[PDLM]

Originally Posted by Lammarite

Also slipstreaming the Tibet protesters were other groups protesting about unrelated things. For instance, there were a group of naturists protesting that the olympics aren't held in the nude anymore in the true tradition of the original Greek games.

Well that does seem like a valid thing to protest about at an Olympic event. Whether you agree with them or not at least it is directly relevant.

And chan13y makes some excellent points. The fundamental difficulty as I see it is that the Chinese government does not have the courage to let its people engage in this process in an open way. Authoritarian regimes are not generally good at dealing with open debate and criticism.

[goleoboy]

they said they had anti-fur groups out there protesting as well. honestly i would love to see peace among all chinese whether tibetians or han chinese... and the concept of 'multiculturalism' is probably very new to the central chinese gov.. (hell even the u.s. hasn't figured that out yet with obama and the controversy surrounding his preacher...) anyways, would love to hold hand and sing 'kum bai yah' with everyone, but it's a process and unfortunately some nicks and scrapes are gonna come with it (including the han chinese who were burned alive by tibetians)... ok turning off the new and off to bed.

[Lammarite]

Originally Posted by goleoboy

(hell even the u.s. hasn't figured that out yet with obama and the controversy surrounding his preacher...)

At least Obama has figured out that Granma is a typical white person. Small steps..........

[Claire ex-ax]

Originally Posted by chan13y

... the Olympics, which is an apolitical sporting event to showcase athletic talent of the highest order.

It hasn't been that for a long, long time. Giving the Olympics to China was a political decision by the IOC, even though it knew China would not clean up its human rights 'problems' as it (IOC) said it (China) would. Big business has made it into an advertising bonanza with overt displays of corporate greed (ask anyone who has joined a corporate package to the Olympics). The athletes are paid big bucks and any medals won are vehicles to financially rewarding endorsements. Don't get me started on the media; at the Sydney Games, the members of the press corps outnumbered the athletes.

The Olympics is an ugly 'grab fest'.

Of course, it does seem to raise awareness among many men of the 'athletic virtues' of at least one sport played by women... beach volleyball.

[Lammarite]

Originally Posted by Claire ex-ax

It hasn't been that for a long, long time.

Of course, it does seem to raise awareness among many men of the 'athletic virtues' of at least one sport played by women... beach volleyball.

True that it hasn't been that for a long time but it's ethos is just that, an apolitical event where differences are laid aside and sport and sportsmanship reigns.


MMmmm- female beach volleyball..........

[jgl]

Hmm... China even played the political card in its bid. Claimed it would help "open and reform" the country. Funny that the government is now saying "keep politics out of it".

Chan13 makes a good point about dialogue. I've tried this a couple of times about sensitive issues (Tibet, Taiwan) and both times it's pretty much blown up. It's odd- a lot of Chinese people confuse criticism of government policy with criticism of an entire culture, when they are completely separate things.

[Football16]

goleoboy makes a lot of sense to me although I am not one to question the motives of the Dalai Lama or his situation in being out of Tibet.

The people running security for the torch have to had the training they got and how to defend the runner and torch without creating a bigger issue - the purpose of any security detail. I doubt they were told to attack- just defend.

If you think the President of the United States doesn't travel with his armed Secret Service people to other countries, you'd be dreaming. They aren't thugs, just people doing their job. If you look at what happened on Bush's second inauguration, they had to move him back into his car and cancel the rest of the normal historic walk from Capitol Hill to the White House. This is problematic when it is a torch that is supposed to be seen. Maybe they need to get the Pope Mobile and put the torch in that with a holder and runners running along side. Even that will get attacked.

The Olympics are a lightning rod for every moron claiming human rights violations and doing it by violating the rights of the torch bearers to move in peace along the streets of major world cities.

Vancouver has had its share of local idiots who took over the microphones and stage wearing masks at the unveiling of the Countdown clock to the 2010 Games. There will be more.

[chan13y]

It hasn't been that for a long, long time. Giving the Olympics to China was a political decision by the IOC, even though it knew China would not clean up its human rights 'problems' as it (IOC) said it (China) would. Big business has made it into an advertising bonanza with overt displays of corporate greed (ask anyone who has joined a corporate package to the Olympics). The athletes are paid big bucks and any medals won are vehicles to financially rewarding endorsements. Don't get me started on the media; at the Sydney Games, the members of the press corps outnumbered the athletes.

