Flag-bearer couples

Absolute equality of rights, between men and women, must be an effective and not a theoretical reality in all fields. And even carrying a flag, when it has a highly symbolic value, cannot be extraneous to social progress. 

The IOC Executive Committee, meeting in Lausanne, approved an amendment to the protocol guidelines relating to the opening ceremonies of the Olympic Games. This will allow participating countries to field a double standard-bearer: a man and a woman. On the contrary: all the national Olympic committees involved will be encouraged to take advantage of the opportunity, which would have become operational in Tokyo this summer 2020, if Covid-19 had not canceled many competitions.

Moreover, if there is a nation that has already gone beyond certain macho habits, it is Italy, given that the last 2 standard-bearers were women: in London 2012, the fencer Valentina Vezzali, and in Rio de Janeiro 2016, the swimmer Federica Pellegrini. Moreover, on closer inspection, the wall has also been demolished in the international arena. In fact, in the 2018 Winter Games in PyeongChang, the Canadian skating dance couple Tessa Virtue-Scott Moir was double standard bearer and double gold medal.

The history of the Olympics has always been the mirror of society's back and forth steps. From political secessions to racial battles, in the end, the Games provided, however, a positive way out, despite suffering painful moments. If we compare the 1900 Olympics in Paris, in which 22 women made their debut, with the 2016 ones in Rio de Janeiro, in which there were 5059, 45% of the total, it becomes a logical epilogue, in the inaugural ceremony, that constituted by the combination man-woman for each country. And if civil rights were not enough, it has been the competitive performances, in recent decades, that have reduced the gap between men and women. Italy knows something about it, which owes most of the most recent international sporting growth to women.

Carlo Nesti
NP august-september 2020