Recommendation: 2005 Deaflympics Games

From: - Mar 1, 2005
Sent in by Donovan Cresdee;

Ok you have had a bad experience with CISS but to slag of the whole of the Deaflympics based on your bitterness with a few individuals is rather sad. Whether there were 3000, 2000 or 4000 athletes is irrelevant, its called spin, and any good PR machine will use it.

The worst was to slag off individuals who were giving there time free of charge to promote the games. Sam Quinn would not have been trying to mislead anyone. He would have been quoting an estimated figure . The real story of the games is the spirit and the friendships that it bred. You cant quantify this.

Deaflawsuit also has egg on his/her face. He said Dean Barton Smith was removed from the presidency because he was inefficient. This is far from the case. It was laughable to say he was replaced by Trish Lacey. To set the record straight, Trish was the paid CEO of the Deaflympics. Dean just volunteered his time as president. In the end he was removed, not because he was inefficient, but because the organisers of the games wanted to appease politicians who wanted an experienced business person as its head. This was extremely sad because from this moment the Games became almost hearing controlled rather than Deaf controlled.

Barton Smith is a loyal servant to Deaf sport. Love him or hate him he gives his all. I dare say without his drive and passion the $12 million that was received in funding would have been sufficiently less. He doesn't deserve to be slagged off and put down, rather he should be thanked and remembered for his wholehearted effort on behalf of the Games.

I think Deaflawsuit should go back in his/her box. Critisism is fine if its constructive but if its just a bitter attack on individuals and petty statistics it should be treated with the contempt it deserves. Deaflawsuit I am sad to say is a sad and sorry individual.

Written by Gary Kerridge (A deaf volunteer of the 2005 Deaflympics Games)