The first to question this will most definitely be the Chinese who must be thinking that their 47 golds are clearly superior to the USA's 31. In fact the International Olympic Committee (IOC) would agree with them, because the IOC ranks the countries according to how many golds they have won.
The whole controversy then is that almost every single outlet of American Media (including us btw) portrays the USA as the top dog still, while almost every single outlet of World Media will rank by gold medals, and place China on top. It's the classic USA vs. the World scenario all over again.
Now let me say something to all the critics of either method of ranking:
Shut up. You are stupid. You fuel a useless debate.
You are worthlessly creating superfluous international (as in among different nations) tension.
One could easily argue the situation either way. For example: The countries should be ranked by total medal count, because what if a nation has 100 medals with 2 gold and 98 silvers and another nation has 3 medals total all of which are gold. Do you really believe that in those Olympic games the 3-gold medal country performed better? NOPE.
Then I can twist the absurdity around and ask what if one nation has 50 total medals all of which are bronze and another nation has 49 total medals all of which are gold? If we rank by total medals the 50 bronzes win out. But again, do you really believe that in those Olympic games the 50-bronze nation performed better? NOPE.
It's outrageous to critique either method of ranking because they are both decidedly retarded sophomoric efforts to rank and compare countries in an quattro-annual? event that is intended to unify rather than divide and define nations of the world.
The medal table is a relatively recent addition to the Olympics because the competition was considered to be against the spirit of the Games, and the IOC, although it orders countries by gold medals won, does not endorse one method over another.There is no official ranking of countries. Even though the IOC happens to rank by gold medals, they admit that this is not an official ranking system, and that countries are free to interpret the medal results as they wish.
The argument that the United States only recently switched to a total medal count ranking is spurious. All of you sports fans will be able to join with me in recounting the days in Atlanta when Dominique Moceanu and Kerri Strugg and the rest of the crew won that team Olympic gold in Women's Gymnastics. (Isn't it sad how we don't remember anyone else?? Shannon Miller was actually the powerhouse of that team, and Dominique Dawes played a large role too, but little old Kerri Strugg had to steal everyone's mother-frackin thunder.) Anyways, when I opened the newspaper in 1996 I clearly remember the nations ranked by total medals, which then seemed reasonable because there wasn't a China dominating every single event that involves flipping and twisting in it.
And now, my critics will be thinking, good one! Arguing based on the "facts" provided by your own memory! Take a few seconds to suck it, kay? Proof!
So now we have gotten out of the way the whole idea that American Media is suddenly twisting things around to favor ourselves. We in fact have been doing things this way for the life of me (Those 2 sentences are a double entendre in a sense. High-five! if you get the joke!)
If you ask the New York Times they'll tell you that:
We use for our medal tables a feed from the Associated Press, which ranks countries according to the total number of medals won.Before the IOC even started providing a medal count table, the AP was the only place to go. By being first, the AP was given the privelege of deciding how it wanted to rank things, and they decided on total medal count, back when it had absolutely no effect on the USA's ranking.
Anyways. I'm no mathematician, but a very simple solution to all of this is to give each type of medal a "point value" and then rank the nations by points. I propose 3 pts for gold, 2 for silver and 1 for bronze. It creates some sort of harmonious symmetry being that 1st place gets 3 points, 2nd place gets 2 points and 3rd place gets 1 point. Humanity at it's finest!
So based on that point system here's the top 5 as of right now:
Tied for 1 - USA, China (200)
3 - Russia (109)
4 - Great Britain ( 93)
5 - Australia (80)
6 - Germany (73)
7 - South Korea (60)
8 - France (57)
9 - Japan (49)
10 - Italy (48)
Just so you guys know, we only rank by total medal count, because we got that widget from NBC for free. So they get to do it any way they want.
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