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Olympics opening ceremony director fired for Holocaust joke

2021-07-22T11:36:06.481Z


One day before the opening ceremony begins, the president of the organizing committee said that Kentaro Kobayashi had been fired for saying in a comic act in 1998: "Let's play the Holocaust."


The organizing committee of the Tokyo Olympics on Thursday fired the director of the opening ceremony, Kentaro Kobayashi, for a joke about the Holocaust he made during a comedy show in 1998, one day before the opening of the event.

"We have discovered that Mr. Kobayashi, in his own performance, has used a phrase that ridicules a historical tragedy," said Seiko Hashimoto, chairman of the organizing committee. 

Specifically, Kobayashi said "Let's play the Holocaust" in a comical act.

[A Latino player and a basketball star will carry the United States flag at the Olympic Games]

The

reactions

to comments from Kobayashi soon.

"Anyone, no matter how creative, has no right to poke fun at the

victims of the Nazi genocide

,

"

said Rabbi Abraham Cooper, associate dean and director of global social action at the Simon Wiesenthal Center, a human rights group based in

Germany.

The Angels.

And he pointed out that the

Nazis gassed Germans with disabilities.

"Any association of this person with the Tokyo Olympics would insult the memory of six million Jews and would be a cruel mockery of the Paralympic Games," Cooper said.

Kentaro Kobayashi is pictured at a press conference in Tokyo on December 9, 2019.Kyodo / AP / File via NBC News

Kobayashi is a former member of the popular comic duo Rahmens and known abroad for comic series such as The Japanese Tradition.

[The Olympics return to Australia for the third time: Brisbane will host in 2032]

Tokyo has been plagued by scandals since the games were awarded in 2013. French investigators are looking into

alleged bribes paid to members of the International Olympic Committee

(IOC)

to influence the vote in favor of Tokyo.

The consequences forced the resignation two years ago of Tsunekazu Takeda, who headed the Japanese Olympic Committee and was a member of the IOC.

The opening ceremony of the Games, delayed by the pandemic, is scheduled for Friday and will be held without spectators to prevent its spread, although some officials, guests and the media will attend.

"We are going to have the opening ceremony tomorrow and, yes, I am sure there are a lot of people who do not feel comfortable about the opening of the games," Hashimoto said.

"But we are going

to open the games tomorrow in this difficult situation," he

added.

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Japan is going ahead with the Olympics against the advice of most of its medical experts.

This is due, in part, to pressure from the IOC, which is estimated to face losses of between $

3 billion and $ 4 billion in television rights revenue if the games are not held

.

The official cost of the Olympics is $ 15.4 billion, but government audits suggest it is much more.

Everything but $ 6.7 billion is public money.

[American tennis player Coco Gauff announces that she was infected with COVID-19: she will not compete in the Olympic Games]

The joke about the Holocaust of Kobayashi and

the resignation of Keigo Oyamada,

accused of harassing his companions in the past and whose music was to be used in the accused ceremony, have been the last events that have affected the games.

Yoshiro Mori resigned as chairman of the organizing committee for his sexist comments.

Hiroshi Sasaki also resigned as creative director of the opening and closing ceremonies after

suggesting that a Japanese actress dress up as a pig

.

Also this week, the chiropractic of the American women's wrestling team apologized after comparing the Olympic protocols for COVID-19 with Nazi Germany in a comment on social media.  

With information from AP.

Source: telemundo

All news articles on 2021-07-22

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