Dear Boston: Say Hell No to the Olympic Games

…every Olympics since 9/11, when security concerns morphed into turning Olympic sites into police states. At each site I've seen debt, displacement and the militarization of space, alongside spikes in police harassment of the most vulnerable citizens. The 2004 games in Greece brought 50,000 paramilitary troops into the streets and arrived at 200 percent over budget, the precursor to a debt crisis that plagues the country today. Olympic structures are now used as dilapidated makeshift shelters for the homeless. The Olympic area was described by The Guardian as Abandoned Athens… The only way the Olympics will stop acting like a sporting shock doctrine will be if cities keep saying no. This is not a NIMBY (Not In My Backyard) movement. It is an international push from below to tell the IOC that our cities will not become expensive security state laboratories crushed by debt in the name of profits for real estate barons and military contractors.  More