Recently, there's been a push to get baseball added back to the Summer Olympic games and even a hailmary to see American football added. But competitive video games or eSports might be closer to being granted official status than either one. However, there's a catch.
IOC President Thomas Bach told the South China Morning Post, "We want to promote non-discrimination, non-violence, and peace among people. This doesn’t match with video games, which are about violence, explosions and killing. And there we have to draw a clear line." He went on to add that sports video games could theoretically be added but that begs the question of whether anyone would care. The global eSports scene is booming around the globe thanks to games like Coutner-Strike, Overwatch, Leage of Legends and Dota 2. Furthermore, why would anyone care about a video game Olympic event for something like NBA 2k18 when the real thing is being played down the street?
The more pressing hurdle for eSports inclusion into the Olympic games is the fact that there's currently no global governing body that sanctions eSPorts, like the International Basketball Federation (FIBA) [Note: the acronym is derived from the French spelling Fédération Internationale de Basket-ball].
Where do you stand on the subject? On the growing movement to get eSports recognized as a legitimate sport, being included by the Olympics would be a huge leap towards legitimization.