Last Friday, numerous students gathered in the dining hall to watch the Opening Ceremonies of the 2018 Winter Olympic games. During the ceremonies, Olympic athletes for Russia marched out wearing grey uniforms without bearing Russia’s flag. This was done as a form of punishment handed down from the IOC after a severe doping scandal from the previous games.

As a result of this punishment, all Russian athletes will be competing as independents. Whenever a Russian athlete wins, the Olympic flag will be raised and the Olympic anthem will be played. In my opinion, this was a fair punishment, as I do not believe that Russia should be represented by athletes, but I do feel as if the clean athletes should not be deprived of competing. Many athletes dedicate their lives to training for the Olympic games and many have only such a small window of time to be among the elite class in the world. By banning all Russians, many deserving athletes may never have received their fair chance to compete in the games.

After reading about the scandal and learning more about the process, I became even more curious in discovering how exactly they pulled it off. Additionally, I think it’s interesting that two of the main chemist’s colleagues suddenly died once the IOC discovered the cheating scandal. I believe that all those who were involved with the doping scandal should be permanently banned from the games.