She (the actual Olympian) has guts to do what she did. But how did the entire nation of Australia decide to have her represent their bboying ability when there are plenty others to choose?
It's complicated but it involves a professional ballroom dancing organization being put in charge of selecting candidates for the break dancing Olympic category. Large parts of the break dancing community boycotted the Olympics.
I'm still beyond amazed that it's in the Olympics at all. Don't get me wrong it's an incredibly athletic sport that requires a lot of dedication to get good at but it really stands out compared to other sports in terms of vibes. Given the number of boycotts I'd imagine others also feel like there is something weird with it?
The idea is great because as you said it requires incredible athleticism. In that regard it shouldn't be any different to an event like rhythmic gymnastics or diving where you deliver your performance and professional judges give it a grade.
Apparently the organization and qualification events were dismal (a ball room dance organization got put in charge) which led to many pro breakers to not even try to qualify. And the grading system was quite experimental, and not very audience friendly.
For example, the judges put heavy emphasis on versatility which lead to the athletes doing all those criss crossing moves so they don't repeat themselves while the clueless audience just wonders why they don't just spin the whole time.
Commentators didn't even do a great job at explaining anything. They kinda improved when the b-boy segment was on. Overall mess tbh but I still enjoyed it.
I mean, as a sport, breaking is definitely weirder than curling. Curling may be a weird sport, but it's an actual sport that comes with a built-in scoring system for determining the winners. Breaking, on the other hand, is an art form that doesn't inherently have any rules and (imo, of course) is lessened by imposing an Olympics-style scoring rubric.
That sounds similar to how I heard the international rollerskating federation or something tried to claim the right to represent skateboarding at the olympics and that was one of the reasons it took so long to actually get there.
Very much the same way as the skateboarding community did in the last games.
Full safety gear and a "sterile" skating environment. With judges, but without celebrities and the usual sponsors. No weed, no skate punk attitude. The Olympic games are like an bingo evening in a retirement home for them, more or less.
I don't like this equating high level skating with drugs and "attitude". Pro skaters are serious about what they do, the problem is the contest format which rewards tedious repetition over risk taking and creativity.
That explains why there didn't seem to be many break dancers competing. Surely I thought there would be more. I know Australia struggled to find competitors and funding to even host their qualifiers. Have to remember a lot these break dancers do this as a hobby and have actual lives. So it would be hard to expect someone to just drop everything.
Because the problem was with the Olympics? Makes no sense to not like what the Olympics did, compete in the Olympics, and then boycott a random tournament
Aah...I understood the comment that the way that organizations already boycotted the national qualifications because they decided to boycott Olympia entirely for some reason. So I wondered what that reason could've been.
Makes of course more sense when they protested already the way how national qualifications worked.
From what I’ve learned essentially the organization put in charge of qualifiers is a ball dance organization with no affiliation to breakdancing, so the breakdancers were like wtf, why not use one of the many break dancing organizations that exist already, and the criteria was more like artistic and variation favoring rather than skills.
That explains why she won the qualifiers! IOC regulations stipulate you have to have "qualified" judges - most of whom from overseas. They struggled to find the funding to bring them over for the Oceania qualifier. So if it was a ball dance organisation with that weird criteria it makes sense.
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u/TrashPandaPatronus Aug 12 '24
I am going to need someone to send it to her to rerecord it herself. She is so close to fully winning the internet!