The point is that we don't know if cleaning up the river thames in london, or the yongding river in beijing, would be any cheaper. I doubt it. So the only definitive criticism to make here is that the French hosts overpaid for some PR footage.

I agree with that.

It's interesting to note that swimming in the Seine has been banned since 1923, primarily because of water pollution.

It's not exactly a new insight that large swaths of Paris are a dump, both figuratively and literally.

Pointing that out is the purpose of this topic

I visited London in 2018 and the river Thames looked like sewage.

I also visited Newcastle-upon-Tyne and the river Tyne in contrast was much better. And lake Windermere was wonderful (as it should be).

These big cities are basically a rats nest of scum, dirt, and villainy. The power exists to clean up the cities but they're populated with people that simply don't care, everyone of integrity has long moved away from these cities

kekw
swimmy in poopy water go BLEGGHHH

This is worse than just eating random garbage off the ground

I'm glad that some swimmers enjoyed the water quality

Paris Olympics, the worst host.