England Sees Red
London is pretty jazzed about hosting the Olympics this June. If you live in London, you probably realized this back in 2008, when Visa started plastering your credit cards with the much-criticized 2012 logo and the London transit authority pasted it on every bus. If you do not live in London, you’ll have to take our word for it.
Today Adidas unveiled the official British Olympic team kit, designed by Stella McCartney. McCartney’s design centers around the British flag, with one slight difference, McCartney has replaced the red of St George’s cross (the thick red cross in the middle that represents England; the blue background and white X is for Scotland) with a bright or navy blue. Stella’s collaborated with Adidas before; but tackling the team uniforms for the first British-based Olympics since 1948 still seems like a rather gargantuan, and quite probably thankless, task. Indeed, as of this afternoon it seems that outrage is sweeping Great Britain—or at least the English part of the nation, we’re not too sure how Scotland feels about it yet. Some example criticisms (courtesy of the Team GB Facebook page) include “It’s a bit Scottish,” “they’ve forgotten England and northern Ireland,” “poor effort” and “shit.” Deary me. We wonder what would happen if someone tried to remove the red from the American flag . . .
