Special Olympics

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~Special Olympics Mission~

"The mission of Special Olympics is to provide year-round sports training and athletic competition in a variety of Olympic-type sports for children and adults with intellectual disabilities, giving them continuing opportunities to develop physical fitness, demonstrate courage, experience joy and participate in a sharing of gifts, skills and friendship with their families, other Special Olympics athletes and the community."

(Special Olympics, 2023)

Eunice Kennedy Shriver was the founder of Camp Shriver, a place with people with intellectual disabilities could feel included and participate in sports/activities, in the early 1960s at her Maryland farm, Timberlawn. Soon, everyone including the young camp counselors realized that these children were not difficult nor unteachable, but all they wanted to do was simply have fun (Special Olympics). Individuals with disabilities were tremendously being mistreated during the 1960s, being sent to institutions and not being able to leave their houses: something had to change. Then, on July 20, 1968, in Chicago, Illinois, the first Special Olympics International Summer Games were held and joined by about 1,000 participating athletes with intellectual disabilities from USA and Canada. Their goal for the event was to focus on ability rather than disability and established the name Special Olympics (Levin, 2022).

Eunice Kennedy Shriver: Champion for Change (U.S. National Park Service)

The Special Olympics were designed for individuals with intellectual disabilities to practice and compete against others with alike disabilities where they can be themselves and have fun with their friends and family. Whereas, on the other hand, the Paralympic Games are for individuals with more physical disabilities who train and compete for their country. I think that both of these specific Olympics Games have something special being their own games and therefore I do think that the Special Olympics should remain separate from the Paralympics.

Although the Paralympics is for people with disabilities, I believe that both the Paralympics and Special Olympics hold a special place in different hearts and were made for their own reasons. I think that everyone should be able to play against others that struggle with the same disability so that they all feel equal and there is no harder competition than themselves. I believe that people with intellectual disabilities should play against others like them so that there is no feeling of exclusion or unfairness if they were to compete against someone with a physical disability and vice versa. A major reason is classification and if those with intellectual disabilities do not meet the requirements for a class or the Paralympics does not have their class, then people can be disappointed or feel left out. It is a tough situation when there are angry parents just trying to do what's right for their kids.

In the Paralympic Games in Sydney in the year 2000, the Spanish Basketball team took the gold for the intellectual disabilities category, but they were faking these impairments, therefore causing a big blow in the Paralympic world. Because of this, the IPC suspended every sport class that included intellectual disabilities in them. Some athletes that actually had intellectual disabilities had to suffer because of this scandal that happened and were banned, which, as one can imagine, was very upsetting and disappointing. In 2009, the IPC made a new system to classify intellectual disabilities, but only a single class for specific sports (France 24, 2021). 

Special Olympics - Wikipedia

References

France 24. (2021, August 31). Athletes with intellectual disability battle for paralympic space. France 24. Retrieved April 4, 2023, from https://www.france24.com/en/live-news/20210831-athletes-with-intellectual-disability-battle-for-paralympic-space

Levin, P. by L. L. (2022, May 18). Camp Shriver - the beginning of a movement. SpecialOlympics.org. Retrieved April 4, 2023, from https://www.specialolympics.org/about/history/camp-shriver

Mission. SpecialOlympics.org. (2022, April 11). Retrieved April 4, 2023, from https://www.specialolympics.org/about/mission

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