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| Posted By : Jaqhama - 3/22/2008 5:14 AM | | Should we boycott the China Oylimpics?
The world I mean, not SF Forum folk in particular.
My GF Lin and I have decided we will not be watching the China Oylimpics on TV.
China picked a bad time to start enforcing their regimes rule in Tibet.
Not watching the events on TV is easily the best form of protest we can think of.
There's so much stuff made in China today it's kinda hard to say...Oh we just won't buy made in China goods.
Not buying china stuff is all but impossible in Oz. Just about all our clothes are made in China.
So our small protest will be ignoring the 2008 oylimpics.
Anyone else here been having similar thoughts?
Cheers: Jaq.
You can read some of my stories here:
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| Posted By : peadarog - 3/22/2008 1:15 PM | I think it's too late for a boycott to have any effect whatsoever. Our mistake here in the West, was to allow big business to convince us that trade with China would lead to change there. But that was just the greed talking.
Tibetan culture is going to disappear and it doesn't matter what we do. The majority of the people are now Chinese who have moved there since the country was annexed. What are we going to do about it? Go to war with China? Of course not. Both sides would lost millions of lives, maybe tens of millions.
Trade boycotts? They now have more of a hold over us than vice versa in that area. So, it's goodbye, Tibet. I never knew you and never will.
Peadar O Guilin
Available now:
"The Mourning Trees" in Black Gate #5
"Fairy Fort" in A Walk on the Darkside
"Hair" in www.feralfiction.com
"Hurdy-Gurdy" in Dark Arts
"The Drain" in Weird Tales
"Where Beauty Lies in Wait" in Black Gate.
Coming Soon:
"The Evil-Eater" in Black Gate.
"The Dowry" in Black Gate
The Inferior from David Fickling Books. Eat or be eaten.
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| Posted By : nathan - 3/22/2008 4:03 PM | I get so frustrated by this issue, lol. It seems like both sides of left/right ideologies fail us to the extreme.
I'd like to see us boycott the China Olympics like we did Russia's back in the 80's. Of course we owe them a helluva of a lot of money. Clinton pushed hard to get most favored trade status including pretending to solve the N. Korea problem ("hey! They said they're going to be good now! Let's believe them!") then getting caught having Chinese funds funneled into his campaign coffers.
Bush has been no better, infact worse for encouraging strongly American business into China. While Clinton owns a lot of how the problem began Bush just made it worse, and gleefully.
Meanwhile you have people thinking you can't bring democracy at gunpoint to other countries. Rember Free Tibet? Richard Gere and a hundred bands singing songs and calling for this and calling for that?
Useless.
For Tibet to be free they must fight. Without outside intervention and support they have 0% chance of fighting a government as ruthless as China though they may suceed in getting their country to look like a mountainous version of the Palestine Occupied Territories which would give China a black eye. But there are many people who don't think this etherally concept of freedom is worth the death chaos and suffering that would follow.
So if the left isn't going to help them. If the right isn't going to help them and if the Dali Lama is going to quit if they the people start doing the only thing that will actually free them--then why boycott?
Why make apolitical atheletes bear the brunt of what governments and nations and the general world population won't do. Let the atheletes game--Tibet doesn't matter enough to anyone in the world to do what needs to be done to free it so leave the Olympians out of it.
Hmm. I guess I must feel more strongly than I thought I did when I started typing, lol.
VIEW IMAGE"Writing the wet dreams of teenage boys" - Lindsey Llyod, Tangent Reviews
Tarantino himself has been forward and unapologetic about his influences. In a 1994 interview with Empire magazine, he said, "I steal from every single movie ever made. If people don't like that, then tough tills, don't go and see it, all right? I steal from everything. Great artists steal, they don't do homages." |
| Posted By : peadarog - 3/22/2008 4:24 PM | Yes, horrible as it is, fighting may be their only option. But keep in mind that it didn't do the Palestinians much good. As happened in the Occupied Territories, China will use terrorism as an excuse to do what it wanted to do all along anyway: take the rest of the land; ethnically cleanse the Tibetans if they get in the way etc. etc. And Tibet is far more isolated from prying Western eyes than Gaza is. Also, unlike Israel, China has no free press to be outraged at any number of ruthless massacres. I honestly don't think violence will save the Tibetans any more than peaceful means would, except that at least with peaceful means, they always retain the moral high ground. As they disappear.
