Every person on our planet, will be influenced by his or her surroundings.
Skaters can get a boost at home or they can fault under pressure and of course a judge can also be influenced by the crowds reaction. Besides that, each judge has a different idea of what is important, the best example is edge quality and speed. If you have very deep edges, then you are usually slower. A judge that want´s speed, might now like it less, than one who likes edges.
In my opinion, are quite a few skating fans, unable to tolerate other peoples opinions - something we see a lot here at the forum. They have their idea of a perfect skater, quite often corresponding with their favorite skaters and nothing else will be acceptable for a high score.
This, however, is very human and it´s easy to start a revolt in the 21th century, when all you need to do is create an anonymous account at social media networks.
As for federations,
it can work a bit like on court. Each party picks the jury members accordingly to their goal and a common example is the black / white or rich / poor selection. Each judge, will have a reputation, just like a referee in soccer and federations can invite based on that / send their skaters accordingly to what judges are present. This, however, is not cheating, it´s just a normal procedure and once you have worked in a management position, you will understand why. Your job is to get the best for your clients or in our case, your skaters.
As example,
if I would work at the US figure skating, then I would certainly invite Ashley for my home events, as she always delivers, while I would send Gracie to European events, as she usually performs better abroad. I would also make sure, that my top ice dance teams, don´t skate at the same GP event and so on. I don´t know much about the judges, so I can not really give examples there, but I would surely invite those, that go for expression and technical difficulty, rather than spins or footwork (in Ashleys case).
Of course, will there some regulations, but these I don´t know, so I can not factor those into my hypothetical example.
That judges work for free is known I think and most of them have a pretty decent life already, plus it´s a great job to see the world and a very encouraging opportunity, If I would be a judge, you could not get my vote with any money, but I would certainly vote in the way that I was taught to vote, which can be very different based on nationality and own figure skating experience. All judges start at home in their own federation and each country has a different idea of a perfect skater and we see that also among us all the time don´t we?
). Do you think the judge, or anyone else, cares if you put the name and country in bold and then talk about favoritism, other than "your skater" got hosed? Puh-leese. :sarcasm:
