Regardless of the Government's response to those proposals, the real test of a residual reconciliation effect will come when opinion polls about social issues over the next few months reveal whether Aboriginal affairs has risen from the bottom of the list, where it has languished for years. If Freeman is indeed a political as well as a sporting inspiration, and if she is to emerge as a heroic role model beyond the Olympics, her well-known hostility towards the Howard Government will presumably be reflected in opinion polls that show a significant swing towards support for the official apology she yearns to hear. In fact, the long-term position of Freeman in our culture will be one of the most telling signs of the Olympics' social impact. It's clear that she embodies much of the Australian sports ethos. She is widely praised for her unaffected manner, her freshness and her humility.
Freeman is a great runner and an attractive, engaging personality.
She is also a lavishly sponsored and promoted celebrity - one of the jewels in the Nike crown. Combine all that with turbulence in her private life, an elusive potential rival who failed to materialise, and the near-certainty, in the end, that she would record a convincing victory, and you have an explosive mixture. Pour it into a stadium packed with over 100,000 spectators bursting with expectation, and you have a phenomenon. But, out of respect for Freeman, we should be very cautious in our assessment of the meaning of all this. I suspect that Freeman is a far more powerful symbol of our devotion to sport than of our sense of national unity.