The 21st century is dominated by technology, even in the realm of human rights. And its a tech company, AT&T, that is leading the movement for equality in the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia.
That’s right. It’s AT&T, not the Human Rights Watch, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) or the U.S. Olympic Committee itself. AT&T was the first U.S. company to oppose a discriminatory Russian law in an official statement.
Last June, Russian President Vladmir Putin signed an official ban on gay “propaganda” just months before the entire international athletic community would show up for the greatest sporting competition in the world. What did the U.S. do to stop this law?
According to Minky Worden, director of global initiatives for Human Rights Watch, the U.S. kept track of the law all the way “up through the legislative system” until its passage. In other words, not much.
AT&T rose to the occasion, though, publicly stating its opposition to the ban, which made it the first American company to do so.
Is this a publicity stunt for the telecommunications company? Data provided by Fierce Telecom and Strategy Analytics suggests that assumption to be unlikely. According to these groups, AT&T has consistently ranked second in total subscribers, behind Verizon for the past several quarters.
In the days following AT&T’s statement, there have been more companies taking a similar position. This could be in response to the large protest groups in cities around the world, demanding that the international community respond to the Russian law.
Many are wondering why the IOC sponsors are not part of this effort.
McDonald’s, Coca-Cola, and other top IOC sponsors have responded cautiously by taking a stand against discrimination of any kind, but failing to refer to Putin’s law directly.
Google made a minor change to its search page logo with a rainbow-colored graphic, which supposedly coincides with other organization’s pro-gay efforts.
Why is the international community still so scared to stand up to Russia? Maybe, if there had been a stronger response, the discriminatory law could have been prevented.
The law violates the Olympic Charter and, as the world has seen in the past, the right entities can have monumental impact on Olympic host countries in terms of preventing these kinds of violations. Worden points to the South Korean games of 1988 as an example of positive change brought about by the sway of Olympic stakeholders.
“We know that the transition to democracy was actually jump-started by the International Olympic Committee and the U.S. weighing in very heavily behind the scenes and pressuring the military government to hold elections before the Olympics,” Worden said in a Huffington Post story.
It would be nice to hear from the IOC or any international leaders on this issue. It isn’t enough to “respond” by releasing a statement against discrimination. This is a specific law that should have been responded to directly last year; the least we can do now is to come out and admit we missed our chance.