I was able to watch the opening ceremony of the 2018 Winter Olympics at Pyeongchang. It was exciting to see athletes from ALL over the world come together to celebrate the start of the olympics. I personally love watching both the summer and winter olympics. It is a great opportunity to watch different sports I normally would not be interested in and I love that the olympics brings attention to these lesser known sports and countries. I was a little bummed that my favorite figure skaters, the Shibutani siblings were not at the ceremony with team USA that night. However, the ceremony was still entertaining as I got to see athletes proudly representing their countries. Of course, that is except for Russia who could not represent their country.

Russia’s olympic team was recently punished for doping and they could not hold up their flag or have their anthem played. The Russian athletes that were allowed to compete also wore neutral uniforms. I believe that barring Russia was just since they had state-backed doping programs. Therefore, the country as a whole should bare the responsibility and not be represented for their actions as it was a government supported occurrence. It is simply unfair to the other countries who compete fairly to go up against Russian athletes who have an artificial advantage. Besides the olympics, in any sporting event, athletes should not be doping for an advantage for their success would not be an honorable one. I believe that the decision to allow the athletes who were not involved with doping to participate and represent themselves was a fair one. I believe it is fair to continue letting these athletes show their abilities without being tainted by their country and possibly fellow peers’ decisions.