Games Monitor

"a point form version of the story in a less academic writing style....a good, short summary of the major criticisms, with evidence (not just assertions) for a general audience?" is an oxymoron ( a self contradictory idea).

The headline hype of Olympic boosterists is often thought of as being a series of bullet points or 'sound bites'. By keeping it simple and adding lots of appealing pictures they fool people with what an obviously good idea it is to have the Olympics in your city. But if you look at a typical example, the Applicant file for the 2016 Olympics to be held in Chicago, that is 88 pages long.

One of the best 'short' critiques I know is called 'Urban Entrepreneurship, Corporate Interests and Sports Mega-events, The thin policies of competitiveness within the hard outcomes of neo-liberalism', by C Michael Hall, Professor of Tourism at Otago University, New Zealand. That is 12 pages long. But to read it you must either buy for £17 the Book in which it is but one paper or purchase a copy of the article for $29.

I am afraid that to properly understand why the olympics are a scam it is necessary to look at the small print at some length. Which is why I have broken the task down into four bite sized free chunks, the smallest of which is the last one.

Martin Slavin