1936 olympics

The 1936 Berlin Olympic Games had been handed to Berlin before the Nazis came to power but now it was the perfect opportunity for Hitler to demonstrate to the world, how efficient the Nazi Germany was. It was also the perfect opportunity for the Nazis to prove to the world the reality of the Master Race. The Berlin Olympic Games gave the Nazis an opportunity to show off to the world as 49 countries were competing bringing with them their assorted media. The Nazi Germany team had been allowed to train fulltime thus pushing to the limit the idea of amateur competition. Germany's athletic superstar of the time was Lutz Lang, a brilliant long jumper who easily fitted into the image. By far the most famous athlete in the world was Jesse Owens of America, an African American and therefore, under Nazi ideology, inferior to the athletes in the German team. The vast Olympic stadium was completed on time and held 100,000 spectators. 150 other new Olympic buildings were completed on time for the event. The anti-Semitic posters that had littered Germany before the games had disappeared. Signs that stated "Jews not welcome here" were not longer visible and anything was done to ensure that the Games went smoothly and caused no upset. In fact, the upset was caused in the stadium itself. The 'racially inferior' Owens won four gold medals; in the 100m, 200m, long jump and 4 x 100m relay. During the Games he broke 11 Olympic records and defeated Lutz Lang in a very close long jump final. Lang was the first to congratulate Owens when the long jump final was over. There were 10 African American members of the American athletics team. Between them they won 7 gold medals, 3 silvers and 3 bronze, more than any national team won in track and field at the Games, except America itself. Hitler refused to place the gold medal around Owen's neck.

The real question was why were the olypmics more about the politics than the joining of the wrold to play these great games. The 1936 Summer Olympics were controversial due to the Nazi regime that came to power after the city's selection. Adolf Hitler regarded it as his Olympics and he took them as a chance to show off the post-First World War Germany. In 1936, a number of prominent politicians and organizations called for a boycott of the 1936 Summer Olympics, which had been awarded to Germany before the Nazi regime came to power. The Popular Front government of Spain decided to boycott the games and organized the People's Olympiad as an altermative with labour and socialist groups around the world sending athletes to the effort. However the Spanish Civil War broke out just as the games were about to begin. The United States considered boycotting the games, but ultimately decided to participate. Nazi propaganda promoted concepts of "Aryan racial superiority," however African-American athlete Jesse Owens did not face segregation and discrimination in Germany that were normal in the United States at the time. So the big emphisis was on germany and the nazis more than the great games. The olypmics are for the world to come together as one and show off what they have to offer.