War, economics, and prejudice: The hidden competitors of the Olympic Games

It's never just about global unity and friendly competition

The torch run during the 1936 Olympics in Berlin
(Image credit: Chronicle / Alamy Stock Photo)

The Olympic Charter outlines the driving philosophy behind the Olympic Games: to create an event "without discrimination of any kind, such as race, color, sex, sexual orientation, language, religion, political or other opinion."

It's a beautiful sentiment. And the Olympics always fails to live up to it.

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Kimberly Alters

Kimberly Alters is the news editor at TheWeek.com. She is a graduate of the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University.