What were we supposed to feel Tuesday night? Outraged at Russian figure skater Kamila Valieva competing despite testing positive for a banned substance? Sickened that a 15-year-old girl has been swept into a doping scandal? Heartbroken at what she and the other skaters have had to go through?

These sensations shouldn’t be too unfamiliar for many viewers of the Beijing Winter Olympics. In many ways, these sensations have defined the Games.

What were we supposed to feel when the Games opened – the world coming to celebrate one of its most cherished events in a country that has trampled human rights in Hong Kong and among its Uyghur population? These Olympics were always going to be an exercise in compartmentalization. Could we enjoy the sport without feeling like enablers? 

The answer appears mixed. Television ratings are poor, and the current scandal has only increased the sense that Russia, a serial drug offender across many sports, has never been held accountable beyond symbolic half-measures. Yet the Olympics have still been the Olympics, filled with inspiration wherever the camera turns. 

It was even there Tuesday, when the star of the night was figure skater Kaori Sakamoto of Japan, with a smile as bright as her near-perfect performance. Perhaps the ongoing investigation will reveal facts that allow us to look back on Ms. Valieva’s incomparable talent without asterisks. But it is also likely that, in the end, Beijing’s signature event will further underline the deep moral ambivalence that has characterized these Games from the start.