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Olympics and human rights
Monday, February 7th, 2022 12:23 amAfter my other posts about the Olympics opening ceremony, I feel I should at least mention the Uyghur situation and other human rights abuses by China so it won't seem like I'm ignoring it.
It is horrible; it is akin to Nazi Germany and the 1936 Olympics.
I was ambivalent enough about it to not be particularly interested in even watching the opening ceremony. But Qiao recorded it for me, knowing that I'm usually into such things. And I was curious about it, so I did watch it.
I know that the China situation is not the fault of the athletes or all the many people involved in the Olympics. If we only allowed the Olympics to be held in countries without human rights violations, how many countries would be left, and how many of those would even be capable of hosting such a big event?
Would boycotting the Olympics completely do anything to help the situation? How?
And if so, shouldn't we be boycotting everything from China, not just the Olympics? We depend on China for so many products, I doubt that would even be feasible.
So, like so many other things in the world, I don't know what the "right" or best approach would be.
.
Other things that struck me about the ceremony:
Xi Jinping is shown wearing a face mask. If I recall right, he took it off to give his speech, and put it back on right afterwards. Sitting in the stands, he wore it.
Whereas Putin is shown maskless, hatless, gloveless, like the cold doesn't bother him. (And maybe it doesn't, if he's a sociopath and if sociopaths don't feel pain as intensely as others.)
But I wonder if Xi Jinping was at all annoyed that Putin didn't wear a face mask.
In the part where the snowflakes with country names were (virtually) spinning in the air before the lighting of the "cauldron", the one for "ROC" (which Russia is competing under) was shown at least 3 times. Seems odd to me. Would China have done that as a nod to Russia?
While some of the speeches were going on, in the part where you could see 4 or 5 young males in the background holding various country's flags, those flag-holders were smiling so cheerfully, for so long. They even looked like real smiles, not forced. Were those people chosen to stand there because they are good at holding a smile? How much pressure was on them (and the other participants) to keep a cheerful face? (I've wondered that about performers in other events too, but this being China, I wonder if there would be punishment given to performers for failing to meet expectations.)
The soldiers in military uniforms who transferred the Chinese flag before it being hoisted... at first, those slow & quick goose steps they did in unison were disturbing to see. But then again, it also looked very neat.
It is horrible; it is akin to Nazi Germany and the 1936 Olympics.
I was ambivalent enough about it to not be particularly interested in even watching the opening ceremony. But Qiao recorded it for me, knowing that I'm usually into such things. And I was curious about it, so I did watch it.
I know that the China situation is not the fault of the athletes or all the many people involved in the Olympics. If we only allowed the Olympics to be held in countries without human rights violations, how many countries would be left, and how many of those would even be capable of hosting such a big event?
Would boycotting the Olympics completely do anything to help the situation? How?
And if so, shouldn't we be boycotting everything from China, not just the Olympics? We depend on China for so many products, I doubt that would even be feasible.
So, like so many other things in the world, I don't know what the "right" or best approach would be.
.
Other things that struck me about the ceremony:
Xi Jinping is shown wearing a face mask. If I recall right, he took it off to give his speech, and put it back on right afterwards. Sitting in the stands, he wore it.
Whereas Putin is shown maskless, hatless, gloveless, like the cold doesn't bother him. (And maybe it doesn't, if he's a sociopath and if sociopaths don't feel pain as intensely as others.)
But I wonder if Xi Jinping was at all annoyed that Putin didn't wear a face mask.
In the part where the snowflakes with country names were (virtually) spinning in the air before the lighting of the "cauldron", the one for "ROC" (which Russia is competing under) was shown at least 3 times. Seems odd to me. Would China have done that as a nod to Russia?
While some of the speeches were going on, in the part where you could see 4 or 5 young males in the background holding various country's flags, those flag-holders were smiling so cheerfully, for so long. They even looked like real smiles, not forced. Were those people chosen to stand there because they are good at holding a smile? How much pressure was on them (and the other participants) to keep a cheerful face? (I've wondered that about performers in other events too, but this being China, I wonder if there would be punishment given to performers for failing to meet expectations.)
The soldiers in military uniforms who transferred the Chinese flag before it being hoisted... at first, those slow & quick goose steps they did in unison were disturbing to see. But then again, it also looked very neat.