olympics. That's just kind of the nature of it, right? And sometimes these hot people are couples. They are together. And then they're like these hot, superhero couples, and that's fun. So I thought we'd talk about it.
Amira: There was a funny tweet that was like, every time they pan to somebody who's like boyfriend or husband or fiancé or wife or whatever, they're like just once I want them to be like, “and this is Susie, Susie hates sports. This is Chad. Chad can not run at all.” And every time instead they're like, and here's the wife, who's also a triple gold medalist in…Beam crossing…Or, you know, something.
Brenda: And, “Studying to be a cardiac surgeon…” [laughs]
Amira: Exactly, exactly.
Lindsay: So, I just thought we'd start our favorite Olympic couples; the only disclaimer for this one is, you know, you need to be in both in this Olympics, both competing in the Tokyo games, because if we broaden it beyond that, we would never end. Amira, please tell me about my favorite Tik Tok couple.
Amira: Yes. They’re my favorite on Tik Tok, and I would check out their blog. Tara Davis, who's a long jumper for Team USA, and a UT alum, and Hunter Woodhall, who is in the Paralympics, who is a track athlete. They are the cutest motherfuckers on this planet. They met at a track meet in high school in Idaho – neither of them are from Idaho, they were just at this random indoor meet that nobody wanted to be at. And then they spent the whole meet thinking each other were cute. Tara finally like slid in his DMs later, and then they basically started building their Tik Tok, vlog-ish, YouTube personalities all through college. So we got to see both of their careers really build together.
And then of course at US trials back in June, both of them making the Olympic and Paralympic team at the same time, within a day of each other, just kind of cemented them. And I think it's really special if you've watched them really from high school develop this relationship and both of their crafts. So, they are just joy personified, and I love even though they can't be together in Tokyo because the Para games are not for another few weeks, the way they've supported each other is beautiful and lovely. So, definitely Tara Davis and Hunter.
Lindsay: I agree. Bren?
Brenda: So, this is overdetermined and obvious, but Megan Rapinoe and Sue Bird. I think it's fine to have, you know, annoyingly overexposed homecoming queens [laughs] at this Olympics. There's ways in which I feel that it's become kind of almost like too branded of a relationship for me to love that much. And then each one of them will go and do something so endearing and so amazing that I, you know…Like the Olímpico, and Megan Rapinoe just being like, we got our asses kicked, and yeah. She's never lost to Australia and she's just…She’s just super swaggy. They both are. It's hot.
Lindsay: I agree.
Brenda: I think it's cool. They're over the radar.
Lindsay: Yeah, and this is probably their last Olympics, you know what I mean? Like for both of them. And what legends.
Amira: I do like how when Megan was reflecting on if it was their last, she was like, listen, we need to plan our futures together, because of one of us retires and the other one is still like doing stuff, it will be seriously FOMO. And like we can't, we have to be on the same page about this. [laughs]
Brenda: Yeah. So, Sue's 40. Megan’s 36. So, next go around would be 40 and 44. I'm feeling like, yeah, that might not happen–
Amira: There’s just three years!
Lindsay: There’s just three years. Yeah. 43, yeah.
Brenda: True. Well, Rapinoe has never been fast, and she's brilliant, but she can't slow down anymore. I mean, it'll just make the whole game too boring, but I love her. I love them both. That’s mine.
Lindsay: Okay. I have two, because yeah, I just do. So we've talked about them before, we've had Ysaora on the show before, but Ysaora Thibus and Race Imboden, the fencing couple. She's from France. He's from America. They're both very hot–
Amira: Multinational love!
Lindsay: And they both won medals at this Olympic! So, she got a silver and he got a bronze, or vice versa. Anyways, they both got medals as the most important part. So they're just like hot people with medals. And then the couple I just found out about, which is Sam Kerr and Kristie Mewis, which is just like…What! I mean, if you have not seen the photos of Kristie consoling Sam after USA beats Australia, and they are like nuzzling on the pitch, like, they are nuzzling!
Amira: The deep dive I sent to Jessica was the people who had gone through their IG comments over the last few months to see how they have been talking.
Lindsay: Apparently all my lesbian friends have known about this. This has been in the group chats. And I'm very mad at everyone for not–
Brenda: We would’ve assumed you knew.
Lindsay: That's what everyone has told me! [laughter] But look, you guys, I’ve been busy! There’s been a lot going on, okay?
Brenda: But the hilarious thing is the way the media portrayed that nuzzling as what “good friends” they are.
Lindsay: Sportsmanship! [laughs]
Amira: That’s right. Somebody put the Spongebob gif like–
Brenda: No, everybody responded and said, “They are lesbians, idiots.” What are you doing?
Lindsay: “They’re lesbians, Stacey,” was like the tweet… [laughter]
Brenda: She’s like, “Look at how people from the US are generous and friendly,” and it's like, um, they're dating…
Lindsay: So good. Okay. Let's go to our lightning round. We want to quickly recap some of our most memorable moments of the game, the ones that just like, you know, we're gonna remember. Amira, you want to get us started? We're trying to do lightning round style, which, if you know Burn It All Down, you know is very hard for us, but because we want to get through a lot here we're gonna to go quick about, one minute. Okay. Amira.
