The Olympics this year have of course been home to many epic athletic battles and incredible feats of strength and ability embodied in the thousands of athletes from every corner of the world, even refugee camps, who have come together chasing gold and who share stories of their incredible rise to Olympics with millions of viewers.
But like in past Olympics, all the reasons we are supposed to be watching have been overshadowed by massive controversy that continues to turn an athletic event into something of a scandal and a train wreck. It has, at times, made the disastrous Olympics in Sochi look like a five star event.
Even before the Olympics, Brazil was having issues and it seems as though the Olympics have only helped to shed light on and fuel the flames and hysteria for these issues. The sudden introduction of the Zika virus forced Olympians and fans to choose the games over their health. The organization responsible for checking doping in Brazil was found to be inconsistent.
Then protests over corruption and needless spending (including for the Olympic arenas) marred the country, and brought it to its knees as the Brazilian economy has nearly collapsed, along with the government after the president was impeached. Things were so bad that police trying to prove a point were showing up at airports holding signs that read "Welcome to Hell" and which claimed tourists would not be safe because police weren't getting paid properly to protect the city.
Once the Olympics got rolling things only got worse. Olympians first arriving to the Olympic village considered conditions unlivable. Mass theft plagued the games and studies that showed both the air and water to be dangerously polluted did nothing to help calm people's nerves. This was especially true when the bay was revealed to be so polluted that only three ingested teaspoons of the water was considered enough to contract a serious virus or bacteria which the bay was absolutely teeming with (along with feces and oil slicks).
None of these concerns were relieved and have only continued to grow after an Olympic diving pool randomly turned lime green over night. They have also grown because of the continued reports of violence, robberies and shootings that have occurred in the city while the games have taken place, often affecting the fans, media and athletes of the Olympics.
This violence, chaos and drama was topped off when American swimmer Ryan Lochte as well as several other members of the U.S. swimming team claimed to have been robbed at gunpoint by what looked to be men in uniform.
Even as I type this, the drama continues to grow as several of the swimmers who reported this robbery have been prevented from leaving the country and have had their passports taken on orders from a judge who is claiming there are serious inconsistencies with Lochte and his teammates' story.
This scandal either means one of several things: that the Brazilian authorities are trying to get rid of the embarrassment of such an event by implicating the athletes to cover their tracks after the fact, the athletes really did lie terribly to authorities, or a massive and very serious miscommunication seems to have taken place. No option looks pretty and all bring the promise of more negativity and controversy over these Olympics that will likely have escalated into something even more dramatic by the time you have read this.
Perhaps the only consolation right now would be that we have very thankfully and fortunately been lucky enough to not see any terrorist activity or Munich type situation unfold. To be fair, the security for the games has been good and these Olympics haven't been all doom and gloom.
Watching the athletes in action has been great, from rugby games to running tracks to swimming pools. But one has to wonder what sort of vetting process these cities can be getting to host the Olympics if such a chaotic, unhealthy and messy result can occur so easily as a country breaks down on live television.
