Isn’t it the worst insult for a historical figure to be universally known for a phrase that was never said? Pierre de Coubertin never uttered the famous motto: ” The important thing is to participate. » The philosophical and little-practiced sentence belongs to the archbishop of Pennsylvania, the obscure Ethelbert Talbot. It was at the end of the 1908 London Games, a sort of ceasefire for an Olympiad which, even today, is seen as a peak of chauvinism on the part of the public, the athletes, and even more so the judges. British who used all means to win their compatriots. The formula was taken up thus by the Frenchman Pierre Fredy, Baron de Coubertin: “Let us remember, Gentlemen, these strong words: the important thing in life is not the triumph but the fight, it is not to have won but to have fought well. » Much less punchline, we will agree.
Actually, ” the important thing is to participate “ owes part of its posterity to the fact that it appeared on the scoreboards during the Berlin Games, organized in 1936. For Adolf Hitler and the Nazis, the promotion of fair play and spirit said “de Coubertin” was not, however, the primary ambition… The false authorship of this Olympic refrain is only one of the many disputes surrounding the Frenchman Pierre de Coubertin (1863-1937), initiator of the modern Games.
While the next Summer Olympics will take place in Paris, the character is causing more controversy than ever in his native country. His aristocratic self-importance is pointed out, his complacency towards Adolf Hitler’s Germany assumed. His misogynistic and racist outbursts, above all, are exhumed. Anthology: “A female Olympiad would be impractical, uninteresting, unsightly and incorrect. » “The races are of different values and to the white race, of superior essence, all others must owe allegiance. » Suffice it to say that, for those who claimed to be a “colonial fanatic”, the matter seems settled in this XXIe century which calls itself #metoo and Black Lives Matter.
The big absentee from the Paris Olympics
The bulky personality arouses the embarrassment of his contemporary successors. Under the carpet, Pierre de Coubertin! Radio silence at the French National Olympic and Sports Committee (CNOSF). A request for an interview with David Lappartient, its current president, to talk about the man whose statue sits a little larger than life (1.67 meters instead of 1.62 meters) in the hall of the Paris headquarters, remained without answer. Type “Coubertin” into the search engine of the Organizing Committee of the Olympic Games (COJO) of this 33e Olympiad, and an infamous message appears: “No results available. »
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