Amira: Yeah. So obviously, one of the biggest takeaways from the games will be Simone and the conversation that she generated about you know, twisties and mental health and safety and whatnot. But her return to the beam and the way that everybody cheered for her will live in my mind. Like, especially her dismount…Suni, you can see Suni Lee in the background literally bending and twisting. She looks like me watching sports, like, almost trying to will her to do it with her own body, and she's cheering. And then Jordan sobbing, but still being cute, like trying to catch the cry right before it turns into an ugly cry. I was like, all of us were Jordan right there, except I definitely did not catch the cuteness and I was just ugly-crying in my living room at like 6:30 in the morning. So that, watching Simone do that, grab bronze on beam, and her smile was worth it, all her smile and her beaming and the cheers and her support system. That to me was a sweet, sweet moment. Absolutely.
Lindsay: Yes! And just also Simone as a cheerleader too, just period. Like, you could hear Simone in the stands when she was sitting out, cheering for her teams, like during Jade Carey’s floor routine, over and over and over again!
Amira: And not just her. Literally every gymnast there, like, if there was a single gymnast on the beam or floor whatever, it would be, “Come on, you got this!” She's cheering on the Chinese gymnast who won gold on beam. She was like, “You got this! You can do it!” Like the biggest coach there.
Lindsay: Amazing. Okay. I’m gonna go. This is a little bit, I mean, everyone has said this, but it still deserves celebration.
Lindsay: Oh my gosh.
Amira: I love it.
Lindsay: I get chills just thinking about it. Okay. So, what you heard there is two high jumpers, Gianmarco Tamberi of Italy, and Mutaz Barshim of Qatar, who shared first place because they decided they didn't want to do a jump off for the Olympic men's high jump. And they are like, best friends, apparently. Tamberi was at Barshim’s wedding–
Amira: And he helped him back.
Lindsay: Yeah. They helped each other back from injury.
Amira: Yeah. Marco was like injured, and he was the one who helped him get back into the sport. So it was just so beautiful.
Lindsay: So, Gianmarco Tamberi is like the epitome of the Italian hugger. Like, he is just so great at hugging. And seconds after he won, Marcell Jacobs won the 100 meter gold in men's running on the track. And so then Tamberi got to run over to him and celebrate, you know, winning two track and field golds for Italy. And they're both his best friends. Like, Jacobs is also his best friend! [laughs] So he just like won gold with all of his best friends.
Amira: Hashtag #friendshipgoals.
Lindsay: Brenda?
Brenda: Yeah, I think that one of my favorite moments was watching Sifan Hassan, the runner who runs for the Dutch, but originally left Ethiopia at 15 as a refugee from Ethiopia. She is a middle distance runner and normally her strategy is to hang back. But that strategy often comes with a price, and it comes with sometimes falling a lot. So in the women's 1500m, there was a prelim. And the 1500 meters, for those of us not rational enough to use the metric system, is just under a mile. And two other runners fell, she fell over. And I just am amazed how she doesn't even wince. She just gets right up, runs in a full-out sprint and won that fucking heat. She ended up with a bronze, but later won gold in the 5,000 and 10,000 meter, but she ends up with a bronze in that. It's like staying with your strategy, a testament to staying with your game, believing in your strategy, believing in yourself. Her eyes are absolutely immediately on the finish line. She doesn't take a second to think about like, oh, that sucks. You know? Aw, dammit. She doesn't look askance of the person that she tripped over. She's just like, okay, here we go. It was…I don't know, it just blew me away.
Amira: Yeah, I'll stay on the track, because I want to shout out Jasmine Camacho-Quinn, who I already shouted out last week in the torchbearers, but just, that was the moment for me when she won gold for Puerto Rico in the hundred meter hurdles, it was like so phenomenal to watch her celebrate. Like, “I did it and it!” And it was like, yes, like girl, you’re a badass. Syd McLaughlin in the 400 meters, right next to Dalilah Muhammad and Anna Cockrell, of course, was in that final as well. Watching her buss that world record open was just phenomenal. And then of course, Allyson Felix, getting bronze in the 400 meters was super sweet. Like, those track moments, especially the kind of relief and disbelief that people have on their face when they cross the finish line, are absolutely some of my favorite what’s good moments from these games. And we have a clip of the 400 meter hurdle race…
Commentator: Dalilah Muhammad's quest to defend her gold medal begins now!
Commentator: Watch for Dalilah, she is masterful…
Amira: Yeah. Look at Syd – because Dalilah gets out faster…
Commentator: Overtaking Anna Cockrell…Sydney McLaughlin, much more relaxed down this backstretch.
Commentator: And now she's going to make her move to try to get back in touch–
Amira: Her flat speed is ridiculous.
Commentator: This is what happened at the world championships. McLaughlin had to run down Dalilah Muhammad. McLaughlin checks fellow 21 year old Femke Bol off the list. Now it's the race to the line, Sydney McLaughlin is brining it took Dalilah Muhammad! Muhammad’s trying to hold! McLaughlin is on the inside to the line! It’s going to be Sydney's time again! And that's a world record again, McLaughlin 51:47.
