{"id":401197,"date":"2024-06-08T23:37:04","date_gmt":"2024-06-08T23:37:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=401197"},"modified":"2024-06-09T01:05:59","modified_gmt":"2024-06-09T01:05:59","slug":"aussies-incredible-hand-in-iconic-olympic-protest","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=401197","title":{"rendered":"Aussie's incredible hand in iconic Olympic protest"},"content":{"rendered":"

To mark 100 days from the opening ceremony of the Paris 2024 Olympic Games, Nine.com.au asked you what your favourite Olympic memories were in a survey. The response was overwhelming! We chose 50 of them to re-live, one a day, before new memories are made in Paris. Scroll on for today's memory.<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

I\ufefft was an Olympic<\/a> protest that made for one of the most influential images ever taken and changed the world. In front of a 50,000-strong crowd and millions of others worldwide\ufeff, an Australian and two Americans took a brave and powerful stand against racism at the Mexico City Olympics of 1968.<\/p>\n

Tommie Smith, Peter Norman and John Carlos had just swept the medals in the men's 200m.<\/p>\n

An extraordinary medal ceremony followed.<\/p>\n

In solidarity with the civil-rights movement in the USA, Smith and Carlos both raised a fist encased in a black glove and bowed their heads as their country's national anthem, The Star-Spangled Banner, rung throughout the stadium.<\/p>\n

The protest was named the black power salute.\ufeff<\/p>\n

Norman did not wear a black glove, nor did he raise a fist, but the star sprinter from Melbourne joined Smith and Carlos in wearing an Olympic Project for Human Rights badge.<\/p>\n

The black gloves represented unity and strength, Smith wore a black scarf as a symbol of black pride, black beads around Carlos' neck, which were recognisable because of an unzipped USA tracksuit in defiance of Olympic rules, indicated the horrendous number of lynchings of African-Americans, and no shoes \u2014 black socks were worn instead \u2014 signified poverty.<\/p>\n

Watch the video at the top of the page to see the iconic black power protest.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

Many years later, the photograph taken of the protest by John Dominis was named in Time's 100 most influential images of all time.<\/p>\n

"We are in the Olympic Project for Human Rights," Carlos had said to Norman as they prepared to walk out for the medal ceremony.<\/p>\n

"Do you believe in human rights?"<\/p>\n

Norman smiled.<\/p>\n

"Of course I believe in human rights," he said.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

When it was realised that Smith had taken black gloves to the stadium but Carlos had left his at the Olympic village, Norman suggested that Carlos wear Smith's left glove. That's why Carlos raised his left hand as Smith lifted his right, which is the traditional black power salute.<\/p>\n

Norman had also shown commitment to the cause in suggesting to Smith and Carlos that he join them in donning an OPHR badge, before chasing up a button himself.<\/p>\n

"Hey, mate. You got another one of those?" Norman said to Paul Hoffman, the coxswain from the US men's rowing eight.<\/p>\n

Hoffman passed him a badge.<\/p>\n

"He's a white Australian runner with two black athletes wanting an OPHR badge," Hoffman said years later.<\/p>\n

"I'll be damned if I'm not going to give it to him."<\/p>\n

Within hours of the protest, Smith and Carlos were condemned by the International Olympic Committee. A couple of days later, they were suspended from the US team and sent home.<\/p>\n

And all three men endured awful pain in their personal lives over many years.\ufeff<\/p>\n

In the\ufeff race that preceded the protest, Smith won gold, Norman silver and Carlos bronze.<\/p>\n

Norman ran a time at the Mexico City Olympics which remains the Australian men's 200m record, stopping the clock at 20.06 seconds.\ufeff<\/p>\n

Smith won gold with a world record time of 19.83, becoming the first man to crack the 20-second barrier legally.\ufeff<\/p>\n

Norman died in 2006 and the two men he had joined in the protest many years earlier were pallbearers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

To mark 100 days from the opening ceremony of the Paris 2024 Olympic Games, Nine.com.au asked you what your favourite Olympic memories were in a […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":400326,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/401197"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=401197"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/401197\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":401201,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/401197\/revisions\/401201"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/400326"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=401197"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=401197"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=401197"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}