A bad precedent
As part of this evening’s Olympic broadcast, NBC recounted the story of the marathon runner in Athens who, with a 90 second lead, was pulled off the course by a whacko who wanted publicity. Clearly shaken, although he lost the gold he managed to finish with the bronze. He also got a special award for sportsmanship. As far as this goes, this was a great story.
Unfortunately they put the whacko on camera to explain to us his insane message. 1) this is exactly what he wanted, so his plan worked. 2) it says to all the other whackos out there who crave publicity “come ruin an olympian’s dream and we will give you and your message national coverage”.
The story of the runner overcoming the effects of this attack was inspiring. The thought that now others will get the idea that they can obtain coverage for their message by staging similar attacks is chilling.
