Loose expression is usually assured to each particular person, however the World Olympic Committee (IOC) restricts the expression of political ideology through athletes all the way through pageant. However does representing compatriots killed all the way through an ongoing warfare, as Ukraine’s Vladislav Heraskevich did all the way through the present Olympics, for which he was once disqualified, represent “political, religious or racial demonstration or propaganda,” because the IOC has dominated? At the back of those casuistic questions is a continuing query this is incessantly requested on this planet of sports activities: what sort of neutrality is said through global sports activities establishments?
On the 2026 Milan-Cortina Olympic Video games, one of the vital mentioned episodes happened now not at the ice, however across the helmet.
Ukrainian skeleton runner Vladyslav Heraskevich, 27, was once disqualified after refusing to compete in any apparatus rather then his “memory helmet”, a helmet bearing the faces and names of probably the most many Ukrainian athletes and coaches who’ve died because the Russian invasion. The World Olympic Committee (IOC) deemed the helmet to be in violation of Rule 50 of the Olympic Constitution, which prohibits any “political, religious or racial demonstration or propaganda” at pageant venues.
On February 11, the IOC proposed a compromise: the athlete may show the helmet earlier than or after the race and put on the black armband all the way through the contest. Heraskevich refuses, mentioning that “the medal is worthless compared to the lives and memories of these athletes.”
On February 12, the World Bobsleigh and Skeleton Federation (IBSF) got rid of him from the beginning listing.
His request earlier than an advert hoc panel of the Courtroom of Arbitration for Game (CAS) was once rejected on February 13.
The CAS press liberate is central: it recognizes the legitimacy of the tribute, however reminds that freedom of expression, whilst secure, is restricted at the box of play. Different areas – the blending zone, press meetings, social networks – stay extra open to the expression of private perspectives of athletes.
This sentence from IOC spokesman Mark Adams summarizes the doctrine: “It’s not the message, it’s the place. “: it is not the message that issues, however the position the place apparently.
Territorial neutrality
The 2026 model of Rule 50 consolidates the interpretive good judgment from the Athlete Expression Tips followed after the 2020–2021 controversies. Rule 50.2 had already been comfortable forward of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics (held in 2021 because of Covid), opening the regulated door to podium expression.
As we hinted to FranzJeuk on the time: “We are no longer in the time of Pierre de Coubertin, when athletes had to express themselves through their sporting gestures.”
This territorialization does now not stand up ex nihilo. On the 2020 Tokyo Video games, the IOC has already comfortable Rule 50, permitting sure types of expression at the box, whilst keeping up a strict ban on podiums and all the way through protocol ceremonies. Knees positioned at the floor, symbolic gestures or indicators carried through athletes then sparked a world debate.
This second marked a turning level: Olympic neutrality now not seems as an absolute ban, however as a mild stability between freedom of expression and coverage of the ceremonial scene. Rule 50 was once progressively remodeled, shifting from a disciplinary regime to a good judgment of surveillance differentiated through area.
The Heraskevich affair is a part of this building. It does now not sign a go back to overall prohibition, however unearths the endurance of a boundary: that which separates tolerated expression from forbidden visibility within the box of pageant.
The normative middle is now spatial: expression is conceivable, however now not within the aggressive area. Olympic neutrality is now not outlined because the absence of politics, however because the arranged control of visibility, according to a transparent difference between the aggressive scene and peripheral areas.
All through the similar video games, skier Gus Kenworthy posted an image on Instagram with the slogan “FUCK ICE”, taking purpose at america’ immigration coverage. No name to reserve adopted, both through the British Olympic Committee or the IOC. The message, obviously political, but provocative in its suitability, circulated outdoor the contest space even earlier than the beginning of the development.
This territorialization was once justified through the IOC within the identify of a conceivable “domino effect”: “With 130 conflicts in the world, we cannot allow every athlete to send political messages during their events” (Mark Adams, quoted in FranzJeuk, 12 February 2026). Neutrality thus turns into a method of managing surfaces.
Reminiscence, commemoration or propaganda?
The debate lies within the very qualification of the gesture. The protest slogan obviously belongs to the class of protest. However does honoring the lifeless depend as propaganda?
Heraskevich’s helmet didn’t make an specific political call for. He introduced faces, names. He materialized reminiscence in an area designed to house most effective functionality.
Alternatively, Rule 50 does now not distinguish between statement and commemoration. All visual inscriptions that may be interpreted as political are prohibited. Neutrality protects the formal coherence of the display. However right here she encounters an intrusion of ancient vulnerability.
