But in the final analysis, must we really care about any of these little national quirks? Yes, we should, if we give any credence to the guiding principles of the official Olympic Charter:
"Olympism seeks to create a way of life based on the joy found in effort, the educational value of good example and respect for universal fundamental ethical principles."
Hmm... Somehow the principle seems a bit at odds with a February 2001 Amnesty International Report:
"When officials from a township birth control office got a hold of Zhou Jiangxiong in May 1998, they hung him upside down, repeatedly whipped and beat him with wooden clubs, burned him with cigarette butts, branded him with soldering irons, and ripped his genitals off.
The 30-year-old farmer from Hunan province was tortured to death because the officials were trying to make him reveal the whereabouts of his wife, suspected of being pregnant without permission."
How can an image like this be resolved with such high-minded Olympic principles as the one above? It can't. But one can feign the existence of the principle in order to blank-out the existence of the image. In other words, if the IOC declares, through the act of choosing Beijing, that the Chinese government has "respect for universal fundamental ethical principles", that must mean China just couldn't be oppressing its own citizens. Right?
The true meaning of allowing Beijing to host the 2008 Summer Olympic Games, though expressed vaguely and euphemistically, is stated in the final sentence of the IOC Beijing evaluation report:
"There is significant public support for the prospect of organising the Olympic Games and a feeling that a successful bid would bring recognition to the nation."
Most of the world's population knows of the existence of China. This fact needs no recognition. The kind of "recognition" China wants is a worldwide self-induced blindness to human rights violations like that described above. What China wants is a moral sanction.
I'm not giving it to them.
And neither should any country with a respect for life, human rights, and "universal fundamental ethical principles."
I call on all free nations to boycott the 2008 Olympic Games.