Amira: It's just wild, it’s wild!
Lindsay: Amazing.
Amira: It’s just wild. who runs a sub 52 in the 400 meter hurdles!? You're jumping over motherfucking hurdles! And who sets a world record at trials, and then literally shaves off enough time for a new world record weeks later, like, people train for years to shave off half a second! Everything about the 400 meter on both the men's and women's side this year has been–
Lindsay: Hold on, you're spoiling it! [laughs]
Amira: Oh yeah! Sorry. I forgot. I forgot. It's just, I was so caught up in the magic!
Lindsay: Leading into one of my favorite moments, which was the men's 400 meter hurdles race, which Karsten Warholm from Norway won by running 45.95 seconds. He took 0.75 seconds off his previous world record–
Amira: Which is wild!
Lindsay: 0.75, and he set that on July 1st, and all the top three…So, Rai Benjamin got silver. He also set what would have been a world record this race, had Warholm not, you know, smashed his world record. And then the bronze medalist from Brazil, Alison dos Santos, finish in 46.72, which, had he run that on June 31st or June…How many days are in June? Anyways, the last day of June, would have been a world record. So, we had three of the fastest times in history in this event all happen in this one race, which is just so good. So good. And then he tried to rip off his shirt, Warholm did, but he couldn't, and I just thought that–
Amira: [laughs] Which…I like the tweet after Syd won and they were like, she won and she didn't even rip off her shirt!
Lindsay: Yeah. All right. Bren?
Brenda: I thought it was a really sweet moment…This’ll be super lightning. When team refugee walked in for the inaugural ceremonies, this time instead of 10 athletes, there were 29. So it felt like it was a little bit more of a community and a celebration. Sadly, come to find out many of them had requested to get the second vaccine, which was supposed to be available to athletes. And they were told that they weren't a priority because they probably wouldn't go forward in heat and preliminaries. So this has just come out recently, and is a little sad for me to think back that some of them might have felt scared or nervous because it just looked so…It's just so important to say these are stateless people, and here's an actual platform, and they look so happy and matchy, and…I don't know. It was heartwarming for me.
Lindsay: I love that. Amira?
Amira: So, yeah, I felt like this is like second week bias because it's in my head. So, I wanted to definitely shout out swimming and watching Katie Ledecky race down that last part of the relay.
Lindsay: It was a 4 x 200, I think. Yeah. 4 x 200 free. Yeah.
Amira: Yeah. And get them on the medal stand. Remember, that was exhilarating. It also feels like forever ago. It literally feels like a month ago at this point. I think the random moments for me, I couldn't decide if it was men’s shot put. It was the same three finishers as in Rio, but watching them push each other to new world record, it was phenomenal. But I think it really goes back to my first week moment that me and Samari watched together that I can't stop laughing at, which was the end of the men's triathlon. And I talked about it before on the show so I won't belabor the point, but again, watching the champion come down in utter disbelief that he was about to cross the finish line first, and then everybody collapsed at the end. The triathlon is a monster event. And I won't forget that look of sheer disbelief and joy on their faces as they crossed the finish line.
Lindsay: Amazing. You know, I don't like to give NBC credit for much, but the viewing parties at home and the way they would show the viewing parties to the medalist, like right after they won, that was pretty cool, to have these cameras, to be able to see how everyone back home was celebrating. And I think I'm going to remember a few in particular. In Alaska when Lydia Jacoby won her gold medal in the 100 meter breaststroke…They say, “act like you've been there before,” and Alaska had never been there before, and they did not even pretend like they had. The celebration from that viewing party was one of the best things in the Olympics.
And I’ll also remember Caleb Dressel after winning his first individual gold, being shown his family and just kind of breaking down in tears. And that was really, really moving. And then the celebration from the entire county of Fiji after they won, I believe it was rugby sevens, the gold in rugby sevens, that celebration was just remarkable. So I think, you know, those viewing parties and kind of getting into people's living rooms, I hope that there are ways that that kind of continues. I think it just brings a lot to watching to see how families and everything are reacting. So that was cool. Bren, bring us home.
Brenda: Yeah. Well, I'm a killjoy. So here you go. I had the actual opposite in the document, which is I'm going to remember how disgustingly patriotic is NBC. I'm sorry, but like, it was like…I just didn't think it was cool the way they covered so many of the international athletes, like just starting with the US-Sweden game, you know, “The US are just stunned!” It's like, they are not stunned. There are other athletes from other countries that are actually quite good at their jobs. And their watch parties in India were off the hook. And so it's true. Sometimes they would like feature it. But for the most part, I found it incredibly frustrating that instead of just being proud of the US athletes, it felt like they had to defeat every other nation or they were like disappointed, and that it wasn't interesting or a rivalry, if it didn't involve a US person. If a US person couldn't possibly gold, then like why would we watch?
And that, for me, felt really annoying. So, I don't know. That's what I took away from it. Like, it was typical. And I don't think that's true of like every journalist, but I think it's just the way NBC crafts it, and they try to get people who aren't really into sports on board through kind of being like the only thing you all must care about are, you know, these particular athletes. I mean, that's just my view, but you all can argue. [laughs]
Lindsay: Well, I would've loved to see viewing parties from, you know, all the winners, you know what I mean?
