Throughout history sports has impacted the world in positive and negative ways. Reactions to certain events and athletes in sports has shown how people feel towards each other, whether it be positive or negative. The reaction to the Munich Massacre of the 1972 Olympics, Hank Aaron surpassing Babe Ruth’s homerun record and Roberto Clemente’s death in the 1970s show the start of racial bias against Palestinians and the long term racial bias against Latinos and African Americans. The Munich Massacre of 1972 played a large role in sports of the 1970s and the peoples beliefs. During the 1972 Olympics, hosted in Berlin, Germany, a group known as the Palestinian Black September Organization held 11 members of the Israeli Olympic team hostage and …show more content…
Roberto Clemente was often ridiculed in the press because he was not completely fluent in English and what he said was typically typed out in the exact way he had pronounced the word and yelled at by the spectators watching the game. Roberto Clemente died in a plane crash on his way to deliver food and clothing to earthquake victims in Managua, Nicaragua on December 31, 1972. After his death people had begun to call him an “Irreplaceable hero” and talking about his success in his baseball career (The New York Times). Clemente’s obituary in The New York Times had described him as being a humanitarian and a strong defensive outfielder. However, the way the article described him led the reader to feel no emotional connection and had focused more on how he had died than the impact he left on the world. The article demonstrates the overall tone and feeling of it being too little too late to respect Roberto Clemente and his ability to play baseball well and be selfless enough to not focus on the ridicule from the crowd and the press. The people of the United States attitudes in the 70s are shown by them being unappreciative while he was alive to suddenly believing he was an amazing player after his death because of the feeling that once someone is dead it is no longer okay to disrespect them. The Americans believing that a living person is not worth as much as when they die shows the effect of not knowing what they have until it is gone being
Roberto Clemente once said “I want to be remembered as a baseball player who gave all I had to give.” One could easily say that Roberto Clemente left everything he had on the baseball field, when he played. Roberto Clemente was originally born in a fairly large city in Puerto Rico. Clemente came from humble beginnings. His father was a foreman at a sugar cane plantation, while his mother did little odd jobs such as running the grocery store on the same sugar cane plantation. Clemente even worked on the plantation to help bring in money for his family of nine and to also buy a bicycle. While growing up, Clemente was focused on baseball and track. He even won medals for javelin throwing.
For many years now, my biggest influencer has been Roberto Clemente, who played Major League Baseball in the 60’s and 70’s. Roberto Walker Clemente was born the youngest of seven children to Melchor and Luisa Clemente in Puerto Rico on August 18, 1934. Although growing up poor in Barrio San Anton in Carolina, he was happy and remained very close to his family and to his country and its inhabitants throughout his entire life. Roberto was an industrious young man and worked various odd jobs including milk delivery. He began playing baseball with his brothers and friends and was eventually signed for forty dollars a month by a professional hardball team in the Puerto Rican town of Santurce. His natural ability got him recognized by a Dodger scout and he was signed in 1954 to a minor league team in Montreal. His
The controversy in Berlin Olympic Games was that the some of the Jews excluded from the Olympic team were actually world class athletes. The athletes left Germany, along with other Jewish athletes, to resume their sports careers abroad.The Nazis also disqualified Gypsies.The Olympics were intended to be an exercise in goodwill among all nations emphasizing racial equality in the area of sports competition. But the Nazis thought that only the Aryans should participate in the Olympics games to represent Germany.Then after that controversy then the committee of the Games wanted to move the Olympic Games to another country.This was because usually the U.S. got the most medals because they sent the most athletes.
Have you ever been protested and demonstrated against? Jackie Robinson felt the outcry of America during his baseball career. Fighting not only for his future, but also for the overall well-being of his sport, Robinson received death threats for his efforts. On a daily basis, this disciplined African man fought the pressures of hatred toward his entire race. As a segregated country, America saw major league baseball as a white man’s sport. Robinson was the outlier in an otherwise American “tradition.” Society observed Robinson’s play on the field with extremely bias eyes. No matter the achievement; no matter the obstacle; many still discredited his abilities due to the color of his skin. Over time skeptics gave in to their malice. Robinson broke the color barrier in American sports! Through perseverance and a stable mind, Jackie Robinson shattered the segregation of sports and started a revolution! Although,sport equality is not completely perfect in this world, Jackie Robinson’s contributions towards American sports, desegregation, and society will never be forgotten throughout the world.
The Munich Massacre (5th – 6th September 1972), a planned terrorist attack happening against the backdrop of the Summer Olympics, was a key statement in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict that carries on to this day. The attack began when eight Palestinian terrorists killed two members of the Israeli Olympic team before taking a further nine hostage. All of the captives were killed along with five Black September members during a large fire fight. Following the massacre, the Israeli government organized retaliation, codename: Operation Wrath of God. The legacy is reflected by the large number of retaliatory deaths, overall effect upon the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the significant development of Counter terrorist agencies around the world.
When asked, every person could point out an item, place, or person that they have personally connected with due to values or memories that said thing represents. These icons may gain widespread attention due to their influence or prevalence in society. However, our tribute to certain icons is not a new practice. A major dilemma of the eighth century Catholic Church revolved around icons and whether they should be allowed and in what form. From this time stemmed our inclination to revel in the glory of certain icons and the worship of these icons can be, at times, similar to the way cultural icons were honored and worshipped in the eighth century. To examine the modern version of the practice in relation to eighth century icon worship, we will examine the qualities that have made Derek Jeter a
Athletes are national heroes who are held in high regard. When their reputation gets very high and they fail to realize that they are still accountable for their actions regardless of the position they hold in their societies, athletes can turn into violent activities. They become egocentric and selfish-centered, forgetting that their moral conduct should be put at check just as any other citizen.
