The Hindu : Sport : Ordinary men, extraordinary moral courage

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Wednesday, Oct 11, 2006
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Ordinary men, extraordinary moral courage

Occasionally athletes must make themselves heard, Rohit Brijnath

Always in the arena we speak of courage. The bloodied man rising for another tackle. The tailender who shakes off bouncers. The athlete who discovers nerve when his team appears lost.

But nothing can best the courage of the moral man, the principled athlete. He is the most impressive, and rarest, of creatures. In a modern world of the self-indulgent, hair-gelled hero, it is hard to fathom there were athletes once who championed causes larger than themselves.

So it is a pity that when I ask Tommie Smith yesterday (Monday), if young people in America know who he is, know the hard road he walked with the gravel-voiced John Carlos and the gone-to-God Peter Norman, he says: "Very few".

So let's tell their story. Again. And again.

For a noble cause

In Mexico 1968, readying to go out and receive the 200 metres gold medal, Smith admitted yesterday he was "scared to death". They all were, men so young, so ordinary, so angry, yet sustained by the certainty their cause was pure.

In America, civil rights leaders braved violence as they peacefully challenged a hideous racism. In Mexico, Smith and Carlos, the bronze medallist, both members of the Olympic Project for Human Rights (which initially proposed a boycott of the Games by African-Americans, but later just asked them to protest), staged their rebellion.

Their protest would lead to expulsion from the Olympics. Condemnation. Threats. Carlos said yesterday he received a letter saying his father would be chopped into pieces.

On the podium, both were barefoot to symbolise poverty among the blacks. The beads around Carlos's neck signified the lynchings the blacks faced. The box in Smith's hand held an olive sapling that represented peace. And their black-gloved clenched fists during the anthem stood for black power and unity. Mahatma Gandhi, who influenced the civil rights movement, would have been proud.

Most forget the third man, whose funeral this week summoned the two Americans to Melbourne. Norman, the silver medallist, was Australian, white, and aware the repercussions of supporting the Americans would be stiff. He did not flinch.

As they walked to the podium in 1968, Carlos asked Norman if he would wear a Olympic Brotherhood for Human Rights badge.

"Yes", he said. In a terrible, turbulent time, it was a gesture that hurdled borders, race, colour and embraced all humanity. This is character.

A hero

Norman became a hero among the African-American athletes. At Sydney 2000, as an official recounted yesterday, Michael Johnson would tell Norman, "You're my hero". At the same party, Edwin Moses would catch every U.S. Olympian who walked in and say "This is Peter Norman" i.e. the great one. Later, Norman would say, "I didn't know that so many people cared."

They should.

These days, athletes infrequently embrace causes. Footballers will occasionally protest racism. Federer is a goodwill ambassador for UNICEF. Cathy Freeman defiantly carried the Aboriginal flag after winning gold at the 1994 Commonwealth Games. But mostly "taking a stand" is not a phrase familiar to locker rooms.

Unique platform

To be fair, athletes cannot be expected to rise up when entire populations are mute to injustice. But athletes have a unique platform to at least raise awareness, even about poverty, but choose silence. Most give generously to charity, but it is the speaking out that makes a difference. Occasionally athletes must make themselves heard.

Asked once if athletes should just shut up and play, Carlos replied: "People (who say that) should make a factory that builds athlete-robots. Athletes are human beings. We have feelings too. How can you ask someone to live in the world, to exist in the world, and not have something to say about injustice?"

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