Boycott Beijing Olympics?
 

I wonder? Will all of this change anything???

Clinton urges Bush to boycott Beijing Olympics.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton urged President George W. Bush on Monday to boycott the Beijing Olympics opening ceremonies this summer unless China improves human rights.

Clinton, in a statement, cited violent clashes in Tibet and the lack of pressure by China on Sudan to stop "the genocide in Darfur."

"At this time, and in light of recent events, I believe President Bush should not plan on attending the opening ceremonies in Beijing, absent major changes by the Chinese government," the New York senator said.

Yeah boycott a country that has billions invested in your economy at the time when your economy is in the tank. Just the kind of 'emotional' reaction a leader can't have.

Olympic boycotts do not work!

It was the US supplied, Al-Queda back, Mujhideen that got the Soviets out of Afganistan. Not the US lead boycott of the 1980 Moscow games....

The days of the Olympics being a venue of great politcal consequence are over....

No. Too many U.S. corportions are heavily invested in, and too many eyes will be watching, the Beijing Olympics. Bush does not have the cojones to upset that. Plus, the competitions themself will be a battle of the superpowers.

In short, it is all about the money.

The best "non sport" accomplishment the Olympics have ever achieved was kudos for the Civil Rights movement and a smack down of CCCP boosting cold war egos in the States. In Munich it simply showed that terrorists knew no bounds.

Just to clarify, Clinton is suggesting boycotting the OPENING CEREMONIES, not the sporting events themselves.

Of course, that would do no good either...

I thought Jesse Owens winning 4 gold medals in Nazi Germany had way more significance than the 1980 boycott. Or any other event. To me, that was the most significant political statement in an Olympics on many levels.

Interesting both the US and Germany had their own versions of second class citizens then. And both countries were heading in different directions on that issues. One creeping, ever so slowly, but towards intergration. While the other raced quickly in the other direction. At least Jesse Owens was representing the US. Germany didn't even have one Jew representing Germany in that Olympics.

HBO Sports had a great documentary on this.

Who missed the 14 countries that participated in the Soviet-led boycott at the 1984 L.A. Olympics? Not me. In fact, to me, it was the most memorable summer games ever. Admittingly, the results may have been different had those countries participated.

:iagree:

Again, no political influence so to "ban" a games is just silly.


Joe Lewis vs Max Baer in '35 was far more symbolic then that.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2kzpECJjefI

I agree, banning serves no purpose.

However, it should be noted that there was some political pressure on Germany before those Olympics. The threat of removing the Olympics from Germany did force them to include some Jews in the selection process...

They used Margret Lambert as a symbol of a fair Germany. She was cut from the high jump team weeks before the opening ceremony. Even though she was the best in the nation and could have medaled. Check out, HBOs Hitler's Pawn

There was so much at stake in that Olympics. So coupled with that, to have the grandson of a slave, a skeleton from America's past, and win 4 gold in front of Hitler and the Nazis, in their backyard, at their showcase Olympics??

That's what I call significant.

Of course you could always look at Max Schmeling too :)

Interestingly enough, while Jesse Owens' gold metals was played out in the press as a political victory for America over the Nazis, Owens himself claimed the Germans were very courteous and that he was treated better in Germany than he was back home in the US. Apparently he was able to stay in "white" hotels, where as back home he had to stay in "black only" hotels when he travelled to compete. Here are a couple of things he said at the time:

"When I passed the Chancellor [Hitler] he arose, waved his hand at me, and I waved back at him. I think the writers showed bad taste in criticizing the man of the hour in Germany."

"Hitler didn't snub me—it was FDR who snubbed me. The president didn't even send me a telegram."

Apparently he was not invited to the White House along with all the other (white) gold metal winners, and when he was honored by the Olympic Committee at the Waldorf-Astoria hotel in NYC, he had to come in the back entrance and take the freight elevator as blacks were typically not allowed in that hotel.

So while the press was chalking this one up as a win for the land of freedom over the land of racism and hatred, the reality was a bit different.

Furthermore, Owens was very good friends with German track & field star Lutz Long, and in the example given above, Joe Louis was life-long friends with Max Schmelling. It's too bad the press made these rivalries into political contests.

The Olympics (and sports in general) is not the place to protest politics. The purpose of the Olympics is for everyone to forget about politics and be friendly with eachother for a short period of time.

That may be but let's keep on track with the truth regarding Jessie Owens and Hitler.

Hitler viewed African-Americans as inferior and chastised the United States for stooping to use these "non-humans." Despite the endless racial epithets and the constant presence of the red and black swastika, Owens made Hitler eat his words with four gold medals.

Of course. But my point was that athletes usually just want to play the game. Rarely do they want to be involved in a political spitting match. Owens' close friendship with his German counterpart is evidence enough of that. Obviously both Owens and Long did not hold a high opinion of the leaders of either country.

Keep on track with the truth? How about lets keep it honest.

By using what appears to be quotes from JesseOwens himself, Eric was able to show (at least to me) the hypocracy in this whole Hitler/Owens olympics debate. We all know what Hitler was about, and did not expect much more from him. I'm sure Owens was pelted with racial epithets and the constant presence of swastikas at the Berlin games. However, after defeating Nazi Germany he returned home to the states where he was faced with the same racial epithets, discrimination, bigotry and the presumably the presence of the confederate flag. Owens is by far the most heralded olympic athlete of all time, an eternal bearer of the laurel wreath. He defined Achievement. He won four gold medals and was not invited to the White House to meet Presidents FDR or Truman along with the other USA olympic athletes???? He had to use the back door of the hotel to receive his recognition from the IOC??? Amazing?...not. Who was the real winner? Certainly not Owens by history's account.

