Christians around the world are angry about imitations of the Last Supper. Now the IOC is apologizing and talking about the motives behind it.
No time? blue News summarizes for you
- The opening ceremony of the Olympic Games outraged Christians because of a reference to the Last Supper by drag queens and representatives of the LGBTQ community.
- The hashtag "BoycottOlympics2024" trended on X and prominent critics such as Elon Musk expressed negative opinions.
- The organizers emphasized that the ceremony was meant to celebrate tolerance and apologized for any unintentional offenses.
At the opening ceremony on Friday, drag queens and representatives of the LGBTQ community staged an allusion to the Last Supper. This was met with fierce criticism from Christians around the world. France's Catholic Church spoke of "scenes of mockery and ridicule of Christianity". Tesla and SpaceX boss Elon Musk also expressed his criticism on X: "This was extremely disrespectful towards Christians."
On Sunday, the IOC published a statement asking for an apology: "The IOC has taken note of and welcomes the Paris 2024 Organizing Committee's clarification regarding the opening ceremony. In the daily press conference, the Organizing Committee stated that it never intended to denigrate any religious group or faith. It reiterated that the opening ceremony was always about celebrating community and tolerance. The organizing committee also said that if anyone felt offended by certain scenes, it was completely unintentional and they are sorry."
Criticism focused in particular on a banquet scene in which a woman, drag queens, a child and representatives of the LGBTQ community interpreted a scene reminiscent of Leonardo da Vinci's painting "The Last Supper".
Calls for a boycott and reactions
On social media, some users called for a boycott of the Olympic Games. On Monday, the hashtag "BoycottOlympics2024" was still trending on X.
Anne Descamps, the spokesperson for the Paris 2024 organizers, apologized for any offense in addition to the statement and stressed that the ceremony was meant to "celebrate community tolerance." "It was never the intention to offend any religious group."
At the same time, Descamps defended the creative director of the opening ceremony, Thomas Jolly. "I believe Thomas Jolly wanted to celebrate community tolerance. We believe that goal was achieved, and if anyone took offense to that, we are of course very sorry."
Attempt at damage limitation
In a further attempt at damage limitation, the official X account of the Olympic Games explained that the controversial scene was "an interpretation of the Greek god Dionysus", which was intended to "make us aware of the absurdity of violence between people".
However, this attempt at an explanation was not well received online. Many users criticized that such images had no place at the Olympic Games and saw them as a mockery of the athletes.
