At the supermarket, as at every Olympics, multinationals are playing it very national-patriotic. A soft drink brand is asserting, in red and white, its commitment to “Team Canada”. Among the Americans, at the local supermarket, guess what you find? The same multinational that is displaying, in the same colours, its resolute support for “Team USA”.
Industrialists have long understood that the most important thing is to participate… in catching everything!
Your day over, you finally crash into your couch. In front of the screen, you watch, on a delayed basis, the sporting events of the day. How do you feel in front of the prowess of all these specialized bodies? Are gymnast Simone Biles or swimmer Léon Marchand of any use to you at the moment when, when you sit down, you feel this little sausage of fat rolling around at the bottom of your stomach?
What should we think of these sporting events in between which are broadcast advertisements for Ozempic, a symbol of our times, clearly more powerful than the Olympic rings? Have we really come to consider such products to deflate an obesity epidemic that says so much about our lives?
In 1896, when Pierre de Coubertin inaugurated the Olympics of the modern era, the question of obesity did not arise. Sport was only a leisure activity for particular people. Most often that of the upper middle class. They alone had the time, while money worked in their place.
At the first Paris Games in 1924, one of only two French Canadians to compete was a Montreal cyclist: Joseph Laporte. He was 17 years old. Using his own means, he embarked, with his bike, on a large cargo ship. In the road event, exhausted from 188 km of effort, Jos finished two hours after the winner. The important thing was to participate.
In Montreal in 1976, athlete Greg Joy won the silver medal in the high jump, narrowly missing out on gold. The Canadian had hitched his way to the competitions, with a bag on his shoulder! He had shared this anecdote with Olympic athlete Sylvie Bernier, as she told me.
The horses that take part in the equestrian competitions in Paris 2024 travel by plane. The cost of a round trip for the animals that have come to compete from Australia? Around $70,000 per head. Not to mention the value of these quadrupeds that trot happily in the legendary simplicity of the gardens of the Palace of Versailles. As Guy Laliberté, one of whose daughters takes part in the equestrian events, pointed out, not everyone chooses ping-pong. To each his own life, yes. And life is priceless, of course. All the more so for those who can afford to offer it to themselves on a silver platter.
At the Olympics, the mounts that gallop the most are those of big business. For the sum of 150 million euros, the LVMH group, a luxury manufacturer, bought these Games on a platter. LVMH is Bernard Arnault. One of the richest men on the planet. His fortune, last year, was estimated by Forbes to $238 billion.
Married to Montreal pianist Hélène Mercier, Bernard Arnault has focused his talents on bourgeois chic and visible bling-bling: champagne brands, jewelry, polished leather goods, designer clothes and little extras, such as Pinarello bicycles or Birkenstock sandals, suddenly valued in the name of pseudo-chic. Not to mention a whole business derived from his art collections.
France’s first lady Brigitte Macron always wears LVMH, the magazine observed. She. Why? A close friendship with Delphine Arnault, Bernard’s daughter, makes him wear dresses costing 15,000 euros. The Macron couple used to eat out every week “or almost,” says a biography, published by Bernard Arnault.
La Samaritaine, LVMH’s temple of luxury in Paris, was finally exempted from the anti-terrorist perimeter that was supposed to encompass it, unlike other stores, so that those occupying it could better see the show. For the opening ceremony, Celine Dion wore pearls and Lady Gaga wore feathers from LVMH. Aya Nakamura and her dancers draped themselves in gold from the Dior brand, owned by LVMH. The French athletes were shod in Berluti, one of the departments where LVMH has set foot. In the press release for the event, LVMH and its brands were mentioned 50 times. Liberty, equality and fraternity, 26, 24 and 14 times respectively.
The medals for the Games are produced by jeweler Chaumet, a subsidiary of the pot-bellied luxury giant LVMH. Those presenting the medals to the athletes are decked out, from head to toe, in LVMH. The medals are presented on a checkered surface, the symbol of the group. But the important thing is to participate… Just remind yourself of that.
Who remembers Pierre de Coubertin, the founder of the modern Games? He asserted how the Games served the narrow ideas of his milieu. The man proclaimed the “superiority of the white race, of superior essence”. He glorified the “adult male”, considered the only true Olympic hero. De Coubertin was keen to dismiss even the idea of a “female Olympiad”. In short, his Games were not intended to highlight the simple grandeur of the sporting gesture.
It took very little for lovers of narrow nationalism to be outraged by the opening ceremony of the 2024 Olympics. Note how these sensitive souls are at the same time indifferent to the gigantic screen behind which the Games, like our societies, are delivered hand and foot to the advertising of major brands, which are ready to do anything to break profit records. The essayist Annie Le Brun, who has just died, asked the question: “How long will we consent to not seeing how the violence of money works to liquidate our sensitive night, to make us forget the essential, the desperate quest for what is priceless?”