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Runners from Russia and Belarus will no longer be allowed to participate in the 2022 Boston Marathon, race officials have announced.
The Boston Athletic Association (BAA) has also banned US citizens who emigrated from Russia and Belarus from running under either of their native country’s flags.
“The BAA, its races, and events will not recognize the country affiliation or flag of Russia or Belarus until further notice,” the organization added.
So much for the tolerant left’s professed love of inclusion and immigrants.
In a statement posted to their website Wednesday, BAA President Tom Grilk justified the discriminatory and xenophobic measure by claiming it’s a show of support for Ukraine.
The B.A.A. has announced that Russians & Belarusians who were accepted into the 2022 Boston Marathon or B.A.A. 5K as part of the open registration process & are currently residing in either country will no longer be allowed to compete in either event.https://t.co/pAwqGqJxOI
1/3— Boston Marathon (@bostonmarathon) April 6, 2022
Russian and Belarusian citizens who were accepted into the 2022 Boston Marathon or 2022 B.A.A. 5K as part of the open registration process but are not residents of either country, will be able to compete however they will not be able to run under the flag of either country.
— Boston Marathon (@bostonmarathon) April 6, 2022
The B.A.A., its races, and events will not recognize the country affiliation or flag of Russia or Belarus until further notice.
Read the full statement here: https://t.co/pAwqGqJxOI#Boston126
— Boston Marathon (@bostonmarathon) April 6, 2022
“Like so many around the world, we are horrified and outraged by what we have seen and learned from the reporting in Ukraine,” Grilk said. “We believe that running is a global sport, and as such, we must do what we can to show our support to the people of Ukraine.”
It’s unclear if the Boston Marathon’s xenophobic exclusion of people from certain countries could be considered a violation of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, which “prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, color, religion, sex or national origin.”
On its face, BAA’s discriminatory exclusion appears hypocritical as it has not taken similar actions against runners from other countries accused of human rights violations, including Venezuela, Cuba, or China, as noted by Reason.com.
Indeed, residents from any number of countries with authoritarian and shady governments, from China to Venezuela, have been welcomed to participate in the Boston Marathon over the years.
The fact that the BAA is allowing residents from other countries whose governments have committed similar sins of aggressive war and mass civilian killings to participate in the marathon shows that it’s not indeed acting on some universal revulsion at government atrocities. Instead, its decision appears to be knee-jerk discrimination against the most visible war occurring right now. It’s hard to treat that as a particularly noble stance.
Of course, trying to exclude every athlete from a country with a nasty government would be a near-impossible task for the BAA. Even if it were feasible to have a consistent policy on when to exclude particular nationalities, that would hardly be desirable for the association. The marathon would become increasingly less inclusive and lose its international recognition. It may even lose its domestic participants. Perhaps, U.S. runners should have been prevented from competing in the 2003 Boston Marathon because of their government’s invasion of Iraq?
The Boston Athletic Association did not immediately respond to requests for comment from Infowars as of writing.
The 2022 Boston Marathon is set to be held on Monday, April 18.
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