i won't be watching the olympics opening ceremony

As Jeremy Hunt narrowly avoids hitting members of the public with his clumsy bell-ringing, and crowds gather across the capital, I am sitting with my television resolutely off. I'm not just a party pooper, just voicing concern about the militarization of my home town, the ever increasing corporatisation of international sports and that these games won't leave any particularly lasting legacy for London.

There's nothing wrong with the idea of bringing together sportspeople from around the world to compete in lovely sportiness. Although the idea of sport as a vehicle for international co-operation and generally niceness remains a little silly. The problem is that these are not a game for the people, this the pet project of a few millionaires and sponsorship wet dream for international corporations. Plus, it makes travel within London, for people who are still obliged to make it to work, impossible.


With a combined total of 49,000 uniformed security personnel - 17,000 troops, 12,000 police and 20,000 troops, we'll see a force larger than the British contribution to the invasion of Iraq, indeed the largest single mobilization of British security forces since Suez. Drones over the city, pre-emptive strikes on protestors and even graffiti artists, and what are we getting for it? - little more than fairy lights on East London's housing estates. Yes, building the venues brought jobs, as did the volunteer programme for the games, but what about after? - the young people who eagerly volunteered will face a jobs market where one million of the peers are unemployed.  What of those outside of London? To them, the Olympics are a distant playground for wealthy capital dwellers. Far from encouraging healthy living, lucrative sponsorship deals for MacDonalds and Cadburys will push kids even further into the clutches of high sugar high fat food. So sorry, for my party-killing attitude, but this Olympics fever simply doesn't do anything for me.

For those able to get tickets, a chance to see amazing sportspeople. But with the Paralympic games sidelined to channel 4 (although channel 4's ad campaign has been positive and not to ableist), and poor Londoners' detached from the games that their city is hosting, this is the people's games, instead the Olympic legacy is surely as little more than an expensive mistake.

Protest against the  unnecessarily corporate  nature of the games (London, tomorrow)