The IOC and Olympic boosters rely on misinformation and phony sales pitches in order to sell their increasingly unpopular brand of celebration capitalism.
Typically the Olympic dream is packaged as a set of promises to potential host cities: new and improved infrastructure projects, long-term jobs, new money funneled into the tourism sector, a sense of public unity, “legacy” projects, the concept of putting your city on the map, and other such chum for their lure.
Perhaps the biggest reason we are saddled with another LA Olympic bid (outside of the nightmare election cycle that overshadowed the 2024/2028 bidding process and the concurrent desertification of local media) is that we are particularly prone to buying these myths, hinging on the fact many still believe the myth that the 1984 Olympics were good for Los Angeles.
Of course, we know that a handful of people and a corporate entity were the ones to actually see any tangible or political profit. Meanwhile many more suffered from the legacy of 1984, as we all know now. Whitewashing the legacy of the ’84 LA Olympics is just one of the ways in which special interests try to lipstick the Olympic pig.
In order to fully appreciate the effects that an LA Olympics could have on Los Angeles, we must separate the reality from the myth.
So without further ado, here are the top 5 myths about the LA Olympics debunked: