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If Censorship Was A Sport, This Post Would Bring Home A Gold Medal

Aug 8, 2008
By .
Sports

This post cannot be read in China, because it contains the word "Eighty-Nine." And that's fine, because I'm not writing this for anyone in China. Most English-literate Chinese people can't read this blog anyway because of things we've already written, a fact that our logs show.  We get more hits from the Ukraine. No, I'm writing it for you, to urge you to boycott the Beijing Olympic Games, which start tonight.

How do you boycott the Olympics? Easy. Just don't watch them. Don't click on links for news about them. But do click on this link. It's a list of Olympic sponsors, all of whom you should boycott to the extent that you can. Some are easy, such as Coca Cola, McDonald's, Volkswagen, and Adidas. You weren't going to buy a car this month anyway, and if you simply must support slave labor, Nike probably makes better athletic shoes than Adidas anyway. Some, like Visa, are harder to punish, but you can still let them know what you think.

Why should you boycott the Olympics? Because holding the games, which purport to support brotherhood among men, unity through sport, and all that jive, in Beijing in 2008 is not too different from holding them in Khartoum, Sudan. Or Harare, Zimbabwe. Or Pyongyang, North Korea. Or in a concentration camp.

And because all of that brotherhood jive is fake anyway. While the Olympics are suposed to be good for the athletes (except perhaps for the ones forced to kowtow to the Chinese government for trying to protect themselves from the deadly air the people of Beijing breathe every day) they're actually all about money. Money for the athletes in some cases, but mostly about money for the sponsors, and the host, and the network. In this case, NBC, a division of General Electric, which makes nuclear weapons and missiles. And which deserves to lose money on its joint venture with the same government which prevents Tibetan Buddhists, Fa Lun Gong supporters, and Chinese Catholics from worshipping as they will.

And honestly, you don't care about the 200 meter freestyle swimming relays anyway. You'd much rather stare at paint drying than watch something so boring. The whole Olympic enterprise is hype designed to make money for corporations and governments, and you're smart enough to know it. So be a cynic, but for a good cause this time.

Boycott the mass-murdering tyrannical censorious Beijing Olympic games.

H/ts in part: Dave, and Geekpress.

Last 5 posts by Patrick Non-White

18 Comments
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18 Comments

  1. David  •  Aug 8, 2008 @10:29 am

    Better yet: consult the list of sponsors and avoid giving them your money, but watch the games anyhow. They rock.

    Whether you watch them or not is imperceptible; whether you give your money to the sponsors is not.

  2. Derrick  •  Aug 8, 2008 @10:43 am

    I blogged incoherently on this point before. I also think a boycotting viewing the Olympics is futile. Esspecially in my household, where my wife's side of the family are all FOB Chinese.

    However, I will root for my country (or any other one really) to kick China's obscure-sport stacking, medal-chasing, education-destroying ASS in any sport. If they lose the Ping Pong Gold, I will be dancing in the streets. Assuming my wife doesn't kneecap me for talking too much trash.

  3. Patrick  •  Aug 8, 2008 @10:54 am

    The only thing more futile than boycotting the Olympics is refusing to do so, because you know it's futile. It takes less effort not to turn on the television than to turn it on. And when you watch them, you are buying into the notion, whether you believe so or not, that this is all some brotherhood of man through sport thing, when it isn't. Your eyes are seeing what they want you to see, which is all that they care about. They have implanted their pollution into your soul.

    Better to move to the Yukon and live like Ted Kaczynski than to buy into the sanctified Disney crap that is the Olympics games.

  4. Derrick  •  Aug 8, 2008 @11:19 am

    Sir, the only thing more futile than boycotting the Olympics is hand-wringing over people who will not.

    The best way to protest the Olympics will be to hit China where it hurts: Their international reputation… or rather, it's perception. A bunch of grad school hippies in the protest zone does jack. A single athelete waving a Tibet flag on the medal stand will do more than twenty million douchebags not watching TV. Such a bold move in that nature WILL happen. If the US Athletes voted a Lost Boy to be their flag carrier, there has to be at LEAST 10 potential medalists up for some REAL fun.

    China has made it very clear that they are tying medal totals to their sense of self-worth. That's where you get 'em.

