people in Britain and around the world. The announcement that London had won the contest to stage the 2012 Olympics was almost immediately overshadowed by the bombings, and the public celebrations were curtailed.
But in the next eight years and beyond there will be room for debate on exactly what the victory secured by Tony Blair and Tory Coe will mean for the people of London and for working
On this page are two contrasting responses, and we are interested to hear readers views: drop us a line or an email and we will publish a selection of the best in our next issue. ment... held up as politically neutral and culturally legitimate".
This is absolutely correct, and there is far too little critical examination of the negative effect of competitive sport pushing the human body to the limits of its physical capacity.
For example the British marathon runner Paula Radcliife has explained that her distinctive head rolling while running is a mechanism for dealing with the debilitating pain she experiences.
The sports which exemplify the Olympics are those based upon direct comparative measurement: for example, athletics, swimming, and boxing.
The competition is between those who can best transform their body into a machine: reducing human beings into people will be driven out of east London to make way for future building programmes.
"The proposed Crossrail scheme threatens to tear the heart out of the historic Brick Lane area. Over the coming weeks, months and years Respect will be working with all interested parties to ensure that regeneration is at the service of the people of east London and its environment, not at their expense."
Respect's Lindsey German, who came second at the general election in the West Ham constituency, adds:
"Billions of pounds will be spent on the Olympics project and local people have every right to demand accountability and control. No one in Newham Calm down, dear, it's only a commercial opening for big business abstract, measurable physical labour.
It is no coincidence that the origin of these alienated sports, where the element of play is entirely absent, coincided with the emergence of wage labour as the dominant relationship of production; a process which removed play and enjoyment from the daily experience of work.
Alongside the sporting content there are huge financial interests, in the construction of the stadiums, housing and transport infrastructure; in advertising; in security and administration; and of course in broadcast rights.
All of this will be paid for, one way or another, by the working classes.
The training infrastructure and sports science is much more advanced in the developed economies of the imperishould be a loser out of this.
"But that will mean a radical departure from previous Olympics. Atlanta was mired in a vast web of corruption. In Barcelona homes were demolished and people uprooted. In Athens scores of construction workers, many of them migrants, were killed in the dash to complete the building work.
"Pollution levels went through the roof. Promised new facilities remained out of reach of many local people.
"We do not want to see any of that happening here. We support the calls by trade unions and community groups such as Telco for decent pay and tight safety regulations for the many thousands of people alist powers
So every four years the Olympics gives an opportunity to ideologically demonstrate that their dominance is underpinned by an implicit racial superiority.
The London Olympics will reinforce the ideology of a classless, idealised national interest. And the more insidious acceptance of the ideological construct of sport - a capitalist industry based upon the competition of idealised people acting as machines.
A society based upon the primacy of meeting human needs, and valuing the well balanced health and happiness of people may include competitive play, but it will never award gold medals for those who submit to an iron tyranny of the clock and the measuring tape as arbiters of human worth. who will be employed on the project.
"The T&G union has already called for ethical employment safeguards, extending all along the supply chain to, for example, the sweatshops of Pakistan and Indonesia, where so much sports merchandise is made.
"With the huge mobilisations this week to make poverty history, today would be the ideal moment for the government to concede that.
"It would also be the perfect moment to do what most Londoners want, admit the disaster of privatised transport and the PPP scheme on the underground, bring it back into public hands and ensure that investment goes into the servIce, not privateers' pockets."