Peadar O Guilin
Available now:
"The Mourning Trees" in Black Gate #5
"Fairy Fort" in A Walk on the Darkside
"Hair" in www.feralfiction.com
"Hurdy-Gurdy" in Dark Arts
"The Drain" in Weird Tales
"Where Beauty Lies in Wait" in Black Gate.
Coming Soon:
"The Evil-Eater" in Black Gate.
"The Dowry" in Black Gate
The Inferior from David Fickling Books. Eat or be eaten.
Available in the US and Canada June 2008. Preorder now for the read of your life! |
| Posted By : nathan - 3/22/2008 5:44 PM | I actually agree with you quite readily. Tibetians are screwed either way. I disagree strongly that pacifistic resistance to tyranny is intrinsitctly on a higher moral ground than armed struggle--but I do agree the point is probablly moot anyway.
VIEW IMAGE"Writing the wet dreams of teenage boys" - Lindsey Llyod, Tangent Reviews
Tarantino himself has been forward and unapologetic about his influences. In a 1994 interview with Empire magazine, he said, "I steal from every single movie ever made. If people don't like that, then tough tills, don't go and see it, all right? I steal from everything. Great artists steal, they don't do homages." |
| Posted By : nathan - 3/23/2008 1:47 PM | "You're screwed anyway" is not a moral argument for competeing--your are exactly correct. It stinks as a mind set (and I hold it) and is at its roots wrong.
But since nothing is going to happen by the people who are suppossed to make things happen and since were going to be enjoying some of the benefits of having them help our economy I just don't see why the Olympians should suffer. They're the least culpable in the whole mess.
If go business as usually-pause-boycott--unpause and business as usual--what good does it do to make the atheletes suffer when no one else it willing to in business, politcs, or the general population?
But yeah, it's not a particularly moral position.
VIEW IMAGE
"Writing the wet dreams of teenage boys" - Lindsey Llyod, Tangent Reviews
Tarantino himself has been forward and unapologetic about his influences. In a 1994 interview with Empire magazine, he said, "I steal from every single movie ever made. If people don't like that, then tough tills, don't go and see it, all right? I steal from everything. Great artists steal, they don't do homages." |
| Posted By : tchernabyelo - 3/25/2008 9:19 AM | While I am no fan of, or apologist for, the Chinese regime, Tibet's right to "independence" is a question that has merit on both sides - just as any other ethnoic/religious grouping of people who find themselves subject to the rule of "outsiders" (in what way are the Tibetans different from Kurds, Chechens, Basques, French Canadians, Lakota Native Americans, San Bushmen, and so on and so forth?).
China's human rights record is poor, but then so are those of many other regimes that the Western world regards as "allies" (Saudi Arabia being the most obvious current example).
The economic power of China (in particular the US trade deficit and the capability of the Chinese government to forcce the dollar into a plunge that would guarantee a US recession) is such that you will hear only lip service from the US (and thus the rest of the West) in support of Tibet, and even that will be heavily qualified.
Brian Dolton
Yi Qin stories:
"The Box Of Beautiful Things" - IGMS#3
"The Man Who Was Never Afraid" - Abyss and Apex #20
"At Blue Crane Falls" - Abyss and Apex #25 "Where No Wind Blows" - Staffs & Starships #2
"What The Sea Refuses" - Black Gate (forthcoming)
"What The Heart Bears" - Black Gate (forthcoming)
"Above The Clouds" - Paper Blossoms, Sharpened Steel (forthcoming)
Other Land Of Wind And Ghosts stories:
"The Dragon Path" - Fictitious Force (forthcoming)
"Three Out Of Four" - Sorcerous Signals Feb-Apr 08
Stories in other settings:
"The Unicorn Hunter" - OG's Speculative Fiction #8
"Call Centre" - Necrotic Tissue #1
"When Winter Came" - ASIM #32
"Cold Fire" - Flashing Swords #9
"St. Saviour And The Devil's Dandy" - Flashing Swords (forthcoming) |
| Posted By : peadarog - 3/25/2008 12:26 PM | "While I am no fan of, or apologist for, the Chinese regime, Tibet's right to "independence" is a question that has merit on both sides - just as any other ethnoic/religious grouping of people who find themselves subject to the rule of "outsiders" (in what way are the Tibetans different from Kurds, Chechens, Basques, French Canadians, Lakota Native Americans, San Bushmen, and so on and so forth?)."
