One of the saving graces of having world sports day delayed by several months and into the 20th month of 2020, is that it has just happened to coincide with the gold standard military enforced lockdown in Western Sydney.
Last Thursday, Alessandra Perilli won the bronze medal in the Women's Trap Shooting final, which was the first Olympic medal for the oldest country in the world, San Marino. Yes, San Marino is the world's oldest country and dates from the year 301. It was never absorbed into the Roman Empire beyond that, nor any of the other countries which came and went in the 1,719 subsequent years.
While that is indeed fun, and if you ignore Russia competing under the Russian Olympic Committee flag, there's some really weird maths when it comes to the number of countries at the Olympics.
A lot to this has to do with how you define a country but the most agreed upon way is to ask if they have a seat at the United Nations. Immediately we run into our fun problem.
There are 206 countries at the Olympics but only 193 countries which are recognised by the United Nations. Simple maths tells you that there are 13 extra countries in the Olympics, which aren't in the United Nations and that's weird.
If we eliminate the 'countries' which totally aren't countries, then:
- Guam
- Puerto Rico
- Amercian Samoa
- US Virgin Islands
These are unincorporated territories of the United States. This means that they aren't states but they shouldn't really their own country either. Puerto Rico has now held a few referenda on statehood and the people voted yes but the United States more or less rejects their wishes. Especially this proves that Puerto Rico is not a country.
That's 4.
- Bermuda
- UK Virgin Islands
- Cayman Islands
These are British Overseas Territories, which look as close to being countries as they possibly can but aren't really.
4 + 3 = 7
- The Cook Islands
This is an island nation with political links to New Zealand that just can't be bothered to apply for UN status even though it totally could.
The Cook Islands is almost the opposite of what is above. Those things are not countries masquerading as countries while the Cook Islands is a country masquerading as not a country.
- Hong Kong
I do not think that Hong Kong has ever been a country. It is a "Special Administrative Region of the People's Republic of China" which is as weird as the British Overseas Territories.
- Aruba
This is maybe the weirdest thing here. Aruba is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands; which would be like if Scotland or Wales competed at the Olympics in the same way as those countries compete in football most of the time.
Then there is the Refugee Team which actually isn't a country at all but a loose confederation of displaced persons who still compete at the Olympics. The Refugee Team is at the Olympics but not as a country and it also isn't a country that also doesn't have a seat at the United Nations... isn't not doesn't... NO! We are not playing this multiple negative parsing game.
So far 4 + 3 + 4 = 11.
This leaves you with two countries at the Olympics which look so much like countries that it isn't funny but aren't in the United Nations.
- Palestine
Whatever you say about Palestine and the Middle East, it's far more complicated than that. Palestine is a country which totally looks like a country but only has "non-member observer state" status in the United Nations because of Israel and the forever unpleasantness which those two countries share. Israel has reasonably powerful friends in United Nations who get to decide who is in and who is out.
- Taiwan
Taiwan is in a similar situation as it competes at the Olympics as Chinese Taipei because although Taiwan is for all intents and purposes in every way a proper country but the United Nations likes to pretend that it doesn't exist because of China.
4 + 3 + 4 + 2 = 13.
There is one country which like Palestine which only has non-member observer state" status in the United Nations and so doesn't count in the 193 nations there, and which also hasn't sent anyone to the Olympics but intends to in 2024. The Vatican City has an athletics federation and has even won a silver medal in synchronized swimming in London in 2012.
4 + 3 + 4 + 2 +1 -1 = 13.
"You can't be a real country unless you have a beer and an airline. It helps if you have some kind of a football team, or some nuclear weapons, but at the very least you need a beer."
- Frank Zappa
Frank Zappa's criteria for what a country is excludes a lot of countries that are either too small or have state religious objections to alcohol. All of the countries on the Zappa Country Development Index are in the Olympics and there are 160 of those.
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