The Winter Olympics have now come to an end, and while the United States did not come out leading the pack, this Olympics has taught us an important lesson about America: When we embrace our diversity and stand together, we are an incredible force to be reckoned with.
The United States ended up ranking fourth out of all 91 participating countries, beating China in total medal count and Russian in total gold medal count. For the United States, this Winter Olympics have been a demonstration of American strength and tenacity, and it displayed an image of what America has the potential to be.
What truly makes the United States stand out from most other countries is our social, ethnic, racial, economic, geographic, and class diversity. We are, after all, commonly referred to as the “Melting Pot”, and as a nation, we have consistently had a history of taking in all the world has to offer and pushing people to be their best.
There are many people who would look at the United States and point to our historical and present disruption of civil, civic, and social rights as evidence to say that we have clearly failed to properly rise to the occasion. However, the Olympics is by far one of the most compelling arenas to support the vision of what America is and should be. When we come together as one people, we ultimately represent the best of what the world has to offer.
One of the greatest threats the United States has faced in recent years is that that we have not been very united. Whether it has been political ideology, race, ethnicity, classism, etc… we have begun to dissolve the embodiment of what it means to be a collective America. We have begun to create a classification-oriented society where we are broken down into sub-sectioned people groups.
Lately, we seem to care more about the identifying markers that come before “American” than simply being American. Instead of everyone just being Americans, we have White Americans, Asian Americans, Black Americans, Latino Americans, Native American, Liberal Americans, Conservative Americans, Rich Americans, Poor Americans, etc… and as a result, we have begun to believe that we actually are not all the same people.
What makes the Olympics special is that when all is said and done, we really don’t classify athletes as Black American Contestants, Asian American Contestants, White American Contestants, etc… every athlete there is simply part of the greater Team USA, and they all embody and represent the collective best of what our country holds.
When an American places in an event, the scoreboard does not say that a White or Black American won a medal, it just says that America won. It does not matter what the person looks like or where they are from, if an American rises to the occasion and does something amazing, we can all rejoice because a win for one of us is a win for all of us.
In historical depictions, the United States is often portrayed as the place where anyone can go to accomplish great things, and while this has not always been clearly displayed throughout our nation’s history, at the Winter Olympics we have begun to see a stunning breakdown of what the United States is capable of.
Among the accomplished by U.S. Athletes at this year’s events:
- In the end, 39 of USA’s 57 Team medals were won by women.
- U.S. athletes, Meyers Taylor and Kaillie Humphries have made history as the first two women to win a medal at four consecutive Olympics.
- Meyers Taylor has become the oldest American woman to win a medal at the Olympics at the age of 37.
- Kallie Humphries, who previously represented Canada in past Winter Olympics changed her nationality, becoming an American before competing and winning gold in the 2022 Olympics.
- Snow boarder, Nick Baumgartner won a gold medal at the age of 40.
- Speed skater, Erin Jackson made history after winning gold.
- Figure skater, Nathan Chen broke a world scoring record along his journey to winning gold.
- Of the total 225 U.S. Athletes, 133 of them were first time Olympians.
The list of U.S. Olympics medalists, along with their stories and backgrounds are a prime example of what American diversity and strength looks like. The 2022 Team USA was a one of the greatest depictions of ordinary people rising to the occasion to do extraordinary things, which is the very essence of what it means to be an American.
While we are all different people with different backgrounds, experiences, heritages, etc… the 2022 Winter Olympics displayed something incredibly special about us; it showed that it doesn’t matter where you come from, what you look like, or how much money you have, because in a United America, when one of us wins we all win, and in the United States of America anything is possible.
Author: Alisher Aminov
