The Rio Olympics start tonight. The modern games are quite different from their ancient counterpart - although I wonder if we would avoid having already had an athlete disqualified for doping if the penalty for cheating was still flogging.
(No, I'm not supporting flogging, just making a wry comment about cheating).
But the ancient games were much closer to their military roots (if you think about it, we have Olympic events that involve hitting each other, shooting guns, throwing spears. Even the equestrian three day event started as a way cavalry officers tested their horses) than ours. I mean, one of their events involved sprinting in full armor.
And while I wouldn't bring back flogging, I do rather love the idea of making the athletes walk past the inscribed names of past cheaters to remind them that it's a bad thing.
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