New Tanith and Ben articles on citizenship, with pictures!
- Thread starter Littlewild1
- Start date
- Joined
- Jun 21, 2003
Linny, when I mentioned the Jewish Law of Return, it wasn't in rsponse to your suggestion about requiring only one partner to be a citizen of the country that the team represents. I was just musing about how easy or hard it might be to declare yourself a citizen of different countries, for purposes of trying out for the Olympic team.
http://www.lectlaw.com/files/int16.htm
I read the other day that in the coming summer Olympics, the Greek baseball team has only two Greeks on it. All the rest are American citizens, most born and raised in the U.S., who have some kind of Greek ancestry.
About "dropping the whole coutries thing altogether," that would mean discontinuing the Olympic Games and instead having World Championships in several sports at the same time. Only every four years we would say, this World Championship is more Champion-y than the last three years'.
To me, that is exactly the difference between the Olympics and Worlds. At Worlds, you try to see who is the best skater. At the Olys you try to see which country can win the most medals.
Mathman
http://www.lectlaw.com/files/int16.htm
I read the other day that in the coming summer Olympics, the Greek baseball team has only two Greeks on it. All the rest are American citizens, most born and raised in the U.S., who have some kind of Greek ancestry.
About "dropping the whole coutries thing altogether," that would mean discontinuing the Olympic Games and instead having World Championships in several sports at the same time. Only every four years we would say, this World Championship is more Champion-y than the last three years'.
To me, that is exactly the difference between the Olympics and Worlds. At Worlds, you try to see who is the best skater. At the Olys you try to see which country can win the most medals.
Mathman
- Joined
- Jul 27, 2003
Mathman said:
No, but I don't know what the law states in the Ukraine. Israeli citizenship is no longer automatic for Jews. There is a waiting period. After applying for citizenship, there is a one-year waiting period and rather than carrying a passport in that time period, you carry "travel documents". At least that is the way it was when I lived there--things may have changed since that time.
- Joined
- Jul 30, 2003
I don't know, the whole concept of the modern Oly and worlds, since they began over a 100 years ago was athletes representing their country. If you want to support radical change, like abolishing country representation so events are more like pro skating, that's one thing, and fodder for a whole separate thread probably. 
As it is though, the whole system is set up that countries compete against each other, as it always has been. Allowing skaters to switch countries whenever they feel like is going against the system IMHO. Within the switches that happened, I think that there are a variety of experiences.
For example, if someone honestly emegrates to another country that they now make their home, like the Jelnicks, that would make sense for them to represent their new home.
Also, skaters like Lili Lee who most probably would never have made a world team skating for the US, but represented a country with no quality skaters and helped Korea get it's skating program off the ground. That I don't have such a problem with.
But skaters like Dianne De Leeuw, who did it for purely selfish reason (she got to skate more, earlier. All that extra skating did'nt seem to help her beat Hamill though) don't get my sympathy. How is she really represnting the Netherlands, she never lived nor trained there. The occasional visit to Grandma doesn't cut it with me, not when so many other skaters are working so hard to accomplish the same.
I hardly find curruption a justifiable reason, re: the Duchesnays. And come'on Marrina, we all know that Russia has the most and the best Ice Dance males on the planet, you realy just had to skate with either Gwendell or Viktor?
Since the country representation concept is still in place, letting skaters change willy-nilly doesn't make any sense. I don't imagine that Canada would have appreciated Rob McCall, Brian Orser, Babara Ann Scott or Rob Paul representing teh US, I'm sure that they're none to happy about Tanith either.
As it is though, the whole system is set up that countries compete against each other, as it always has been. Allowing skaters to switch countries whenever they feel like is going against the system IMHO. Within the switches that happened, I think that there are a variety of experiences. For example, if someone honestly emegrates to another country that they now make their home, like the Jelnicks, that would make sense for them to represent their new home.
Also, skaters like Lili Lee who most probably would never have made a world team skating for the US, but represented a country with no quality skaters and helped Korea get it's skating program off the ground. That I don't have such a problem with.
But skaters like Dianne De Leeuw, who did it for purely selfish reason (she got to skate more, earlier. All that extra skating did'nt seem to help her beat Hamill though) don't get my sympathy. How is she really represnting the Netherlands, she never lived nor trained there. The occasional visit to Grandma doesn't cut it with me, not when so many other skaters are working so hard to accomplish the same.
I hardly find curruption a justifiable reason, re: the Duchesnays. And come'on Marrina, we all know that Russia has the most and the best Ice Dance males on the planet, you realy just had to skate with either Gwendell or Viktor?
Since the country representation concept is still in place, letting skaters change willy-nilly doesn't make any sense. I don't imagine that Canada would have appreciated Rob McCall, Brian Orser, Babara Ann Scott or Rob Paul representing teh US, I'm sure that they're none to happy about Tanith either.
- Joined
- Jul 28, 2003
Basically, after Lininchuk broke up Ilya and Marina, she would have almost no chance of ever skating competitively in Russia. Lininchuk was just too powerful at the time, and other coaches would not take her. Is it corruption? Well, I'd rather think that reasons why one of the best ice dancers would be locked out is the corruption.berthes ghost said:And come'on Marrina, we all know that Russia has the most and the best Ice Dance males on the planet, you realy just had to skate with either Gwendell or Viktor?
Also, this thread started by being about Tanith and Ben. With them, I stand by my opinion that switching countries for one of them (either one) was fully justifiable to skate together.
I believe it is still like that. If I recall, they changed the rules after an American Jew went to Israel to avoid prosecution in the US; back then, he got his citizenship immediately, and Israeli law prevented the authorities from handing him over to the US. That's when, I believe, the changed the rules.RealtorGal said:
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