We dream of idols

The past Olympics with extraordinary clarity confirmed how strong our need for an idol is. And the point, as you understand, is not a servile passion to have a charismatic leader. No politics. In sports, for example, this need is redundant and disinterested. I would like to see the “most-most”, special and impressing with some of its own, again special, qualities. Like, for example, figure skater Yulia Lipnintskaya.

Everything is the best here. The youngest figure skater in the history of the Winter Olympics. Already a Wikipedia character. On the day of the team victory, she became the Honored Master of Sports. Cute, not childishly strong-willed. And how touchingly her program begins: either she collects a snowball on ice, or she courts a sunbeam, or she draws a sign of infinity. Charming wunderkind. In addition, her mother raised her without a father.

I liked Julia too. But the crackling voices of the hosts and the animated, ecstatic crowd suggested that something was wrong. Every now and then I thought about the second figure skater — Adeline Sotnikova. Staying in the shadow of someone else’s glory on the eve of decisive competitions must be uncomfortable. However, the crowd knows how to love only one, only the first. Even the name of Sotnikova was not known to many until her victory.

But she might not have won. Anything can happen: sports, judges, points, mistakes. But Adeline won. And then in an instant it turned out that there were also videos about her and that she was also a child prodigy (before everyone else she began to do some difficult jumps). Today she is seventeen years old (unlucky — two years older than her friend). By the time the Olympics began, Sotnikova was already a two-time silver medalist of the European Championships, a world champion among juniors, a four-time champion of Russia (the first time at the age of 13). And also a master of sports of international class.

However, as the press reported, it was Lipninskaya who shook the world. So, no one cared about the merits and achievements of Sotnikova. The press started talking about her only after she beat Lipnitskaya in the short program: “Now all the newspapers write about Lipnitskaya …

I don’t know and I don’t want to know. — Isn’t it a shame that they don’t write about you like that?

«I don’t read the press.»

In the answers one can feel a strong character, but also resentment, resentment too.

Now the press is wondering why Yulia, who instantly became “our everything”, in fact, a national symbol, ended up only in fifth place. The reason is called the mass hype, in which they themselves are to blame. Almost under state protection, Yulia was taken away for several days to train in Moscow, away from the Olympic noise and spotlights, but the journalists found her there too. They say they installed bugs in the apartment. But legally, they did not have the right to publish even her photographs without the permission of her mother. In short, the nerves of this harsh girl could not stand it.

• Why do we watch the Olympics?

Perhaps this is so. Don’t know. But now I’m talking about something else.

The crowd is not only a mass gathering of people in the stands or in the squares. There is also the taste and opinion of the crowd, which is cultivated by the media and replicated by specific journalists. There is no mention of quality here. It is not talent that is valued, but rating. The latter, unlike talent, is man-made. The main thing is to correctly hear and formulate the order of the crowd. The matter is simple. Obedient executors of the order confidently pronounce: the people will not understand this, the viewer will turn off the TV, the electorate is not mature. Valued, I repeat, not a person, but a reputation. Which is often false. Black and white cinema. Well no. Ours is not ours.

Correctly or incorrectly an order is heard, always remains on the conscience of its performers. This would be all right if it were not for the incredible opportunities for manipulating public opinion that are now in their hands. They do not fulfill the order, but actually form, dictate tastes and preferences. And resisting this temptation of the crowd is becoming increasingly difficult. Having bought into mass demand, we become slaves to someone else’s opinion. Which in itself is pretty humiliating. It only seems to a person that he likes it, that he feels it. No, he is infected with someone else’s emotion of adoration. The estimate he uses is obviously not accurate. The opinion of the crowd is not connected with the real merits of the object. And most importantly, what I started with: it is monstrously tactless, both in relation to the praised, and in relation to the talented and stubborn, whom the mass listener, spectator, reader or fan does not honor his attention for the time being.