Brenda: Exactly. I know.
Lindsay: All the winners, no matter the country, I would always love to get to know all the athletes a little bit more.
Brenda: Yeah, exactly. And I love the Alaska thing. I mean, those high schoolers are charming. They were lovely! I just thought to myself, like, dang, couldn't we get more into some rivalries that don't involve just the US? But you know…
Lindsay: Brenda…
Brenda: I know.
Lindsay: You’re so optimistic. [Brenda laughs] So…Look at you, look at you. I think the rest of us just gave up hope on that a long time ago. [laughs]
Brenda: You're right. You're right. You're right.
Lindsay: Alright. So, mental health was a big topic. And I want to say, the interview for this week, which will be out on Thursday, is with Imani McGee-Stafford, WNBA player and law student. And you know, we kind of dive deep into topics on mental health and athletes and Simone Biles, but, you know, I wanted to ask you guys, I mean, I can't remember an Olympics where mental health was a bigger topic conversation. Do we think that Simone’s kind of openness will really like change things? Or is this a situation where it’s just a lot of virtue signaling, and then like we return immediately to business as usual?
Amira: Yeah, that part, that one.
Lindsay: Yeah. [laughs]
Amira: I mean, I think that what's interesting about it is that the discourse with Simone opened up about mental health. But I think that in the rush to kind of simplify narratives, as the media does, as Brenda was just mentioning, in part. It made it only that, and we missed the connection between mental and physical health. She was like, this is a mental block that could hurt my physical wellbeing. And part of the conversation is how we can contend with these together and how we think about it more robustly. And when I talked to a lot of the Black women on Team USA, that's one of the questions I put to them are like, are we even having the right conversation? Like, in our framework of it? And I think that that's why I'm like, a lot of the stuff with Simone, you could see how the discourse shifted from this kind of broader conversation to a narrative about her. And I actually think her getting back on the beam in the media's eyes punctuates that narrative, right?
But the reason why I still say yes and no is because what Simone said is the reception she got in the village, right? The way other athletes are talking about this. And so in my view, if any athlete at any level cites this or uses this moving forward to make their own decision, then I think that's the impact worth celebrating. I don't have much hope for how the framing of it will continue, but I do think that it opened up not a conversation, but actually a pathway of possibility for other people watching.
Lindsay: Yeah. And you know, Imani and I talk about this a little bit, but one of the things that I started seeing things get out of control in multiple ways narrative-wise, but when it was A) like, Simone doesn't owe you anything, look at all her medals. And you know, to me, that's kind of implying, like, if you don't have all those medals, you don't have the right to make these decisions. And then also, you know, in a way like the, the conversation with her, because of how dangerous gymnastics was, because of this mental block, the twisties, you know, it became kind of a really life or death almost situation. Her physical health was seriously, seriously in danger, which I think in some ways made the decision a little bit easier to justify and easier to understand, but we’ve got to find a middle ground where you don't actually have to be at the risk of being paralyzed and you don't have to have be the most decorated Olympian of all to decide that it's more healthy for you to take a break and step away. But that's a lot of nuance, and I don't know how to get there. Bren?
Brenda: I wish that there had been a bit more emphasis also on the trauma that she's gone through with USAG. I just felt like that could have been recognized a little bit more, that she was competing for the very organization that had facilitated her harm, and how much pressure it was for her to constantly be the face of, you know, the last victim, maybe the person who had to kind of keep reminding people of what these women had gone through. And I'm not saying that that has everything to do with it, but I felt like some more culpability should have been continuously placed on USAG, which I guess we could say every single week. But that connection there about how like she wasn't sort of nurtured in any way, but quite the opposite. And so you're really out there on your own in so many ways, trying to take care of yourself.
Lindsay: Absolutely. So, going into this Olympics, we were very frank about the fact that we didn't really believe that they were supposed to happen, you know, how dangerous they were and how fucked up the kind of Olympics as an enterprise are, despite the fact that we have a lot of moments of joy, as well as we talked about at the beginning. But I mean, I just kind of want to ask for any reflections you have on the Tokyo games and just the fact that like we got through this two weeks, like, does that change your mind any on whether or not it was responsible to go forward with them in the first place? Amira? You're making a face.
Amira: Yeah, not a single day.
Lindsay: Yeah. [laughs]
Amira: Not a single solitary bit. In fact, something else happened this week that just punctuates the blatant disregard that the IOC continues to have and has had for Japan, for safety, for people on the ground. This past week of course, was the anniversary of Hiroshima, when the United States harmed, burned, killed, maimed many of people in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, dropping atomic bombs on them. And the mayor of Hiroshima and the government had asked the IOC to do a moment of silence on this day while they were in Japan to acknowledge this. And they denied it. They denied it – this comes weeks after Thomas Bach broke COVID protocols to do a photo op at Hiroshima before the games, despite people there petitioning to cancel the games. Definitely not fucking with this photo shoot. And that to me is the reminder of who we're dealing with, right? As long as the IOC is doing this, they're still going to have blatant disregard for health over any level of decency for a number of topics.
