I just finished watching a CBC interview of Canadian fencer Sherraine Schalm and was motivated and impressed by her passion and values. After an emotional outburst after losing her fencing match, the media (Canadian media) pounced all over her like she committed some terrible crime.
I find her dedication to sport and her unabashed honesty exhilarating and am proud that she is Canadian. Finally, here is a strong female athlete who is unafraid to say exactly what she thinks, and is just as quick to apologize and learn from her mistakes. I am doubly proud of her!
When I watched her reaction at the end of the fencing match, my first reaction was: "YES! Finally a female athlete with some fire!" She gave it all she had, and in the antagonistic interview on CBC, she didn't back down. I loved how when the interviewer introduced her by saying she was unable to win an Olympic medal for Canada "yet again," she interrupted him and repeated sarcastically "yet again." The interviewer is the one who needs etiquette lessons.
Near the end of the interview, the interviewer again blundered into the realm of rudeness when he asked why after all her world cup wins, her efforts have not translated into a medal. I LOVED her response...
She asked him, (my paraphrase here) "I don't know if you know what it's like to be an Olympic athlete, but every girl here has the potential to win gold. And all 32 girls are asking themselves what they could have done differently." Right back at you sucker! Ha!
I am disgusted at this interviewer's tactics -- considering she is one of our athletes. For that matter, I am disgusted with the CBC's habit of chasing the ambulance so to speak and asking athletes right after they have given it their all - "Why didn't you do better? How do you feel knowing that your personal best wasn't good enough?" How do you think they feel? Like shit.
I am so proud that Sherraine is such a fireball!
Congratulations on your performance, Sherraine -- you are a true Olympian!!
8 comments:
well put my friend!
Very nice...I did not see that interview but I too am really tired of the CBC and their perspective on this Olympics. It frankly really sucks. I would love to see ANY of those announcers, interviewers try to keep up with ANY of the olympians. In the pool, they are breaking records and posting personal bests all over the place...what more can we ask them to do? EVERYONE is swimming fast...I believe that is the nature of the games, is it not? And besides I did not know one name of the Canadian swim team before this week...maybe the media should focus on these athletes more than just once every four years.
Just my opinions.
hmm. blogger ate my rant on, and rant off tags.
rant on
Medals are all very well, but are a poor measuring stick. How can someone that is a fraction of an eye blink slower be considered a loser?
The ordinary taxpayer has no idea how difficult it is to peak at just the right time. And how strong the pressure, both internal and external, really is.
Some of these people have peaked to a personal best, some of them have even set new records, only to be eclipsed by someone else in the same race. In what possible sense can we point the finger and say they didn't do enough?
I think the fencer should have given the interviewer the sword, pointy end first, and said, here, you try it. Of course, they'd need a proctologist to retrieve it, and it would need a thorough cleaning before the match...
rant off.
I saw the interview as well and my immediate reaction was "my gosh this ass went to the brian williams school of interviewing"! But then i sat back for a moment and thought that success in todays world is measured by money! When you meet someone the first thing out of their mouth is "so what do you do" not what are your passions and interests in life!!...and unfortunately sports and the olympics are equated with money in the terms of medals. The problem is our poor atheletes are terribly underfunded unless they win a medal. Our training programs are second rate in "first" world contries. Our governing body has impossible standards in some events and then soft standards in others. This year alone we have had several athletes meet our countries olympic standard quidelines only to be told sorry that meet was too small we want you to try again. The olympics has not been about the amatuer athelete for a very long time. It is politics pure and simple! Watch the movie Prefontaine, it shows the underbelly of the the American beast.
Our lot in the UK are just as bad - we'd won some medals, and all the news could report was a spat between 2 divers - one of which is 14 years old - way to go BBC!
Kelly -- I completely agree with you. The coverage is terrible, so terrible in fact, that I actually wrote to CBC complaining about it!
Keith - You are dead on! We are talking about hundredths of a second in most races. How can anyone be disappointed in that? Love the proctology rant! Hahah!
Chuck - I've always HATED when someone asks me what I do! I make a point of not asking what other people do -- my personal war against the idea that we are defined by our jobs. Canadian sports needs a complete overhaul -- a robust sports program should be integrated into all levels of schools. I read an interesting article about how an infusion of cash into sports would result in a healthier populace and take pressure off the health care system.
The interesting thing is that the majority of the funds received from lotto 649 and the such were originally to go to fund amatuer sports (and i am old enough to remember this).....but as long as there are bureaucrats with their fingers in any thing you can guarantee that they are the only ones being funded!!
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