Rejecting any notion that ideological considerations might influence their
histories, reconstructionists are particularly vigilant of colleagues who mesh ideology
with sources: this amounts to subjectivity and distorts history. Yves-Pierre Boulongne
once accused ‘feminist leagues’, ‘radical political groups’ and the ‘sporting-countersociety’
of misconstruing Pierre de Coubertin, the founder of the International Olympic
Committee (IOC), who the olympic historian said encouraged women and girls to
partake in physical activity. These ‘malicious detractors’, Boulongne complained,
‘abbreviate quotations’ and remove evidence from its historical context.