People often wonder why sports are so important and how they impact great populations. Sports have not always been a staple in society or a part of the “American Dream,” however; they have proven to have significant influences like how a team winning the World Series can bring tears to the eyes of an entire city, or how Jackie Robinson breaking the color barrier to become the first African American to play in a MLB game sparked a generation of segregation. The power of sports extends further than the scoreboard and can bring a nation or a race together during times of strife.
The plight of athletes of color in American sports has been a well-documented and heavily conversed issue throughout society. Our treatment of these athletes was unwarranted, unfair and unacceptable, but all of that seemed to be over with pioneers such as Jackie Robinson breaking the color barrier in the early 20th century and finally bringing athletes of color to the same playing field as their white counterparts. Today, we proudly proclaim that our major American sports are completely void of all stereotyping and racism that plagued them in their infancy. It is obvious that this is not true with various examples such as the Donald Sterling incident showing that there are some whimpers of outright racism remaining, but there also may be be an issue that is much more widespread than we realize. A phenomenon we now call “unconscious racism” explains that in modern society we have effectively internalized our racist rhetoric to the point where it is now subtle and almost second nature. This is especially clear in the National Football League in the treatment of black quarterbacks. These quarterbacks are subjected to harsher and often more unfair scrutiny than their white counterparts, despite their similar production, as a result this new breed of subconscious racism.
The 1972 Olympics were held in the summer in city of Munich, Germany. Munich is a city in the Southern region of what was then West Germany. They were “The Games of Peace and Joy” and they were going to be the biggest and most expensive Olympic Games ever. The Olympic Games in Munich were supposed to have more athletes representing more countries than at any previous sporting event. During the 1972 Munich Olympics, 10,490 athletes were present. Bavarian officials hoped that the 1972 Munich Olympics would confirm Germany’s rehabilitation as a civilized society. Germany was trying to expunge memories of the Second World War and the infamous 1936 Olympics in Berlin, Germany. At the 1936 Olympics in Berlin, the German dictator Adolf Hitler had recently risen to power. Hitler tried to use the Olympics to showcase his belief that German whites were a superior people. There was no greater confirmation of Germany’s rehabilitation than the presence at the games of a delegation from Israel. Many of the families of the Israeli Olympic Athletes had been victims of German Dictator Adolf Hitler. The organizers of the 1972 Munich Olympics worked hard in order to not remind the world of what the Nazis had done. The organizers even refused to let security guards carry weapons, because they were worried that they would invoke memories of the heavily armed Nazi soldiers. They invited massed ranks of the media, a greater concentration than ever before to witness the festival of sport and the redevelopment of West Germany. At least four thousand newspaper, magazine, and radio journalists travelled to the Bavarian capital along with another two thousand television journalists, announcers, and crews. They had a television audience of nearly one billio...
crash. The plane was taking medical, food and clothing supplies to Nicaragua, to help out after an earthquake. Vera and friends begged him not to take the trip because of poor weather and an unstable cargo plane, but Roberto was determined. He was upset that the previous supplies had not made it to the victims. Roberto was going to personally see to it that the victims received the much needed supplies. Unfortunately the plane went down off the coast of Puerto Rico. Roberto's body was never found. Just months after Roberto joined an elite group of players with 3000 hits, he was gone. Roberto’s tragic death in 1972 prompted the Hall of Fame’s Board of Directors to unanimously wave the customary five year period for induction, which opened a door for the Baseball Writer’s Association of America to hold a special election on Clemente’s behalf.
The athletics during the Holocaust were grouped up, were took to prisons and had been killed during that time. The Jews were also one of the five other countries competing and to receive an individual gold medal in all of the Berlin Games played.
Historical and sociological research has shown, through much evidence collection and analysis of primary documents that the American sporting industry can give an accurate reflection, to a certain extent, of racial struggles and discrimination into the larger context of American society. To understand this stance, a deep look into aspects of sport beyond simply playing the game must be a primary focus. Since the integration of baseball, followed shortly after by American football, why are the numbers of African American owners, coaches and managers so very low? What accounts for the absence of African American candidates from seeking front office and managerial roles? Is a conscious decision made by established members of each organization or is this matter a deeper reflection on society? Why does a certain image and persona exist amongst many African American athletes? Sports historians often take a look at sports and make a comparison to society. Beginning in the early 1980’s, historians began looking at the integration of baseball and how it preceded the civil rights movement. The common conclusion was that integration in baseball and other sports was indeed a reflection on American society. As African Americans began to play in sports, a short time later, Jim Crow laws and segregation formally came to an end in the south. Does racism and discrimination end with the elimination of Jim Crow and the onset of the civil rights movement and other instances of race awareness and equality? According to many modern sports historians and sociologists, they do not. This paper will focus on the writings of selected historians and sociologists who examine th...
...organized retaliation with Operation Wrath of God. This operation systematically killed the remaining members of Black September and since then Palestinians and Israelis were at each other’s throat to defend what they each thought was rightfully theirs. The athletes that were murdered could have lived completely different lives if they had not met death so suddenly. Their death was caused by a trickle effect from the Cold War, if the Balfour Declaration didn’t happen then Jews wouldn’t have a homeland, which would lessen the tension between Israelis and Palestinians, which ultimately would mean that Black September would have no need to take Israeli athlete hostages that fateful morning and these athletes could have lived through the Olympics and gone home safe to their families. In the end global tensions are to be blamed for the massacre that occurred in Munich.
It takes outrageous conduct for the reality of racism in sports to come to the forefront. When comparing a minority athlete to a non-minority athlete, we can see they both are victims of discrimination because of their race. However, the type of discrimination is very different, and the effects are very different. To a lot of people, the sports world is a place in which none of the normal problems of the “real” world could possibly exist. However, racism in sports has been an issue throughout the world.