Olympic Torch

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The 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing have descended into something quite different to that envisioned many years ago: the idea that all the nations (wealthy enough) should send athletes into battle with each other (in a non-gladiatorial sense) in a fair contest. This has changed in recent years and forever.

With the number of cheats not appearing to diminish the rôle model of an Olympic athlete is quickly losing its shine and a whole generation of children is growing up with the message that cheating is OK. It gets results.

• Money
• Fame
• Success

In reality society is deteriorating as standards and principles are evaporating. Society is losing its way if it hasn't already been lost and it's difficult to be upbeat about a future when cheating is a growing attribute apparently worth chasing. To be a wealthy, yet much admired cheat. To compete at the top of any sporting event against peers, yet cheat all the way to the podium in pursuit of perceived glory. To win by being lauded as the greatest cheat the world has ever known. It only takes a few cheap individuals to wreck the ethic of the Olympic Games. To bring it down to its knees in shame. All the thousands of athletes world-wide who aspire to be the best and compete against the best in the world only to be thwarted by those that cheat.

Some commentators suggest that sport and politics should be kept separate. In an ideal world this would be an excellent idea, but with China as an example of absolute subjugation of its people, this does seem highly improbable. The infamous Tiananman Square incident of 1989 provides an example of crushing any freedom. It's a dreadful irony that Beijing (once known as Peking) should be the site of an Olympic Games that separates global society rather than acts as the glue that binds it together. It looks quite transparent that the selection of Beijing was completely politically convenient to bring China into the global arena it so craves.

Rather than separating sport and politics, this cynical attitude actually is that glue. The Olympic Torch travels the world and unleashes hostility everywhere it goes and the division of acceptance creates a schism between the two: open support or total opposition. Nearly 60 years ago, the Chinese army routed the unprepared defending Tibetan army of only 5,000 which resulted in the occupation of Chamdo by the 40,000-man army of the People's Republic of China on October 19, 1950. This served as an important precursor to the eventual defeat of the Lhasa government as China walked into Tibet with its massively overwhelming army. The defeat subsequently 'forced' the signing of the Seventeen point agreement by the Tibetan Government. The Olympic Torch is to pass through the Chinese-occupied Tibetan city Lhasa. This demonstrates a different philosophy: a well-equipped army of 40,000 soldiers opposes a country that has only 5000 soldiers. A relatively peaceful occupation. Chinese occupation and rule means that the Dalai Lama, the Tibetan spiritual leader, is in exile in India.

• On 10th March 1959, General Chiang Chin-wu of Communist China extended a seemingly innocent invitation to the Tibetan leader to attend a theatrical show by a Chinese dance troupe. When the invitation was repeated with new conditions that no Tibetan soldiers were to accompany the Dalai Lama and that his bodyguards be unarmed, an acute anxiety befell the Lhasa populace. Soon a crowd of tens of thousands of Tibetans gathered around the Norbulingka Palace, determined to thwart any threat to their young leader's life.

China expects to be a major player on the world stage, but with a testimonial based on deception and tyranny, it is little wonder that such open hostility is apparent. Playing fair does not seem to be in the Chinese book of ethics. Historically, precedent was set in the Australian Olympics in Sydney (2000).

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Onward to -> 2009

• April 29th 2009

Just a few of the many drug related citations involving the Chinese. The later ones suggest that China is making attempts to clean up its act, but the last one appears to be the worst. With this sort of history, this is not illustrative of a nation that plays by anyone's rules except its own. It looks probable that the Chinese will never be seen to perform anything but exceptionally well in the Chinese hosted Olympics in Beijing.

The most worrying scenario?


China wants to enter world trade circles.  

US Olympic Torch Farce