Olympic shame
Yesterday saw the Chinese propaganda parade through London, escorted by police who behaved rather more violently than was necessary. There was the predictable parade of apologist politicians going on about “the Olympic spirit” - what they seem to forget is that the Olympic flame is not a politically neutral sporting symbol. In fact it was conceived by another dictatorial regime as a propaganda exercise in the runup to the 1936 Olympics.
If there are still those - perhaps among those who took part - who want to argue that participating in a Chinese propaganda exercise does not constitute endorsement of the Chinese regime, then that’s up to them. They wouldn’t have the right to form their own opinion in their beloved China.
For the rest of us, the simple solution is to ignore the 2008 Olympics from now on. Don’t watch any of the TV coverage, or buy any of the merchandise.
April 26th, 2008 at 12:32 am
I wonder if anyone’s boycotting VISA because of their “Win a trip to Beijing 2008″ competition…