But just to me, getting to this week and then having like one moment to do something right and just do a moment of silence while you're in Japan, and to not do that shows the continued disregard and disrespect. If it's not about the bottom line, right? If it's not about that profit of the games, if it's not about putting them on at any cost, then the IOC doesn't give a damn. And that in and of itself is what we were concerned about. And we've watched it play out in front of our eyes. So, no, it doesn't change my feelings about it. I'm happy that people are healthy. I'm happy for people who had a good experience. And I'm also thinking of the number of people who aren’t, and who were harmed, and will continue to be harmed as the Olympics leaves town.
Lindsay: Yeah. Bren.
Brenda: Yeah, boy, did we call this? [laughs] Like, I feel like Burn It All Down covered every single thing that we were worried about. We pretty much predicted, and were excited about, also. I think first of all, we saw this week, the COVID infection spreading outside of Tokyo more and more and more rapidly. And so they hit the morbid milestone of a million cases. That was really sad to see. We saw the effects of global warming on the games. We saw….Though at the same time, like we said, conversations about those very aspects of the games. And I do think that there are sports thinkers, I do think my co-hosts are among them, and others, who are using this to start these conversations and are even more radical in many ways than typical progressive media folks. My mom heard Lindsay on NPR this week, randomly in her car.
Lindsay: [laughs] Aw.
Brenda: You know, Amira was all over the place. So these are good opportunities for really smart and critical thinkers to get in on some of these conversations. I guess the last thing that I'll just say is we didn't quite predict this, but it is predictable every Olympics, that despite the narrative of coming together and, oh, “we are the world,” that actually this Olympics has caused some degree of tension and even xenophobic tension in east Asia. The Japanese have an election this year, and so there's a lot hanging in the balance. A lot of journalists have noted that the bad feelings that it can cause, the way it's being reported between Japanese, South Korean and Chinese media, has seemed worsened. The South Korean delegation refused to eat in the dining hall, citing concerns with the quality of Japanese food.
Or we saw, for example, the Chinese badminton player, Chen Qingchen, who was accused of being very foulmouthed – well, I guess she was – and said “fuck” during her match. And the badminton Korean association has now filed a huge complaint against her, saying she violated sports ethics. So anyway, going forward, we saw that it's not all sort of kumbaya. In fact, there's ways in which going forward the media may use this, different political forces may use this to incite tension among countries or between countries.
Amira: Not to mention that there's already a tension on display that's only going to continue to be carried forward. For instance, in badminton, you had a win by what the Olympic committee calls “Chinese Taipei,” which was a deal brokered in the 70s with the Taiwanese Olympic committee, because of course Beijing refuses to recognize the island of Taiwan, as they believe they have no right for recognition in any sphere, especially the Olympics sphere. So the deal brokered was they compete without their flag and without their anthem under the name Chinese Taipei. However, after winning badminton gold, the team from Chinese Taipei retweeted it and said, “I'm from Taiwan," which got of course a lot of support. And this is something, of course, that is not going to go lightly away, especially given that the next games are going to be in Beijing, in the Olympic cycle.
And it reminds us that there's a lot that goes into the names and flags and anthems that we see, or don't see. Along those lines, of course, there's going to be continued scrutiny on the Russian Olympic committee. Who of course, despite Russian being banned, the Russian committee of athletes was everywhere winning a bunch of medals. And then of course we see political happenings coming up in individual athletics as well when individual athletes are having issues with their nation state. Right, Lindsay?
Lindsay: Yeah. It's really tough when you think about, you know, the nationalism and the pride, and we see like the celebrations in Fiji and all these things where there's this positive nature for winning for your country, but there's a lot of negative here too. And you know, what we saw happening in Belarus is just really extremely disturbing. So, we had Kristina Timanovskaya, who is a sprinter from Belarus, who criticized her coaches during the games because they literally out of nowhere wanted her to run in the 400 meter relay, even though she had not prepared for that at all. They entered her into it, and she felt that it would damage her chances in the 200 meter sprint, which was her marquee event. And so she criticized them and immediately her coaches tried to force her home. She talked to her family back in Belarus and they said that the media was being so critical of her and they literally felt her life would be in danger if she went back to Belarus.
So she ended up landing in Poland, and Poland is kind of helping shield her for now. She's seeking political asylum now in Poland, but you know, apparently her criticism of the coaches was seen as criticism of the Olympic committee in Belarus, and the Olympic committee is run by the son of the authoritarian president Alexander Lukashenko. And Lukashenko told these players before these games kind of jokingly – but also, given what's going on in the country, this is not at all a joke – you know, “come home with medals or come home not at all.” And so it's just really disturbing what's going on, and you think these athletes…I mean, talk about lack of autonomy. Talk about lack of being able to take care of yourself. I mean, everything's at risk. And I don't know, it's just a really dark side to all of this.
This week, as I mentioned, on Thursday, you will hear my interview with Imani McGee-Stafford, who gets really candid about how to set boundaries and take care of your mental health as an athlete. And I'll admit it, I opened up about some of my stuff too. It's definitely a meaningful conversation.
