3 responses to “will you watch the olympics?”

1. 

   Keith Bodger

   March 17, 2008 at 6:48 am

   The Olympics are intended to be a sports contest; not a political statement. While the IOC is certainly political and the locations chosen are political, the athletes who have been working for years should not be the brunt of political misgivings.
   Consider the 1980 Olympics in Moscow. The US boycotted those Olympics because Russia (USSR) did the most dastardly deed: they invaded Afghanistan. As a result of the US boycot, many Western nations followed suit and boycotted the Moscow Olympics. Then, four years later, when the Olympics were in LA, the Soviet countries and their minions boycotted because…well I don’t know what their official reason was but ultimately it was a tit for tat.
   Who was harmed in all of that? How about the 1000s of athletes who trained for years to compete amongst the world’s elite only to find out they couldn’t go to the Olympics because Russia invaded Afghanistan. Seems ridiculous. Consider those athletes who competed in ’80 or ’84 and won a gold medal. They could say proudly, “I’m the best in the world.*”

   So don’t boycott this summer’s Olympic games. Try to keep it about sports and not politics. No doubt in 2010 there will be some who want to boycott Vancouver because of government subsidies to the lumber industry. Then in 2012 we’ll boycott London because of them driving on the wrong side of the road then in 2014 we’ll boycott…I have no idea where we’ll be in 2014…Japan, perhaps. Then in 2016 we’ll boycott Chicago because of the Daley Administrations’ myriad alleged corrupt ways.
   Watch your nation’s athletes with pride this summer. Stand whenever your national anthem is played. Those athletes worked so hard to get there. Not watching them will be your loss; not China’s.

   So what do we do about China? How about boycott products made in China. It’s these products that produce the benzene plumes floating down rivers. It’s the products that require the tonnes of coal in factories that don’t have emission controls. It’s the products that are produced in factories that get their electricity from the Three Gorges Dam (wonderful engineering, by the way). It’s the products that require the human labor that is, in essence, human rights violations. I’m not sure how the products affect Tibet but I’m sure there’s a link.
   That’s all. I’m going to get more coffee (made in Jamaica) for my mug (made in Malaysia) from my coffee maker (made in China, I’ll bet) for my body (made in Canada).

   *Athletes who won gold medals are best in the world excluding those nations boycotting these olympics.

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2. 

   Leigh

   March 17, 2008 at 1:41 pm

   I have to agree with the previous comment. My high school English teacher would have competed in the 1980 Olympics if not for the boycut; he was a frontrunner for the gold medal. And now we’ll never know if he would have won and if he still would have ended up teaching me at WNHS. It strikes me as more unfair to the athletes than anything else. There are better ways to let China know our stance.

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3. 

   David

   March 17, 2008 at 4:49 pm

   Keith and Leigh… thanks for your insightful comments. Your historical view is helpful in thinking about this. As is the French Roast coffee from who-knows-where I’m enjoying at the moment. 😉

   Here’s my dilemma… I would love to keep sport and politics separate. While I’m not real big into the types of sports represented at the Olympics, for some reason I love watching them every 4 years. However, I think we’ve all heard enough times that China sees this summer’s games as their coming out party, as it were. There seems to be no doubt that those in government see the games as a political (and not just patriotic or good business) event.

   So… if politics and sport is connected for the hosts of the games, is it automatically connected for the viewers as well? That’s my dilemma.

   Which, of course, doesn’t negate Keith’s legitimate suggestions of paying attention to what we buy and where it comes from as a means to protest that which we understand to be unjust.

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