It seems that even those who are not interested in sports and do not follow the Olympic Games have already read about the "50-year-old Turkish man who showed up at the competition in a wrinkled T-shirt, without special equipment, and took the Olympic silver without even taking his hand out of his pocket."

"Surely, Turkey sent some kind of hitman to Paris!" social media marvels.

In the blink of an eye, Yusuf Dikec, a previously unknown figure outside professional circles, a retired gendarmerie officer and professional shooter, became a global internet meme and sensation.

Everything is great! The moral of this story could be: no matter how old you are, keep doing what you love, and your best achievements may still lie ahead, even if you are an athlete over 50!

But another nuance caught my attention.

The fact is, Yusuf Dikec did not win the Olympic silver alone. It was a team event. Shooting alongside him was his colleague Sevval Ilayda Tarhan. In the same T-shirt, in the same pose, and also with minimal equipment.

The only difference is that he is 51, and she is 24. He began professional shooting around the time she was born.

Dikec is an excellent shooter with a plethora of medals from prestigious competitions, but he had never made it to the Olympic podium until his young partner grew up and competed with him on the same team.

If we look at the individual performances of these shooters in the same discipline where they took silver as a team, we will see that Tarhan finished 7th, while Dikec only came in 13th.

Now let's trace how mass consciousness works: we simply do not notice the woman standing next to him. It does not matter who she is, how she is dressed, how she shoots, or how unique her achievement is. We only see the man in the "wrinkled T-shirt," deliberately nonchalant, and create a romantic image of a "hitman." We spread a photograph in which he is shooting alone, and the result of this shooting is 13th place! Yet, we declare that he won "silver."

Why does the logic of mass culture work this way? After all, patriarchy has long ceased to exist, feminism is unnecessary, equality has been achieved, at least in Paris 2024 for sure!

This is how patriarchal myths about great male victories are born before our eyes. These images are entrenched in culture and shape our thinking. Meanwhile, women's contributions and achievements are simply erased from history. It was like this before. Unfortunately, it still happens today.

#Paris2024 #YusufDikec #SevvalTarhan #Olympics

Translated text. Original text from Maya Guseynova