The Winter Paralympics started last Friday. But Peacock hid the Opening ceremonies at the bottom of the home page so it took forever to find it. This is completely different coverage than what the Winter Olympics received – and the Winter Olympics received very high ratings. So the Winter Paralympics should be getting a boost from a successful Winter Olympics games, right? Well…
NBC promised that coverage would be nearly identical between the Olympics and the Paralympics, but it has been far, far worse and nearly forgotten. For reference, the Olympic Committee is different than Paralympic Committee. They are two separate entities that agree to have these events back to back.
First, on the first day or two of the Paralympics, viewers using Peacock could not find events, This is due to not having a dedicated Paralympics tab like there was for the Winter Olympics a few weeks ago. The Paralympics receive enough viewership that complaints reached NBC. There is now a dedicated Paralympics tab.
Summary of Problems
There is a laundry list of problems with the Paralympics coverage. The problems did not exist during Olympics coverage. Some examples include – no audio on some broadcasts. Most of the coverage has been crowd noise and ambient sounds. No commentary, no excitement. Just ambient sound while watching. Sometimes you can’t even hear the announcers that are in the arena for the spectators at the event. It’s very hard to watch and get into the sports if there’s no commentary explaining what is happening. Especially when you never watched the sport. Part of the fun of the Olympics and Paralympics is learning new sports and the stories of the athletes.
Commentary Controversy
The biggest offense of this happened in Alpine skiing finals. A FINAL EVENT didn’t have commentary. The athletes competed. They didn’t show the medal ceremony. The feed cut to another sport and never came back to the medal ceremony. It’s a shame for these athletes to train just as much as Olympic athletes train, but get less attention and not the same level of coverage.
In the Winter Paralympics there are SIX SPORTS. NBC and the Paralympic Committee thought so little about these athletes they couldn’t find broadcasters for SIX sports. The only sport I have watched that has consistent broadcasting is sled hockey. That has been the ONLY fun sport to watch and I feel bad for the skiers that won but the coverage was so terrible I could not watch it.
I heard wheelchair curling finally got broadcasters for later rounds, but earlier rounds deserve broadcasters too. The rules of wheelchair curling are very different than people with legs curling. And since Olympic Curling is an American treasure, Paralympic Wheelchair Curling should also be marketed to create some hype. I know it’s not for everyone, but it’s still underrepresented compared to the Olympics.
Effects on the Disability Community
The lack of coverage continues to keep the disability community feeling forgotten or their accomplishments and their training are less competitive than the Olympians. This is not true in the slightest. Both events’ athletes stay in the same accommodations. They use the same locations. The main difference is changing the sport for sitters and the visually impaired to compete on an equal playing field. They’re working just as hard, but the athletes get less recognition.
One last issue is the time of year. Paralympics should be before the Winter Olympics OR they should move the Winter Olympics to January so the Paralympian’s aren’t competing in worse condition because
we’re less than two weeks from spring. Skiing was terrifying to watch because the conditions were so bad on the hill that it caused crashes and unnecessary difficulties. It’s no longer the Winter Paralympics if we’re playing them in spring conditions.
So to wrap up, if you have Peacock, please, please just watch some Paralympics coverage so NBC Universal and the Paralympics community sees there is support and interest for the Paralympics. I LOVE seeing and being represented at both the Summer and Winter Paralympics, and I want better coverage for the Summer Olympics.