Please Save our Sport Petition - a Comment

The fact that this petition exists is real bad news for the sport and its governance, as it reveals deep, serious, problems, but on the other hand, it's good news to see such a substantial online movement - nearly 10,000 signatures at the time of writing this short note. Clearly, sailors all around the world want meaningful sailing competitions at the Olympics. Here in Canada, I enquired about the decision process, and it's a very small group of people making the decisions, writing the submissions, representing the country. It's a very small group, and there was barely any consultations outside that group. It's likely the case in most countries. Therefore, with thousands of signatures, this petition probably has more weight than all the submissions, open letters, working papers etc. produced by World Sailing and its official delegates. The irony: while the Internet is providing a voice to all those concerned about recent developments, this very small group of people will resort to online voting to make decisions with potential long lasting detrimental impacts on the sport.

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