I'm a big fan for allowing all of these peoples to have self-determination if they want it. Why should people who want a divorce be forced to stay in an unhappy marriage? In the case of Tibet, it was already an independent, very peaceful country until China invaded it.
Peadar O Guilin
Available now:
"The Mourning Trees" in Black Gate #5
"Fairy Fort" in A Walk on the Darkside
"Hair" in www.feralfiction.com
"Hurdy-Gurdy" in Dark Arts
"The Drain" in Weird Tales
"Where Beauty Lies in Wait" in Black Gate.
Coming Soon:
"The Evil-Eater" in Black Gate.
"The Dowry" in Black Gate
The Inferior from David Fickling Books. Eat or be eaten.
Available in the US and Canada June 2008. Preorder now for the read of your life! |
| Posted By : DAWaverly - 3/25/2008 1:52 PM | From where I sit boycotting the Olympics, only, would be an empty gesture. Now for those that truly want the human rights and self determination returned to the Tibetans, then all aspects of China in our lives should be boycotted. That includes all of those cheap products that fill the shelves of your local Big-Box-Mart. It includes the current policies of the US Government (i.e. the funding the Irag war) that depend on loans from China. It takes no real effort to tell someone else to not participate in a sporting event. It does take effort to only buy and use non-China products or to march on Washington with a picket sign in hand.
For many of us (and I do include myself) it is easy for us to spout off about some injustice on a forum or blog and then feel good about ourselves. But have we really done anything?
- Deven
Blogtide Rising |
| Posted By : Gustavo - 3/25/2008 2:25 PM | Intersting question. I'm not in favor of boycotting the Olympics, and I really believe that tyranny in China will fall the same way it did behind the Iron Curtain: as a greater number of Chinese become educated and globalized (China tries to censor the internet, but it's a pretty empty gesture), and as commercial pressures mount, totalitarianism will either collapse or adapt. Either will be good for human rights.
I'm not actually certain that democracy would WORK in China (I'm from Argenitna, the country that proves that democracy gives the people the government they deserve, in our current case the rule of imbeciles over imbeciles) and a failed government in China could mean millions or tens of millions dead. It's a tough problem, but I think, in the end, globalization will absorb the Chinese, too.
Interesting thing about Basque separatists... As Europe strives to tear down more and more borders, do ethnic groups even need to have a specific territory?
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| Posted By : peadarog - 3/25/2008 5:09 PM | Deven, I agree with you.
Gustavo: With all the borders coming down in Europe, you might argue that there's no real advantage to smaller nations in having their own states. But if that is the case, then there is no disadvantage to the larger states in giving them the dignity of making their own decisions -- however minor they may seem these days.
Peadar O Guilin
Available now:
"The Mourning Trees" in Black Gate #5
"Fairy Fort" in A Walk on the Darkside
"Hair" in www.feralfiction.com
"Hurdy-Gurdy" in Dark Arts
"The Drain" in Weird Tales
"Where Beauty Lies in Wait" in Black Gate.
Coming Soon:
"The Evil-Eater" in Black Gate.
"The Dowry" in Black Gate
The Inferior from David Fickling Books. Eat or be eaten.
Available in the US and Canada June 2008. Preorder now for the read of your life! |
| Posted By : tchernabyelo - 3/26/2008 6:40 AM | It's interesting to note that, as Europe "tears down" borders in terms of the movement of people, many countries are making it much, much harder to gain citizenship, and are moving towards a real two-tier society - those who can visit and stay and work for a certain length of time but have very limited rights in areas such as healthcare and pension provision, against those who are "full citizens". I find it a rather worrying trend.