World controversy
The episode brought about fierce controversy. IOC President Kirsty Coventry for my part attempted to persuade the athlete to modify his helmet, she later defined to the media with tears in her eyes.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky publicly supported Heraskevich, condemning the incomprehensible choice within the context of warfare. There were important voices stressing that the Video games exclude or strictly keep watch over the participation of Russia and Belarus – selections which are already extremely political – whilst qualifying the tribute as a prohibited political gesture, a measure observed as incoherent.
On social media, a picture of the helmet circulated broadly, adopted through hashtags like #RemembranceIsNotAViolation (#LaCommemorationN’EstPasUneViolation) or #HelmetOfDigniti (#CaskueDeLaDignite). Ukrainian athletes reacted with microgestures of unity: Olena Smaha (sledge) appearing a glove with the inscription “Remembrance is not a violation”, Dmytro Shepyuk waving the message “UKR heroes with us”.
Olena Smaha displays a message written on her glove. Unitedmedia24 Ks account
Those gestures apply precisely the boundary drawn through the IOC: an expression outdoor the sector of play, with out an immediate inscription at the racing apparatus. Neutrality is circumvented with out being without delay violated.
The semblance of equivalence
Aside from the person case, the talk highlights a deeper asymmetry. The Video games are according to the fiction of equivalence: all athletes input the sector below the similar laws. However warfare introduces an intensive asymmetry: some compete whilst others die.
Challenging that this asymmetry stay invisible approach keeping the eurythmy of the spectacle—this regulated solidarity of our bodies, indicators, and surfaces that promises the legibility of the development—at the price of smoothing over vulnerability. Olympic neutrality protects the narrative continuity of the development. But if reminiscence enters the sector, it unearths a normative blind spot: Olympism is aware of how you can body propaganda; he struggles to consider mourning.
In 2024, all the way through the 2024 Paris Olympics, two Afghan feminine athletes met with other fates after voicing their give a boost to for ladies’s rights when it comes to their nation. On August 2, sprinter Kimia Youssofi grew to become over her vest to show a handwritten message: “Education, Sports, Our Rights.” No sanction is imposed. On August 9, the dancer Maniža Talash published a material, a gown with the inscription “Free Afghan Women” all the way through a breaking pageant: she was once disqualified tomorrow.
As within the Heraskevich affair, the query isn’t such a lot concerning the defended factor as concerning the visibility it has at the aggressive scene.
The variation is not just within the content material of the messages, however of their depth and the scene in their look. In terms of the 2 Afghan feminine athletes, the primary message units values; the opposite formulates an categorical prohibition. In each circumstances, the rationale defended is similar. However at the aggressive level, expressing the declare without delay is thought of as a ruin with the symbolic grammar of the Video games.
Olympic neutrality does now not do away with politics. It regulates their bureaucracy, levels and puts of look.
A query that transcends limitations
The Heraskevich affair does now not most effective name into query the translation of a rule. He questions the capability of the Olympic fashion to combine ancient vulnerabilities into an area this is conceived as compliant.
Olympism was once built now not most effective thru normative texts, but in addition thru performative statements. The Olympic Oath, whose wording developed over the process the twentieth century, comes to athletes in a ritualized scene wherein they jointly claim honor, loyalty, and now inclusion. Olympism does now not merely restrict: it shapes collective voice and visibility.
Rule 50 is a part of the similar good judgment. It isn’t most effective meant to stop political messages; protects symbolic coherence, continuity of indicators at the pageant space. It is helping keep a performance-centered scene the place our bodies are meant to meet in a type of symbolic equivalence.
The illusion of the “memory helmet” due to this fact does now not ruin the rule of thumb itself. It introduces an indication that doesn’t belong to the standard ceremonial grammar of the Video games.
Rule 50 prohibits all political “propaganda”. Alternatively, the time period isn’t impartial in Olympic historical past. In his founding writings, Pierre de Coubertin explicitly known as for the “propagation of the idea of peace” and envisioned the unfold of neo-Olympism as an academic enterprise aimed toward remodeling mentalities. Olympism was once by no means detached: it all the time carried a normative challenge.
Fresh neutrality due to this fact does now not correspond to the absence of ideology. It represents a different modality of this ambition. It organizes visibility to keep the average scene.
However this equivalence is fragile. When athletes are without delay suffering from an ongoing warfare, when the names and faces of the lifeless pop out at the monitor, the separation between recreation and the sector turns into more difficult to take care of.
The Milan-Cortina helmet affair does now not contradict the Olympic supreme; unearths its constitutive stress. Olympism has a tendency to provide symbolic cohesion. It is still observed how this cohesion can coexist with the visibility of fractures that stand up now not from idea, however from lived revel in.
The query is now not merely whether or not recreation is political.
It is composed of figuring out how a ways neutrality can move when reminiscence is made visual – and whether or not the eurythmy of surfaces can combine the vulnerability of the our bodies that move thru them.
