Dishonor at the Olympics

11 Saturday Aug 2012

Posted by dan demetriou in honor and sport, honor in contempory media

This Olympics has been marred by dishonorableness of a certain type: call it “strategic losing.”

The most widely-reported case was the Chinese, Indonesian, and South Korean women badminton teams obviously throwing some preliminary matches in order to secure a better draw later in the tournament. They were expelled from the Olympics.

Another involved Algeria’s Taoufik Makhloufi, who quit his 800m heat, apparently because he knew he wouldn’t win it and wanted to save himself for the next day’s 1500m finals. The Olympic authorities kicked Makhloufi out of the games temporarily, but reinstated him when a doctor supported his claim of a knee injury. The “injury” must have healed miraculously, since Makhloufi won the 1500m the next day.

A third case involved a British cyclist who deliberately crashed after a bad start. By doing so, he got a restart and ended up winning the gold. A fourth case involved Japan’s women soccer team, who had been instructed by their coach not to win a preliminary contest against South Africa, allowing the team to stay in Cardiff and avoid the stress of travel. Neither of these two cases drew disciplinary action.

Question: Is it okay to strategically lose?

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Honor at the Tour de France

17 Tuesday Jul 2012

Posted by dan demetriou in honor code, honor in contempory media, philosophy of honor, stories of honor

≈ 1 Comment

You may have heard about the case of sabotage at the Tour de France this weekend, when the race was disrupted by someone who hurled hundreds of carpet tacks across the road. How the cyclists responded to the sabotage is instructive for the student of honor.

Essentially, what happened was this: the tacks caused havoc as the lead riders had to stop to switch out wheels or whole bikes. The most notable victim was defending champion Cadel Evans, who lost about two minutes. The lead British cyclist and one of Evans’ main rivals this year, Bradley Wiggins (on Team Sky), ordered his team to slow for Evans. He even managed, with considerable success, to direct the lead group (or peloton) of cyclists, composed of various teams, to wait for Evans as well. Evans eventually did catch up, and the standings after that stage were left mostly unchanged.

Here’s a quote from the Guardian on the event. It demonstrates that honor was very much at the forefront of Wiggins’ reasoning:

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Should “Stolen Valor” Be Illegal?

06 Tuesday Mar 2012

Posted by dan demetriou in honor code, honor in contempory media, honor system, philosophy of honor, political science of honor

≈ 6 Comments

Samuel Johnson said every man thinks meanly of himself for not having been a soldier. This seems to hold true even today, given the propensity people have of concocting false stories about military service and awarded medals. It turns out that there is a law prohibiting this, and the Supreme Court is now considering whether that law is Constitutional.

Because of the Stolen Valor Act, which was passed in 2006, it a federal crime to “to falsely represent oneself as having received any U.S. military decoration or medal,” and offenders can be sentenced to up to a year in prison. The current legal challenge, United States v. Alvarez, argues that such lies fall within one’s free speech rights.

One thing that the Justices seem divided on is whether false claims to honor cause any “harm,”or whether it is important to the “public interest” that such lies be discouraged. Taking up the perspective inclined to answer “no” to these questions, Justice Sotomayor challenged the prosecution, asking:

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