Criticizing third world countries is not the way to go

Venues in shambles, green pools breeding mosquitos with the Zika bio-hazard, athletes held at gunpoint — the Rio Olympics were supposed to be a disaster. Yet, despite international hesitance and doubt, the recent games concluded without many incidents.

All the criticism directed at Rio wasn’t shown during the London Olympics in 2012, yet London remains one of the world’s most unequal cities with a 15 percent poverty rate and increasing wage gaps. The main difference? Rio is part of a third-world country.

Throughout the history of the Olympics, the Western media and public have constantly criticized other countries’ abilities to host the Olympics. This can be seen in the upcoming 2020 Olympics hosted by Japan. Western media have already begun to criticize Japan’s attempts to create a more personalized Olympic logo and build a stadium.

Time and time again, the West has expressed its superiority over other countries. Perhaps the entire controversy surrounding the Rio Olympics has once again been an over-exaggeration from Western media outlets.

One overarching example is the threat of Zika. Many news outlets portrayed Zika as a prominent threat, yet as the Olympics rolled by, cold temperatures and wind eliminated Zika as a threat.

While this over-exaggeration of threats may be in the best interests of athletes, it actually caused some serious repercussions: It has made the U.S. appear overbearing and has caused unnecessary concerns for threats that don’t exist.

Our perceptions of third-world countries have led some to take advantage of them. Athlete Ryan Lochte was caught lying about being mugged at gunpoint to cover up for his own drunken vandalizing of a bathroom. Perhaps he thought he could take advantage of the third-world’s “inferior” system to escape responsibility and punishment. Lochte’s action resulted in international criticism, and Lochte has suffered a financial cost since many of his sponsors dropped him after the controversy.

If we made more efforts to help developing countries instead of criticizing them, a lot more could be accomplished. In Rio, the U.S. was more focused on protecting its own athletes instead of trying to improve the environment it criticized. For example, we worried about the Zika virus threat but did little about it. A more collaborative approach would have been more beneficial in the long run.

The West’s viewpoint of  third-world countries is flawed. While these nations have daunting challenges, we shouldn’t view them or their people as inferior or mediocre. Instead, we should begin to change the way that we think of them so we can create real change. Criticizing problems is only useful if we try to solve them as well.