Claire ex-ax: Corporate influence and greed is much different than Politics, although they're clearly not mutually exclusive. But I mean apolitical as in people have rarely interfered with the Olympics just to get in a few jabs on a political level against the hosting country (I say rarely because there have been exceptions).

But ever since Antiquity, this has been the trend, because I've read of the Greeks and Persians stopping their on-and-off wars just for the Olympics, only to resume shortly after. But maybe what I'm reading is wrong.

My point is just that it's unfortunate that an event like this, in which people are there to enjoy the Olympic games themselves, is being appropriated by people on both sides to forward their own political causes.

I do agree with you on all of what you said in terms of corporate greed, because, frankly, it's prevalent in every single piece of society these days and it's only getting worse.

[jgl]

Originally Posted by chan13y

But I mean apolitical as in people have rarely interfered with the Olympics just to get in a few jabs on a political level against the hosting country (I say rarely because there have been exceptions).

But ever since Antiquity, this has been the trend, because I've read of the Greeks and Persians stopping their on-and-off wars just for the Olympics, only to resume shortly after. But maybe what I'm reading is wrong.

Whilst I agree with your overall sentiments, you should look up a bit of history to avoid getting too starry-eyed. The modern Olympics have often been political battlegrounds. Most famously it's been between competing ideologies (capitalism vs communism), and sometimes for other reasons (including, ironically, China vs. Taiwan).

The 1956 Melbourne Olympics were the first Olympics that were boycotted by the Netherlands, Spain, and Switzerland, because of the repression of the Hungarian Uprising by the Soviet Union; additionally, Cambodia, Egypt, Iraq, and Lebanon, boycotted the games due to the Suez Crisis.

In 1972 and 1976, a large number of African countries threatened the IOC with a boycott, to force them to ban South Africa, Rhodesia, and New Zealand. The IOC conceded in the first 2 cases, but refused in 1976 because the boycott was prompted by a New Zealand rugby union tour to South Africa, and rugby was not an Olympic sport. The countries withdrew their teams after the games had started; some African athletes had already competed. A lot of sympathy was felt for the athletes forced by their governments to leave the Olympic Village; there was little sympathy outside Africa for the governments' attitude.[citation needed] Twenty-two countries (Guyana was the only non-African nation) boycotted the Montreal Olympics because New Zealand was not banned.

Also in 1976, due to pressure from the People's Republic of China (PRC), Canada told the team from the Republic of China (Taiwan) that it could not compete at the Montreal Summer Olympics under the name "Republic of China" despite a compromise that would have allowed Taiwan to use the ROC flag and anthem. The Republic of China refused and as a result did not participate again until 1984, when it returned under the name "Chinese Taipei" and used a special flag.

In 1980 and 1984, the Cold War opponents boycotted each other's games. Sixty-five nations refused to compete at the Moscow Olympics in 1980 because of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, but 16 nations from Western Europe did compete at the Moscow Olympics. The boycott reduced the number of nations participating to only 81, the lowest number of nations to compete since 1956. The Soviet Union and 14 of its Eastern Bloc partners (except Romania) countered by skipping the Los Angeles Olympics in 1984, arguing the safety of their athletes could not be guaranteed there and "chauvinistic sentiments and an anti-Soviet hysteria are being whipped up in the United States". The 1984 boycotters staged their own Friendship Games in July-August.

From, of course: - Wikipedia

[emmie]

Originally Posted by jgl

Hmm... China even played the political card in its bid. Claimed it would help "open and reform" the country. Funny that the government is now saying "keep politics out of it".

Chan13 makes a good point about dialogue. I've tried this a couple of times about sensitive issues (Tibet, Taiwan) and both times it's pretty much blown up. It's odd- a lot of Chinese people confuse criticism of government policy with criticism of an entire culture, when they are completely separate things.

JGL - Your above expresses my thoughts, exactly.

Been almost branded "a traitor" to my face in the midst of HEATED "opinion sharing" with a particular PATRIOTIC local... Apparently, my ethnic Chinese-ness was "lost" because I was born and brought up in, so was "seduced" by all things "West".

It's strange how SOME immediately BRISTLE at ANY objection to the (often authoritarian) line taken by the Beijing central government. As IF to say anything to "offend" the communist ruling party is to "offend" ALL Chinese people ("all over the world", blah...).

In the West, we can openly criticise / bash the policies of Bush, and previously Blair etc, without their public whinging about the "hurt feelings" of ALL their respective peoples...

Yeah, government policy and "the people" aren't always on the same page.