Why do Olympic athletes and other sportsmen and sportswomen come under so much pressure from their country's media and politicians to succeed? Is winning that important to the national mood?

That's certainly the case in Japan, but much less so in my own country, where a gold medal win warrants maybe the third or fourth slot on the evening newscast.

The reason in Japan is nationalism combined with celebrity worship and lack of individuality. The levels of all 3 are much higher in Japan than Western countries. Seeing Japanese people succeed, beating foreigners, etc., stirs the nationalism of the Japanese like crazy. They project this form of "evidence" of superiority onto themselves as a nation. And it gives them a warm and fuzzy feeling.

More mature and emotionally secure societies don't react in quite the same way.

In some countries, the national mood does depend on sporting success - soccer in Brazil, rugby union in New Zealand, judo in Japan, skating in Korea, and countless other examples. In my country (Australia), there was a national inquiry after the Olympic swimmers failed to win gold in London. I mean, who cares? It's just a sport, right?

But I guess everybody wants to be good at something, but the media overdoes it.

There are a couple of cases where a sport is so identifiable with characteristics of the people of a country, that I can understand how an entire country can be affected by winning or losing.

Ice hockey is a team game that is very physical, requires great skill, teamwork and a humble, yet confident attitude to play well. Canada's entire country mood and pride are affected by how their hockey team does. Does that show a flaw in their priorities? Perhaps, but they say hockey is in their blood, and because of the United States' presence as a neighbor and being a commonwealth, Canada is quite like the younger sibling, who needs an identity, and hockey gives it to them. They certainly dominated Sochi, taking the gold, and Canada is on cloud 9.

Brazil, in the World Cup, and especially at home, will have their entire emotional well being married to success in soccer. Both Brazil and Canada are examples where winning is important to the national mood, and it is what it is.

Er... this is fairly simple.

Because they are representing their country.

In Australia winning is considered essential as Australians are "entitled" to their sporting success.... without this success the ongoing bubble of self congratulations they live in would be punctured requiring focus to be shifted to more important areas of life.... it's a rather sad state of affairs actually - media confected "enthusiasm" for sporting events that have little meaning....

That's certainly the case in Japan, but much less so in my own country, where a gold medal win warrants maybe the third or fourth slot on the evening newscast. The reason in Japan is nationalism combined with celebrity worship and lack of individuality. The levels of all 3 are much higher in Japan than Western countries. Seeing Japanese people succeed, beating foreigners, etc., stirs the nationalism of the Japanese like crazy. They project this form of "evidence" of superiority onto themselves as a nation. And it gives them a warm and fuzzy feeling. More mature and emotionally secure societies don't react in quite the same way.

I think that's quite accurate - and would just add that some countries have this innate inferiority complex and constantly struggle to find ways to justify their perceived uniqueness and sense of self as compared to other nations and cultures - so they tend to go overboard with the Olympic achievements and expectations - I would certainly put Japan in that category.

But as with all things, I imagine money is just as much of a factor..........

My take is because sport is the last area where the common person can yell and scream at people who do not meet expectations. We are surrounded and controlled by incompetent, selfish, stupid and lazy people in government, politics, civics and a whole gaggle of other areas but we have no voice. On the other hand when a 19 year old kid misses a jump or slips on the ice or track, we can focus our outrage on that person who has become our whipping boy or girl. We can't do that to Abe, NHK, the school board or the drones in the city office but it's acceptable to criticize people who are far more athletic and couageous than we will ever be. It's not fair and often wrong but I think that's part of it.

I am waiting for that Japanese background song to disappear from my head, but my local sports club started adding it to their mix of background muzak. Anyway, I think it is all about competition, not just winning. Or so the "losers" are always saying through their tears.

Its just the tribalism of mankind. We (our team) need to beat theirs (their team). That being said, however, I believe that things are going too far. Back in the day, sportsmanship was a key element of international sport (extending your hand after the game, etc.), these days the (professional) athletes are both too self-centered and just a little too quick to flash their sponsors products. Rather sad really.

I'm with the two other Aussies that posted on here. Basically, the Australian public all but expect to be the victors in three key sports - cricket, rugby (both codes - yeah Wallabies have been awful for a decade I know!) and swimming.

There was quite literally a government panel made to get to the root of the problem as to why the Australian swimming team came back from London 2012 with zero gold medals. No consideration was given to any other sport - just the swimming.

It would be like Brazil losing the World Cup or Japan losing a Judo championship. It all comes back to the sensationalism & over-exposure from the media. Like it or not - they've got a business to run! I'm not even a sport fan myself, but when we got a one year build-up (not kidding) of the swimming team's progress to the London 2012 Games day in and day out AND ended up with nothing, it all seemed a bit ridiculous!