She would have known what the impact would've been, she literally studied the sport. She must have seen many female Australian breakers who were leagues above her in terms of skill. Yet she thought she was worthy to represent her country, hate is a strong word, but she and the org that put her there should be heavily criticised.

I mean, I get what you're going at, but she does hold a PhD in cultural studies, and she did put in a lot of effort to get in. It's very possible, too, that, in an arena so different than what she's used to, she choked. A lot of the hate goes above and beyond with death threats and claims she should kill herself, and nobody deserves that.

For how goofy it was, and the memes that have come from it, she's earned my respect and thanks for bringing a little, albeit unintentional, joy to my life.

I think what the snooty professional athletes and organisers need to remember is that the general public don't really care who is the fastest woman to run 250m through mud while wearing a rucksack. You can dedicate your whole life that and for the majority of us it doesn't matter a jot.

But somebody falls on their face or nearly drowns in the pool, and people will see that because it's more newsworthy than "man jumps 1cm further than other man".

Eddie the Eagle. The Jamaican Bobsled team. Eric the Eel. These are the names that stick in the memory. We'll only remember winners if they win a ton of medals, like Usain Bolt, Michael Phelps or Simone Biles.

Who even won the women's Breaking gold medal? I'd have to look it up if I wanted to know. But we know who Raygun is for better or worse. So who's the real winner here?

probably got free healthcare while she was there though

(Rumors that Raygun’s husband was on the Olympic breaking selection committee have ultimately been dispelled by the Australian Breaking Committee, and historically, Raygun ranked first or second on Australia’s list of nationally-ranked B-girls from 2020 to 2023. The official Olympics site also has a detailed description of the rigorous process of qualifying to compete in the sport at the Olympics.)

From the link in @Spiralvortexisalie@lemmy.world ’s comment on this post

Ugh, that sucks.

I saw an interview with her yesterday where she said she gave it her best after a lot of work and was pretty upset about all the hate.

I guess I need to do some more research!

E: seems like she won some awards and was pretty good in her neck of the woods