Day of the Flag — February 20 — Olympic Flag Substitutes Today, February 20, 2022, we witnessed the closing ceremony of the 2022 Winter Olympic Games in Beijing, China. As the Vexillist has stated before, seeing flags at the Olympics is basically the Olympics of flags. At this Olympics, we were reminded once again that flags become a lot more important when the world is watching. Following revelations about state-sponsored doping within Russia's Olympic program, the I.O.C. (International Olympic Committee) ruled (a year ago yesterday, in fact) that Russian athletes participating in the 2022 Winter Olympic Games would compete under the heading of R.O.C. (Russian Olympic Committee). This initialism, which fans of the games will certainly recognize at this point, caused some consternation in the Republic of China, A.K.A. Taiwan. Taiwan itself has actually competed under a substitute flag at every Olympic Games since 1984, after it was denied its seat within the United Nations. In 1992, after a global consensus against apartheid had formed, South Africa's national flag was banned and athletes from that country competed under a flag specifically approved by the I.O.C. Of course, all these examples are relatively recent when compared to the All-German Olympic flag, which was flown from 1959-1968 for athletes from both sides of the Berlin Wall, out of a sense that the political divisions present at the time were not enough to treat these populations as truly separate nations. It is interesting that all of these flags still retain iconic design aspects of the national flags they replaced, from the tricolors to the charges. What's more interesting is how all of these examples show that the Olympics have long been a forum in which people are placed over politics. The I.O.C. seems to have (time and again) taken the position that, no matter how egregious a national government's behavior, the people of every nation deserve the chance to compete among the best. Is that the most upstanding policy? Let the Vexillist know your views in the comments. [V=] 💙💛🖤💚❤️🤍 #dayoftheflag #flinsta #flags #organizationalflags #vexillology https://www.instagram.com/p/CaOLqXJMA9p/?utm_medium=tumblr
