The original spirit was a few Greek men running around naked to show that they were racially superior to all other peoples. The rest of the Olympic 'tradition

The original spirit was a few Greek men running around naked to show that they were racially superior to all other peoples. The rest of the Olympic 'traditions' were invented at the 1936 games for not-dissimilar reasons. Crass commercialisation is probably the "nice side" of the olympics.