Cacophony said:
And while the political aspect of the Olympics this year can be annoying it is certainly an important aspect. It’s been one of the biggest parts of this particular Olympics since they announced China as the host nation. What irks me is that sudden interest in the human rights violations that only seem to be going on because of the Olympics and will probably die out after the event is over. While it might not always be obvious, the Olympics always has a political side.
Uh, no. Activists have been decrying the Chinese government’s behavior for many years. The Tiananmen Square massacre comes to mind. True, there has been a signifigant increase in the awareness of the government’s human rights violations sinse they got the Olympics, because people don’t like the Chinese government receiving the honor of hosting the games. This is a good thing. The more international pressure put on them, the better. I wouldn’t call the political element of the ’08 Olympics annoying so much as telling.
While the opening ceremony is all about the host country–and is thereby open to political observation–the games themselves are all about the atheletes. It’s pretty fun watching the events, regardless of the hosts. Yesterday, I was watching the men’s gymnastics. This one American (I think his name was Sasha) was an absolute beast on the rings. It must have really messed with his shoulders, swinging around like that. This other American whose name I can’t remember (it was Indian, I think) was on that horse-thingy. It was really cool, like he was breakdancing in the air or something.
I remember watching the ’96 games, and I thought it was annoying how the events kept being pre-empted by the TV channel. They would only show a little bit of an event, then move on to a soap opera-type segment about some athlete’s struggle to get to the games. If I’m watching an event, I want to see the whole thing. Also, Izzy sucked. From what I’ve seen, the ’08 games are being presented much better. It’s all action.