If you’re like me, you’ve probably been watching the Olympics these past two weeks and cheering on our Olympic athletes as they go for the gold in Rio de Janeiro. While most people have been quite supportive of our talented athletes and have cheered them mightily as they won one gold medal after another, a few haters in the social media universe have taken it upon themselves to criticize some of our athletes for not living up to particular standards “they” have deemed to be appropriate. In particular, the social media haters have gone after our most successful African American female athletes like Simone Biles, Simone Manuel, and in particular Gabby Douglas.
Four years ago Gabby Douglas won two gold medals in London in women’s team gymnastics and the all-around individual medal. She made the team in Rio this year to compete in team gymnastics as well as the individual all-around medal and in the uneven bars apparatus event. In a sport where four years can be an eternity and yesterday’s sprite young darling can quickly become a has-been, this achievement in itself was quite remarkable. As it turned out, the USA women’s gymnastics team dominated these Olympics like no other nation has in the history of this sport. Simone Biles easily qualified for and eventually won the individual all-around event and fellow teammate Aly Reisman came in second and won the silver medal. Gabby Douglas finished third after the team competition ahead of all other competitors other than Biles and Reisman, yet due to the International Gymnastics Federation rules, no country was allowed to have any more than two athletes compete for the all-around medal. So naturally Gabby Douglas was disappointed in finishing third and not being able to compete for a medal in the individual all-around event, yet some in the Twitterverse were quick to criticize and demonize her for her alleged sour behavior. But worse yet, those same haters demonized Ms. Douglas for not holding her hand to her chest upon accepting the team gold medal as the national anthem was being played. In fact, the social media firestorm was so fierce, Gabby Douglas herself felt the need to apologize for something she did not even need to do.
Meanwhile, Ryan Lochte came into these Olympics after having won in Beijing and London and at the age of 32 was making his final Olympic appearance in swimming. He would win a gold medal in the men’s 4 by 100 medley along with Michael Phelps but in his other event he didn’t even come close to the medal stand. Nevertheless, fans were glad he won at least one gold medal and be pleased he could presumably retire from the sport with grace, but as you may have heard this week, he told Rio police authorities and the media that he and three other swimmers had be robbed at gunpoint by thugs who posed as police officers who demanded their wallets, and they had no choice to comply in order to stay alive.
Lochte went on the Today show and repeated this accusation, but as police authorities began investigating the allegations, the story began to unravel, and it appears that the swimmers had not been held at gunpoint, and furthermore the alleged “thugs” were actually security guards who heard a commotion and approached the gas station bathroom where a heavily intoxicated Lochte had broken down the door and trashed the inside of the bathroom. While the security guards were armed, they did not pull their weapons on Lochte or the other swimmers, and after being confronted by the security guards Lochte and the other swimmers gave money to the gas station attendant to pay for the damage to the bathroom.
Now this incident is embarrassing enough as it is, but this is a black eye in particular to the US Swimming Federation and to our country as a whole, and it put Rio in a situation they did not deserve. Most of the reaction to this incident has been rather negative towards the swimmers, and the New York Post was particularly scathing on its front cover today. Nevertheless, too many people on social media have dismissed this incident as a “frat boy incident” gone wrong, or “boys will be boys” type of situation, yet many of these same people excusing Lochte’s behavior were the ones demonizing Gabby Douglas. So it’s horrible for a young competitive Black woman to be disappointed for not finishing high enough to compete for a medal, yet it’s okay for a drunken white male athlete to commit a misdemeanor and lie to the world about it? If this isn’t white privilege, I don’t know what is.