FUCK THE OLYMPICS

10 reasons why I already hate the London 2012 Olympics


(This article may include some factual inaccuracies in order to emphasise certain points)


1. The Olympics is full of shit sports that no-one normally cares about. Why would I pay £70 to go and watch long distance fencing or equestrian tennis? Fuck off.

2. The only way to be sure of getting a ticket for one of the events was to apply for tickets for all of them. Unless you're rich, the resulting ballot and automatic collection of payment from your bank account would then more than likely bankrupt you and lead to you and your family being turfed out on to the streets into a life of drug addiction and prostitution, and all you'd be left with is a pile of tickets for the women's 800m pole jumping.

3. Due to the apparently universally accepted fact that the Olympics MUST SUCCEED AT ALL COSTS, politicians are using the Games as a smokescreen to introduce draconian legislation limiting the democratic right to protest and indulge in macho masturbatory counter-terrorist posturing, like deploying surface-to-air missiles around Hackney to police an Olympic no-fly zone. Which is all pretty handy for quelling dissent while the Government is pulling the support of the welfare state out from under the people who need it most so that banks and big business can carry on feathering their filthy nests.

4. The Olympics has been designed to deliver a lasting legacy to one of the more socially and economically deprived areas of London. This legacy is a world class velodrome, a load of expensive flats and a shit sculpture named after a billionaire tax-dodging steel magnate.

5. Don't even get me started on the fucking cable car.

6. The London 2012 Organising Committee is so committed to brand protection - or, in English, 'greed' - that simply saying the word '2012' out loud without prior consent from Locog can result in a hefty fine or imprisonment.

7. The corporate sponsors of the Games, whose adverts will be ruthlessly installed not just all over the venues but all over London, include: Coca Cola, well known for their championing of human rights throughout the developing world; environmentally responsible companies such as EDF and BP; Lloyds TSB, who are presumably paying for the sponsorship with whatever was left of the money lent to them by the British taxpayer once this year's bonuses were dished out; and the well known health food chain, McDonalds.

8. Boris Johnson's progressive transport strategy, which involves measures such as scrapping the congestion charge for wealthy, Tory-voting west London and bumping up fares for the Tube and bus services most Londoners depend on, is being ramped up further in the run-up to the Olympics, to help pay for the interminable upgrade works he desperately wants to be finished by 2012. Boris is allowed to do this because the Olympics was actually his idea.

9. The Olympic mascots are a pair of anthropomorphic cyclops robo-penises, and the London 2012 logo looks like it was designed by someone recovering from a massive stroke.

10. Sebastian Coe.