Imani McGee-Stafford: And I think like the hardest part, I've always said, with dealing with mental health, is that it's something you can't see. You can't see it. If I break an ankle, cut my arm, you get it, because you see it, and you can be like, okay, I empathize with you. I see your pain, whatever. But when you're having a mental health situation, you can't see that. Especially if I don't have like the hallmarks of what dealing with mental illness looks like, right?
Lindsay: Okay, friends, it is time for the burn pile. Whew. [laughs] I’ve got one that I honestly never thought this would be on a burn pile. I literally never ever thought that I would have to burn something like this, which just says a lot because our burn pile is wide-ranging. This week The Athletic published an interview with OJ Simpson about his “complicated” legacy. Yes. That is a real thing I just read. The Athletic is looking back at kind of identifying the best 100 players in football history and as part of that, I guess, they thought Tim Graham should seek out OJ Simpson and talk with him. Now they say that, you know, OJ knew that this was not going to be…That they were going to address his past in the piece, that this wasn't going to be like, you know, a fluff piece. But I read it, because I was going to burn it.
So I actually read it, and it's pretty damn fluffy. [laughs] There’s just a lot of fluff in there, friends! If you control-F for the words “domestic violence,” that doesn't come up until the comments when people are pointing out. So it only talks about whether or not he was guilty of murder, and none of the actual known domestic violence, you know, the ways that he has admitted, he pled guilty to, he was a convicted domestic abuser. You know, it has OJ Simpson bragging about his lifestyle now, talking about how many people love to take photos with him and really glamorizing his life. I'm honestly…Like, OJ Simpson is glamorizing his life and they are giving him the column inches to do it.
In the opener and the lead of the piece, they talk about OJ sipping a Bloody Mary. I can’t…I can actually not with any of this bullshit. A list of 100 players is completely subjective. Nobody is forcing you to include OJ Simpson in it. Nobody will miss him if he's gone, and murder and domestic violence are completely legitimate reasons to exclude someone from a list like this. Just completely legitimate, 100% legitimate. And if you do put him on the list, do not tell me you grappled with his past sins when you did not. When you were not at all. So burn, burn, burn burn burn.
All: Burn.
Lindsay: Bren?
Brenda: I am going to burn – and this is not the first time, and I'm sure it won't be the last – the football club Juventus, from Italy, for…I don't know who the fuck works for them. I don't know who they hired to do this. I don't know how many people are virulent racists in that organization, but apparently a lot. It's also a club, remember, that takes from its workers’ salaries to pay for Ronaldo’s security protection so he can not be served to face rape charges. So, there’s that. But Juventus women tweeted out a picture of a player with…Her name is Cecilia Salvai, and she's pulling her eyes, with a training cone on her head, a very anti-Asian, a very racist pose. It's incredible that it got out. It's incredible that it was done in the first place. I cannot believe it.
And then to add to the burn pile, their apology says, “We sincerely apologize that our tweet, which was not meant to cause controversy or have any racial undertones, may have offended anyone. Juventus has always been against racism and discrimination.” Not true. Not true. Not true. Not true. No, they haven't. They've always been. Take out “against,” racist and discriminatory. Not against either of those things. Then “hashtag #DifferencesMakeTheDifference.” What the fuck is that? It's incredibly meaningless. They want their racism to be uncontroversial and their racial undertones to be pasty white. We all know–
Amira: It’s not even undertones!
Brenda: It’s…That’s enough. Burn, burn, burn.
All: Burn.
Lindsay: Amira.
Amira: I just can't get over the fact that they were like “racial undertones” – no, overtones! [laughter] This is blatant. This is not even…Anyways. Yeah. I want to burn just another example of how profit is being prioritized over athlete health and safety at the good old Olympic games. This time, looking at the women's gold medal match for football, because it was slated to kick off here in the states at a reasonable 10:00pm, which is teed up for a United States primetime audience. Why? The assumption was that the US women would be in the gold medal game. That is why the scheduling was like that. Ask me what time that would have been locally? In the middle of the morning in Tokyo, in the summer, where the heat was basically a hundred degrees Fahrenheit over. It was about 38, 39 degrees Celsius. That is that is fucking hot. In a fishbowl that's only gonna make it feel hotter.
Why are we having the Tokyo Olympics in the summer anyways? Oh, because the Olympic organizers lied about the weather, despite the fact that the summer games in 1964, when they were in Tokyo, were held in October. Why? Because it's hot as hell in Japanese summers! And this was known. Ask me why it was known? Oh, I'll tell you. Because the athletes were forced to sign IOC waivers, both mitigating any liability if they were to get COVID. This is literally the text of the waivers they signed: “I agree that I participate in the games at my own risk and own responsibility, including any impact on my participation to and performance in the games, bodily injury, or even death raised by the potential exposure to health hazards such as the transmission of COVID-19 or extreme heat conditions.” Why is extreme heat conditions right next to COVID-19? Because they knew it was going to happen.
