Two Fists, One Stand: The 1968 Olympic Protest cover art

Two Fists, One Stand: The 1968 Olympic Protest

Two Fists, One Stand: The 1968 Olympic Protest

Listen for free

View show details
On October 17th in 1968, one of the most powerful and enduring images in sports history was created on the medal stand at the Summer Olympics in Mexico City. American sprinters Tommie Smith and John Carlos had just finished first and third in the two hundred meter dash, with Smith setting a world record of nineteen point eight three seconds in the process, a mark that stood for years afterward. But what happened next overshadowed the race itself and became a defining moment not just in athletics but in the broader story of civil rights in America. As the national anthem began to play during the medal ceremony, Smith and Carlos, both wearing black gloves, bowed their heads and each raised a single fist into the air. Smith lifted his right hand, Carlos his left, a deliberate choice so that together their raised arms formed an arch of unity. They stood shoeless on the podium, wearing black socks to represent Black poverty, and Smith wore a black scarf around his neck symbolizing Black pride. Carlos had his jacket unzipped in solidarity with blue collar workers everywhere and wore a necklace of beads which he said represented the lynchings and killings that Black people had endured throughout history. Silver medalist Peter Norman of Australia, who had run the race of his life to finish second, also played a quiet but meaningful role. Norman wore a badge on his jacket supporting the Olympic Project for Human Rights, showing his solidarity with the two Americans even though he was not Black himself. It was Norman who actually suggested that Carlos wear the left glove after Carlos realized he had forgotten his own pair back at the Olympic Village, with Smith and Carlos splitting a single set of gloves between them. The reaction was swift and brutal. The International Olympic Committee, led by Avery Brundage, deemed the gesture a political statement unfit for the apolitical ideals of the Olympic Games, which was a bit ironic given Brundage's own history of accommodating Nazi Germany during the 1936 Berlin Olympics. Smith and Carlos were expelled from the Olympic Village and sent home in disgrace. They faced intense backlash upon their return to the United States, including death threats and years of professional and personal hardship. Norman, too, paid a price, as the Australian Olympic establishment effectively froze him out of future Games despite his qualifying times, and he was left off the Australian team for the 1972 Munich Olympics. Over time, however, the moment transformed from controversy into celebrated history. Smith and Carlos came to be seen as courageous figures who used their platform at the height of global attention to protest racial injustice, poverty, and inequality at a time when the civil rights movement in America was reaching a boiling point following the assassination of Martin Luther King Junior just months earlier that same year. Statues honoring their protest now stand at San Jose State University, where both athletes had competed collegiately. In 2019, the United States Olympic and Paralympic Committee formally inducted Smith and Carlos into its Hall of Fame specifically for their activism, a stark reversal from the punishment they received five decades earlier. Norman, who passed away in 2006, was honored posthumously by Smith and Carlos themselves, who served as pallbearers at his funeral, a final testament to the bond forged on that podium in Mexico City. The image of three men, two fists raised and one silent ally standing beside them, remains one of the most iconic and studied photographs in the history of sport and social protest.
adbl_web_anon_alc_button_suppression_t1
No reviews yet