Not true....

http://espn.go.com/sportscentury/features/00016393.html


In Germany, the Nazis portrayed African-Americans as inferior and ridiculed the United States for relying on "black auxiliaries." One German official even complained that the Americans were letting "non-humans, like Owens and other Negro athletes," compete.
But the German people felt otherwise. Crowds of 110,000 cheered him in Berlin's glittering Olympic Stadium and his autograph or picture was sought as he walked the streets.

Discrimination in the 30's before and after was terrible and left a scar on America which will never go away. However, it cracks me up to see Eric and in some part Krimson place the United States at the time on par with Nazi Germany who was exterminating an entire race in gas chambers.

Great Eric...Owens was mobbed for autographs in Berlin so they must be better than America. Do you even listen to yourself at times?

The point of the debate was not to say that Owens received anything other than 4 gold medals. But his victory was seen as some sort of theological/political victory. Even though, as I stated in earlier post, both the US and Germany had similar ills and it was, although extremely significant, no such thing.

We are turning this into a debate about race and Oympics. We could do that! There is a long terrible US history about race and the Olympics. But that definitelty was not the debate in this particular thread....

From what I remember it was the political significances of Olympic boycotts, bans or other things such as that.

To that end, political statement have never acheived any tangible results even with respect to race! John Carlos and Tommy Smith were kicked off the team and sent home. Muhammed Ali (then Cassius Clay) was treated no better, upon return to Kentucky after winning his medal.. Although I believe if all the black atheletes had boycotted the US team, as they originally planned, that would have been a major statement. However the images of Carlos and Smith is burned in my memory... I'm old enough to remember seeing it on TV.

Still not the debate we are having. I don't think I, nor anyone else on this thread, indicated that wonderful things happened for Jesse, in particular. Because for all intent and purposes he was used by the US, just as Margret Lambert was by Hitler.

Although the US, at the time, was not akin to Nazi Germany, it can be argued, that its accumilated ills were equal, if not greater than Nazi Germany.

The Nazi's perpetrated their deeds in a compact span of time. But similar deeds were done over an extended period of time in the US. And it should not be discounted because there was a marginal recession in those deeds by the Berlin Olympics. Blood, not matter the speed spilt, does not wash away so easily...

But again! This was not the discussion we were having! This is a totally different issues that deserves its measure of attention.. Not a by-the-way-thread-diverting one....

Jeez I thought this thread was about whether to Boycott Beijing Olympics? and not about America, Germany and history.

I say boycott the games.

Just correcting something that was posted which was not true. I'm sorry if the truth offends you, but that does not give you the right to put words in my mouth.

It was then that morphed into "do boycotts serve a political or a social means".

Speak for yourself MrLabGuy. I do fine by myself. Read CBAX5's post #20. That's a point I can agree with.

My issue is that we are quick to stand in judgment of someone else's ill's before we examine our own. That goes for the current olympic protest around the world and the requests for the President to boycott the opening ceremonies.

Krimson, I'm not so sure I can agree with post #20 when you take into account Historical context. Slavery and Discrimination is disgusting and highlights what humans are capable of when left unchecked. That said in the early years of the United States slavery was common place around the world. That does not make it right or acceptable but look back even farther in History. Many people and many races were enslaved as servant's and laborers back as far as written history goes.

To say Nazi Germany leading women and children into gas chambers in alarming numbers was on par with early America and America in the 30's is just wrong. Granted, it is not easy splitting hairs with evil and Slavery is and was evil. Discrimination of any kind shows a complete lack of mental acuity replaced by a false sense of superiority.

Anyway...I love the debate. Keep it up because it keep us all thinking and talking about these important issues which can't and should not be ignored. History forgotten is History repeated.

The common mistake when talking about slavery and discrimination is how easily the brutality of the US version of slavery is not talk about or forgotten..

You are correct. Slavery existed in many culture for centuries. But there is a reason why the US version is the most discussed, reviled and is the poster child for the evils of the institution. I believe this is so, for 2 reasons, the continued practice of slavery when it was outlawed in the rest of the world, and more importantly, the sheer brutality of the American slavery. For the Holocust, we are able to have actual numbers, pictures and video of that horror. So it seems greater, more prevalent, more real. This lack of visual, more recent evidence diminishes the level of human disregard in our version of slavery.

Now this is not to say slaves in other cultures and other parts of the world were not treated brutally, but there was more evidence of acceptance and possible assimilation in those cultures. The US slavery was exceptionally brutal and was methodically pepetuated for decades. It was not just the separation and subjugation of another human being based on race, it was the almost common determination that they were actually less than human. This is the main reason there are not a lot of statistics on the victims of slave brutality. The slave did not qualify for that level of concern. Just was we have no numbers on the amount of cattle slaughtered in 1860 (and we might actually), we have no numbers on the human cost of slavery (we definitely don't).

The sheer numbers of killed, lynched, starved, raped, burned, drowned US slaves will rival the number of victims of the Holocaust.

Let me clarify, I am not comparing or placing American slavery and the Holocaust in the same context. It's apples and oranges. Further, I am not saying that America did not fight to end both. However, history forgotten is history repeated, approximately 8 million african slaves were killed in the storage and Trans-Atlantic transport to the Americas alone. Because slaves were considered chattle property we will never be able to calculate the total number of lives lost as a result of American slavery. Some historians say the number is unfathomable. And no, this is more than a race issue, its a human rights issue.

I responded to Quick's earlier post to say that you cannot discuss Jessie Owens and his accomplishments at the Berlin Games without discussing both the good and the bad. i just don't like half-truths or only one side of the story.

I felt the need to respond, but we are waaaay off topic.