Brian Dolton
Yi Qin stories:
"The Box Of Beautiful Things" - IGMS#3
"The Man Who Was Never Afraid" - Abyss and Apex #20
"At Blue Crane Falls" - Abyss and Apex #25 "Where No Wind Blows" - Staffs & Starships #2
"What The Sea Refuses" - Black Gate (forthcoming)
"What The Heart Bears" - Black Gate (forthcoming)
"Above The Clouds" - Paper Blossoms, Sharpened Steel (forthcoming)
Other Land Of Wind And Ghosts stories:
"The Dragon Path" - Fictitious Force (forthcoming)
"Three Out Of Four" - Sorcerous Signals Feb-Apr 08
Stories in other settings:
"The Unicorn Hunter" - OG's Speculative Fiction #8
"Call Centre" - Necrotic Tissue #1
"When Winter Came" - ASIM #32
"Cold Fire" - Flashing Swords #9
"St. Saviour And The Devil's Dandy" - Flashing Swords (forthcoming) |
| Posted By : Gustavo - 3/26/2008 12:43 PM | Peadar, of course there's no disadvantage (or maybe I just don't see it), what I meant was that it's too late to ask for independence as a separate country...
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| Posted By : peadarog - 3/27/2008 5:17 AM | This is off-topic, Gustavo, but wanted to point out that your English is amazing. Congratulations.
Peadar O Guilin
Available now:
"The Mourning Trees" in Black Gate #5
"Fairy Fort" in A Walk on the Darkside
"Hair" in www.feralfiction.com
"Hurdy-Gurdy" in Dark Arts
"The Drain" in Weird Tales
"Where Beauty Lies in Wait" in Black Gate.
Coming Soon:
"The Evil-Eater" in Black Gate.
"The Dowry" in Black Gate
The Inferior from David Fickling Books. Eat or be eaten.
Available in the US and Canada June 2008. Preorder now for the read of your life! |
| Posted By : Gustavo - 3/27/2008 5:11 PM | Thanks, but I cheated.... I grew up in the US and in Switzerland (American schools there). So I can't really take credit for being proficient in the language I spoke almost exclusively until age 12...
Visit my livejournal! http://bondo-ba.livejournal.com/
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| Posted By : peadarog - 3/27/2008 5:39 PM | Ah! All is clear.
Peadar O Guilin
Available now:
"The Mourning Trees" in Black Gate #5
"Fairy Fort" in A Walk on the Darkside
"Hair" in www.feralfiction.com
"Hurdy-Gurdy" in Dark Arts
"The Drain" in Weird Tales
"Where Beauty Lies in Wait" in Black Gate.
Coming Soon:
"The Evil-Eater" in Black Gate.
"The Dowry" in Black Gate
The Inferior from David Fickling Books. Eat or be eaten.
Available in the US and Canada June 2008. Preorder now for the read of your life! |
| Posted By : Steven the Git - 4/6/2008 3:16 PM | Have to say from a british viewpoint it is a hard one to call. If we didn't send our athletes, well, first, would anyone notice?!
But seeing as we have the next Olympics, and also as we have forces in two countries, if we boycott, then others could boycott us for valid reasons. Mind you, in saying that, it could happen anyway.
I do think if major nations did boycott China would be very embarassed and they do want to appear better in world views, if for nothing more than money as well. I think it would have meaning, but would it work? I guess sometimes that isn't the question. You sometimes should say it is worth trying.
To be honest, I doubt I'll watch the games as there is nothing in there I truly respect or enjoy. So I could well boycott for different reasons - ie. it's crap.
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| Posted By : DAWaverly - 4/6/2008 7:54 PM | Steven the Git said...
But seeing as we have the next Olympics, and also as we have forces in two countries, if we boycott, then others could boycott us for valid reasons. Mind you, in saying that, it could happen anyway.
I thought about mentioning in this thread that my nation, US of A, is currently occupying two nations, and that a boycott could be seen as hypocritical by some. I decided not to. I did however obsess about my statement earlier in the thread...
DAWaverly said...
For many of us (and I do include myself) it is easy for us to spout off about some injustice on a forum or blog and then feel good about ourselves. But have we really done anything?
... and ended up kicking out an experimental bit of fiction that, even if it doesn't sell, at least has me being more aware that I personally need to take more action instead of just talking or blogging about it.
- Deven
Blogtide Rising
published
"The Journey" at Every Day Fiction
forthcoming
"An Awakening of Shadows" in The Infinity Swords anthology from Carnivah House
"All That Glitters" at Every Day Fiction |
| Posted By : Jaqhama - 4/8/2008 1:06 PM | I take the point about the USA occuypying other countries at this time.
But unlike Chinese security forces in Tibet the American security forces are answerable to someone. Crimes commited in public, witnessed, are investigated/prosecuted.
Such is the not case with the secuirty forces in Tibet.
