It’s interesting that Cheerleaders show up on this list before any other kind of sports related thing. Cheerleaders are the gender neutral part of a sporting event. Women watch them for their dance, tumbling, throws, and syncopated coordination. Men watch them for their “unique athletic abilities” and for the fleeting chance that they might get to see something that they weren’t supposed to see.
It’s equal opportunity.
The Olympics needs cheerleaders. Until the Olympics adds cheerleaders it will always just be an uppity event where hoity-toity organizers dole out pretentious subjective scores and where politics is disguised as sport.
For me, I just love cheerleaders in their happy little uniforms and I can just imagine one picking me out of the crowd and saying, “Where have you been all my life?” Oh, the high school fantasy lives on.