As if we needed more evidence that the FIG is made up of fools.

The FIG [International Gymnastics Federation--it's official title is in French, hence the changing of initials] has decided to add a “kiss and cry” area to gymnastics competitions.

Dear God in heaven, what will these people think of next?

For those of you who may not be familiar with the term “kiss and cry”, it means the place where the athlete goes and sits with a coach in a box-like area with cameras trained on them and advertisements in the background. There, the athlete gets his or her score and either gets a kiss from his or her coach, or cries. Hence “kiss” and “cry”. You might be more familiar with this from ice skating competitions. It’s also used in other disciplines of gymnastics (rhythmic and trampoline, for example). Artistic gymnastics, which is what most people mean when they say gymnastics, has never had anything like this.

The details on the implementation are scarce, but it seems completely impossible. First of all, gymnastics is unlike ice skating or rhythmic gymnastics because there is not one central performance area with one athlete going at a time. Gymnastics is a four ring circus (or six, in the case of MAG, men’s artistic gymnastics); during most competitions, someone is competing on each event at any given time. So how could they possibly stop a competition for each athlete to sit in the kiss and cry to get their score? It’s totally impractical. In team gymnastics, it’s simply impossible. Each team does twelve routines. The competition would take six hours! They’d need to put cots down on the floor so the athletes could get some sleep, because it would be a long competition.

Aside from artistic gymnastics being a four ring circus, it is also a heavily mental sport. Along with being physically more demanding than any other sport, it’s also mentally daunting. In between routines, gymnasts need to keep their muscles warm, they need to mentally prepare (perhaps by relaxing for a few minutes with music if need be), and a lot of times they need to gather up their gear and rush to their next event. Now the FIG expects them to interrupt all of that so the gymnasts can sit in front of the camera and wait for their scores.

And lets be honest, that won’t be nearly as interesting as the FIG wants it to be. Gymnasts aren’t a very emotive bunch. It’s kind of a rule to keep things to yourself. Almost every gymnast knows the correct responses to give and the correct emotion to display, if they display any at all. Oooh, it would be hilarious to see the old-school Soviet gymnasts in the kiss and cry. They’d break the camera with their intense stare. And, oooh to see Khorkina in a kiss and cry! That would be gold! But I cringe to think of 14-year old Kerri Strug or someone like Carly Patterson in a kiss and cry–cringe-worthy (because of her shyness) and boring (because of her blandness), respectively.

But I digress.

Apparently the FIG is going to sell ads on the walls of the kiss and cry. There’s a surprise, it’s for money.

I honestly don’t know what these idiots are thinking. I don’t think any governing body of any sport has ever actively tried to ruin their sport, but the FIG is currently doing a wonderful job of just that. This is the latest in a string of horrendous decisions: eliminating compulsories, raising the age limit to 16, ridiculous Codes of Points, stabbing the artistic part of artistic gymnastics in the heart,  getting rid of the 10.0, the tie-breaking rules at the Olympics, and now this. It’s unfathomable. Who the hell are these people? It’s beyond belief how foolish these people are. I wish I knew how they could be removed from their positions, because they’re like cancer eating away at the sport.

Here is what needs to be done:

1. Scrap the current code. Seriously. Reverse it to about 1995-6, when artistry/execution was balanced with difficulty.

2. Lower the age limit back to 15. All that raising the age limit accomplishes is the exclusion of a lot of gymnasts at the peak of their abilities.

3. Tell Bruno Grandi to jump off a bridge.

4. Oh, and someone please get rid of Al Trautwig, who commentates for NBC. Seriously, he’s an idiot.