They're scheduling events with not an eye to where the sun's going to be in the sky and how hot you might be, but when we can get the most eyeballs on it and viewership numbers for TV revenue profit. That is disgusting. I am glad that the Canadian and Swedish Olympic committees were able to put pressure on and change that gold medal match. I also feel like the only way they were able to do it is citing the fact that the US women's national team wasn't still in there. I think that there's a fair chance that if they did, the IOC would push back a lot on moving that game. And that's a shame, because it was a wonderful game and it was a better game because it was played in conditions where they could actually breathe and play and succeed. And the fact that that's not the fucking point of scheduling in the first place is disgusting, and just another reminder of why the IOC is a constant member of our burn pile, and today is no different. Burn it down.
All: Burn.
Lindsay: Whew. All right. After all that burning, we have some torchbearers of the week. I do want to say, this is the Olympics. There is no way to get everyone in here! I tried to focus this list on some people we didn't highlight in the beginning that we haven't talked about yet. But congratulations to all of the Olympic competitors for making it here and for performing on the biggest stage and, you know, for all the hard work. We love you all. So that is my caveat. Don't yell at me. Okay. Brenda, who was our perfectionist of the week?
Brenda: China’s Quan Hongchan, who scored not one but two perfect tens on her dive in her very first international competition in the women's 10 meter platform final. No splash! And she is only 14 years old.
Lindsay: Oh, and she won gold. I forgot to put that in the text. She won gold. [laughs] Sorry. Amira, who are our sisters of the week?
Amira: That would be Kawai Yukako of Japan who won Olympic gold in the women's 62kg weight class, and exactly 24 hours later, literally down to the minute, her sister Kawai Risako won gold in the 57kg weight class. Risako, who earned Olympic gold in 2016, made a run for the Olympics in a lower weight class to provide her sister with the best chance of qualifying for the Olympic teams. And now, look, they're both gold medalists!
Brenda: Aww!
Lindsay: All right, our trailblazer, or…I don't know what the word for water is. Water…Can you have a trail in water? I don't know. But anyway! [laughs]
Amira: Water benders!
Lindsay: This is the first year that women have been allowed to canoe in the Olympics; before it was only kayak, which is just ridiculous. And so I want to congratulate Jessica Fox of Australia, Xu Shixiao and Sun Mengya of China, and Nevin Harrison of the USA, for winning the inaugural golds in the three events in the sport. And I apologize if those pronunciations were wrong. We did research, but it is hard to find. So, I wanted to congratulate all of them. Bren, who are our fireworks of the week?
Brenda: Elaine Thompson-Herah, Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce, Briana Williams and Shericka Jackson from Jamaica who won gold in the 4x100 relay on Jamaica’s independence day.
Lindsay: See, fireworks? See what I did there?
Brenda: Yeah, I see that. [laughter]
Lindsay: Amira, who’s our 11 time Olympic medalist of the week.
Amira: That would be Allyson Felix, who surpassed Carl Lewis' American record to become the most decorated American Olympian in track and field history. She won bronze at the 400 meters and gold in a 4x400 relay where the gap between first and second was massive. Allyson Felix is also my Peloton friend, hashtag #PelotonMoms. [Lindsay laughs] Shoutout to you, Allyson.
Lindsay: Oh my god. Okay. Our unexpected flip of the week is Gable Steveson, who won gold in wrestling after a last second takedown, and punctuated it with an unexpected backflip that you really need to see. And can I get a drum roll, please, for our torchbearers of the week?
[drumroll]
She couldn't be on the episode with us today, but we have a special guest here to talk about our torchbearers of the week.
Shireen: Flamethrowers, it brings me so much happiness to share with you that the torchbearers of this week are none other than the Canadian national women's soccer team, otherwise known as the Olympic gold medalists of women's football at Tokyo 2020. You all know how much I love this team, and to see them and to see captain Christine Sinclair possibly end her career on such an incredible note – although she did not offer any explanation or hints that that was coming. To see them claw and fight their way in an incredible match, the finale was outstanding, with Canada’s Stephanie Labbé facing off against Sweden's stalwart, Hedvig Lindahl, in a thrilling and heart-palpitating penalty shootout that saw Canada's Julia Grosso finish it off with an incredible shot, blew it past Lindahl in the net, world stands to their feet.
In Canada, 4.4 million people watched this game that began at four o'clock in the morning. Unbelievable. Just unbelievable. In extra time, then in penalty shootouts, this team just kept fighting. I also want to mention that part of this team is Quinn, who is the first trans nonbinary athlete to win a medal at the Olympic games. Congratulations to Quinn. We hope to see much, much more of this. Also, shoutout to whoever switched goalkeeper Stephanie Labbé’s Wikipedia page to say that she was the minister of national defense. Women's soccer fans are the best, truly. I'm happy for everybody involved here. This is incredible.
This team, this program. It means so much. But I also want to point out that despite this moment of unadulterated joy, this team continues to advocate. Advocate for this game, advocate for girls and women in Canada, advocate for what's right. I'll leave it to the words of Stephanie Labbé, who was later interviewed with Christine Sinclair from CBC Olympics, about what happens next and what it means for this team and what it should mean for soccer in Canada.