  5. Patrick  •  Aug 8, 2008 @11:24 am

    The athletes are sheep, the choice of a Sudanese runner as flag bearer aside. See the kowtowing link above. That's what the Chinese government understands, and that's what you're giving them, sir.

  6. Derrick  •  Aug 8, 2008 @11:38 am

    That apology was strictly the work of the milquetoast USOC, and I rely on them for nothing aside from designing uniforms and debating over what shade of blue to use.

    But there HAS to be a loosely organized group of atheletes who plan to capitilize on the moment if it is presented to them. They are the only direct conduit that has a chance of making it through the Chinese media firewall. I expect a bushwhack somewhere, I just hope it's the US that does it.

  7. Patrick  •  Aug 8, 2008 @2:58 pm

    I pray to Yog Sothoth (as an agnostic he'll do as well as any other) that they do. But we're not going to see any raised fists for Tibetans from the US Olympic team, because they're all about the fucking money, and they're a bunch of Alan Iversons and Wheaties wannabes.

    Yog Sothoth prove me wrong. AND BLAST THE CHINESE GOVERNMENT WITH YOUR MADNESS-INDUCING MIND BEAM DEATH RAYS!

  8. Derrick  •  Aug 8, 2008 @4:06 pm

    I don't know, all that free publicity from a stunt like that can bring plenty of the green.

    Maybe nothing for Tibetans, I doubt ANY athlete has the balls to do Tibetan stuff. But Sudan? That SHOULD work. Man I hope Bernard Lagat does something. WSU REPRESENT.

  9. Sarkus  •  Aug 8, 2008 @10:57 pm

    As much as I dislike China, I do agree with the head of the IOC who said that if you are going to politicize the games you might as well stop having them. It's supposed to be an event that emphasizes what we have in common, not be an event where we (or the atheletes) make political points. There are plenty of outlets for displaying our anger with China. Not watching these games or buying Coke while you continue to buy all matter of other products made in China is the height of hypocrisy.

    That all said, I don't plan on watching the Olympics anyway.

  10. tgb  •  Aug 9, 2008 @5:55 am

    Just to let everyone know: Animal Planet is televising Puppy Games 2008 opposite the Olympics. I know they are not taking place in China, because if they were they would be on the Food Network.

    Anyway, an alternative source of bullshit for y'all.

  11. Sarkus  •  Aug 9, 2008 @3:16 pm

    Boycott: Epic Fail.

    http://www.variety.com/article/VR1117990320.html?categoryid=2864&cs=1

  12. Patrick  •  Aug 9, 2008 @4:22 pm

    Only because of genocide-loving losers like Derrick and David.

    We watched The Sopranos and drank Pepsi products last night,

  13. Chris H  •  Aug 9, 2008 @10:14 pm

    Watching the Olympics, drinking a Coke. Enjoying both quite a bit.

  14. David  •  Aug 10, 2008 @10:39 am

    Only because of genocide-loving losers like Derrick and David. We watched The Sopranos and drank Pepsi products last night…

    So you're a Mafia-loving teenager? ;)

  15. Derrick  •  Aug 10, 2008 @12:14 pm

    U-S-A! U-S-A!
    Saw the US-China match in basketball. Meh. China kept it close by shooting 3's, ridiculously accurate for the 1st half. Sun Yue is pretty good, and he signed with the Lakers so expect Ezra to be all crushing on him next year.
    But the US is too deep and their defense is awesome when they focus. It makes me barf to root for a Mike K-coached team though.

    After the game I went out and oppressed some minorities.

  16. Grandy  •  Aug 11, 2008 @4:12 am

    There is an olympics going on?

  17. Derrick  •  Aug 11, 2008 @5:12 am

    That 4x100M freestyle was awesome. Say what you will about the Olympics, but beating the French at ANYTHING, esspecially when they're favored, feels really good.

    Esspecially when the Frenchies talk trash beforehand.

  18. PLW  •  Aug 11, 2008 @6:46 am

    I'm with you Derrick. I actually whooped and hollered when the US came back to win. It cracked me up that one of the swimmers actually referred to them as "Frenchies". :)

    Are we helping or hurting the Boycott by letting them know all the awesome things they are missing by not watching?