The IOC bans Heraskevych’s commemorative helmet but ignores Russian flags. The case that exposes the Olympic double standard
Vladyslav Heraskevych shows up on the Cortina track with a helmet different from the others. It doesn’t have bright colors, it doesn’t have sponsors. It just has faces. Faces of kids who are no longer here: more than 650 they are the athletes and Ukrainian coaches killed in four years of war. Alina Perehudova, 14 years old, weightlifter, shot down by a Russian sniper while running away. Dmytro Sharpar, figure skater, fell in Bakhmut. Yevhen Malyshev, 19 years old, biathlete, killed while carrying humanitarian aid. And, unfortunately, many others.
The Ukrainian standard-bearer, at his third Olympics with skeleton, had found the simplest and most dignified way to remember them: pasting their photos on the helmet, the one that the cameras focus on, given that the discipline is run on the stomach. No slogans, no propaganda. Only the necessary memory of boys who died unjustly. But no: the International Olympic Committee blocked it immediately, invoking article 50 of the Olympic Charter. Too “political”, they say. Better a discreet black armband.
The double standard in Milan Cortina
Here the donkey falls. Because while Heraskevych is prevented from honoring the dead, snowboarder Roland Fischnaller calmly shows up with the Russian flag on his helmet and no one bats an eye. Of course, Fischnaller only wanted to show the flags of the countries where he had competed, and he is rightly perfectly free to do so. But why this double standard when it comes to the flag of the invading country? Where was the IOC there?
And again: Arkadij Dvorkovich, president of the Russian chess federation, wanders around the Olympic stadium wearing a “CCCP” shirt, the Cyrillic acronym for the Soviet Union. The communist regime that caused millions and millions of deaths. Nobody stops him, nobody is scandalized. And instead Heraskevych, who only wants to remember those who (alas) can no longer compete, suddenly becomes a problem.
Olympic spokesman Mark Adams spoke of “compassion and understanding”. It’s a shame that this compassion translates into a senseless outright ban, while for others the most total indulgence exists. What compassion is there in silencing memory? What understanding in allowing Russian symbols and banning Ukrainian faces?
Because this rule needs to be rewritten
The President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky defended his athlete: «He reminded the world of the price of our struggle. This truth cannot be labeled as a political demonstration.” Heraskevych announced that he will still race with that helmet. “It breaks my heart,” he said when told to remove it. But he won’t stop.
What remains, however, is a brutal question: If remembering the dead is political, what isn’t? And if honoring those who can no longer stand on an Olympic podium violates a rule, then that rule needs to be rewritten. Because the IOC cannot preach peace and brotherhood and then prevent an athlete from commemorating his missing teammates. Monuments, memorial stones and headstones are dedicated to the war dead. Heraskevych had only asked for a helmet. Too. Better that the dead remain where they are: underground and in silence.