Stephanie Labbé: Yeah, I mean, it's huge. I know back in 2012, the team inspired so many young girls to want to pick up a soccer ball and start playing soccer, and some of those girls that were inspired then are now on this team and have brought this team to the next level, which is, you know, the top of the podium. And I think we have to continue moving forward from there and continue to inspire young boys and girls to want to play football, to want to grow the game in our country. And in order to do that, just like Christine said, you know, we need to continue to push to have a professional league in Canada. I'll quote Sinky from the other day, but the fact that we're Olympic champions and we don't have any professional teams in our home country is pretty unacceptable. So that's definitely something that as a team we want to continue to keep pushing for and keep moving forward to.
Lindsay: Whew. All right. What's good, friends? Bren.
Brenda: So, I had no idea. But my co-host Amira entered our co-host Shireen, who you just heard undoubtedly over the top, excited about the Canadian women's team. This has got to be Shireen's week. She entered her into a contest to win a Peloton bike and she won, and that is so cool. I never win anything, and to win something for somebody else is cool. So I'm so excited for Shireen. I mean, on the other hand, I'm so sad for all of us who have to hear both her and Amira now about their Peloton cult, [Amira laughs] but I love it so much. It made me just really happy hearing them celebrate. I was like, oh my gosh, I never know anyone that wins shit like that! So it was very tickling. And besides that, like I said, there's been tons of beautiful things at the Olympics, despite my, you know, general or ornery-ness.
Lindsay: I love it. Amira?
Amira: You know, Jessica Luther loves her gym, GrassIron, here in Austin, so while Jess is out of town I snuck over to GrassIron to sign up and to get some time lifting as well. So that was a lot of fun. And I have enjoyed my kids all being in camp this week. Samari went to theater camp, and the boys were running around doing something. Maybe archery was involved? I don't really know. But it was wonderful, and they weren't here. That's largely my what's good. I got into my new office on campus. That's good to me. And tacos continue to be very good in my life, especially breakfast tacos – and then I can sneak in a side of queso, and nobody will know, because it's like a breakfast thing. And then I'm just like, ha ha, totally eating queso at 10 in the morning. It's beautiful.
Lindsay: I got to say, I am glad the Olympics are over. I'm glad we don't have the French open. We don't have Wimbledon. [Brenda laughs] My sleep schedule, you know what I mean? Like I can get on like a schedule, a normal person schedule. I can start going back into my coworking space because I won't be having to stream things at 6:00am every day, like, I'm ready to get back. July was a big month for me. I was traveling and doing work trips for the first time since the pandemic started. And I had a lot of anxiety around it, just kind of returning to the world. And I made it through.
I feel like I've checked that off the box – although not saying I'm done with pandemic anxiety. I'm just saying, like, I've been outside my apartment, so that's good. And I don't know, I'm excited for August, because I feel like I was holding my breath all of July just to see if I could make it through. And I wasn't that productive, but we made it through, friends. What we're watching this week?
Amira: Not the Olympics! [laughter]
Lindsay: The WNBA will returns; still got NWSL play. Trinity Rodman, check her out. The Paralympics are coming up in a week or two, so get ready for those. And Brenda has told me that the football transfer window is going to be fun.
Brenda: It’s the soap opera that you need to be watching. Obviously people are looking at Messi going to PSG, but there's lots of other transfers out there. I'm still waiting for Colin to get picked up. I mean, it is intense. It's a sport in and of itself.
Lindsay: Tweet at us if you would like Bren to just record a 30 minute hot take by herself full of Messi feelings. [Brenda laughs] So please, @ us if you would like that. [laughs]
Brenda: It’s annual, you know, I did it last year when they denied him the transfer. So, it’s an annual thing.
Lindsay: I know. We need an update! We need an update.
Brenda: We do. I can tell you how many barrels of oil need to be extracted from the ground to pay for him, et cetera.
Lindsay: The content the people want!
Brenda: It is! It is. [laughter]
Lindsay: All right. That's it for this episode of Burn It All Down. This episode was produced by our phenomenal producer, Tressa Versteeg, and Shelby Weldon is our web and social media guru. Burn It All Down, we’re part of the Blue Wire podcast network. You can follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Listen, subscribe and rate the show on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Spotify, Google Play, TuneIn, et cetera. Ratings really, really, really help. I'm just going to say it – five star only. For show links and transcripts, you can check out our website, burnitalldownpod.com. We do have transcripts for every episode, and also you'll find a link to our merch at our Bonfire store. Once again, thank you patrons. This work would literally not be possible without you. Patreon.com/burnitalldown, and throughout all of this, I believe Amira is doing a 10:00am macarena on the Zoom–
Brenda: She is doing the macarena!
Amira: Hey, macarena! [laughs]
Lindsay: If you're wondering what it's like to work with Amira, I just want to give you…It is exactly as much the most as you think it is. [laughter]
Amira: I did break into the macarena with the hand jive briefly as a remix. You didn't catch that.
Brenda: I think I did. I think I did.
Lindsay: Thanks again for listening to Burn It All Down. As Brenda said, our catchphrase: burn on, but not out.