And after the torch relay debacle in the UK and France I think politicians everywhere are beginning to realise how the events in Tibet are upsetting peopole in the rest of the world.
An Oz polly said tonight on tv that they won't stand for a handful of Tibetan protesters disrupting the Oz torch relay...silly bugger doesn't seem to know that the majority of proteters in the UK and France were local people. Not Tibetans.
I think China and the pollies have failed to understand the power of the Internet also.
You can't keep world events a secret anymore.
People all over the world can know the latest news and opinions in seconds.
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Swamp Story. Down South. Florida Haze.Wild Justice...
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| Posted By : MichaelEhart - 4/8/2008 5:50 PM | As a politically active geek for the last 40 years or so, I have to say that boycotts, for the most part, have little or no net effect other than making the boycotter feel noble and virtous.
The lettuce boycott in the 70's eventually worked, and some TV show boycotts work because the boycotters target advertisers, who are sensitive to that sort of pressure. The US not participating would most likely have no discernable effect, as we would (international opinion! please don't flame me) be calling the kettle black, due to our equally unpopular presence in Iraq. Once again, not arguing the differences, just the perception.
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| Posted By : Scott M. Sandridge - 4/17/2008 3:58 PM | I doubt boycotting the Olympics would do much. If the Tibetans show a willingness to fight back, I'd be all for supplying them with all the equipment they'd need (after all, better to give the guns to them than our wannabe dictator "allies" who only pretend to be friendly). No, the only type of boycott that'd be effective would be one that hits them where it actually hurts: an economic one.
Distant Passages: Volume 1
Which lich fell in the ditch? |
| Posted By : Jaqhama - 4/22/2008 2:41 PM |
Scott M. Sandridge said...I doubt boycotting the Olympics would do much. If the Tibetans show a willingness to fight back, I'd be all for supplying them with all the equipment they'd need (after all, better to give the guns to them than our wannabe dictator "allies" who only pretend to be friendly). No, the only type of boycott that'd be effective would be one that hits them where it actually hurts: an economic one.
Sure give the Tibetans guns and watch China slaughter a few thousand at a time.
China would roll right over Tibet in an armed conflict.
Giving them firearms isn't the answer.
World condemnation of China's tactics in Tibet and even boycotting China goods will be much more effective.
You can read some of my stories here: Swamp Story. Down South. Florida Haze.Wild Justice...
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| Posted By : Scott M. Sandridge - 4/22/2008 4:45 PM |
Jaqhama said...
Scott M. Sandridge said...I doubt boycotting the Olympics would do much. If the Tibetans show a willingness to fight back, I'd be all for supplying them with all the equipment they'd need (after all, better to give the guns to them than our wannabe dictator "allies" who only pretend to be friendly). No, the only type of boycott that'd be effective would be one that hits them where it actually hurts: an economic one.
Sure give the Tibetans guns and watch China slaughter a few thousand at a time.
China would roll right over Tibet in an armed conflict.
Giving them firearms isn't the answer.
World condemnation of China's tactics in Tibet and even boycotting China goods will be much more effective.
At least they'll get to die on their feet instead of on their knees. I know what choice I prefer on that. While world condemnation and boycotting goods would be most effective, do you honestly think most people will stop watching Britney Spears long enough to give a crap and do it? I highly doubt it.
Distant Passages: Volume 1
Which lich fell in the ditch? |
| Posted By : Frank - 4/23/2008 1:26 PM | | maybe it's cuz i was never much of a sports enthusiast, but i think the olympics are a bunch of pompus crap anyway and among the generation younger than me, unless they are atheletes themselves, they don't give a shit either... |
| Posted By : Stuart Clark - 4/29/2008 10:25 PM | I agree with most of what's been said in the thread already. I think the only way to get through to China would be with an economic boycott but that would then be asking the corporations that outsource their (cheap) manufacturing to China, and thus widening their profit margins, to find somewhere else for their plants - and in the unlikely event that ever happens, that increased cost is only going to be passed on to us, the consumer. You've only got to hear all the complaining about increasing utility costs and gas prices to know how popular that's going to be.
I don't think it's fair to ask athletes to boycott the olympics. They've been training for years for this opportunity, and for many of them, it is a once in a lifetime opportunity - the location is unfortunate, but that's not their fault. I'm not quite sure what the IOC were thinking.
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| Posted By : cussedness - 5/17/2008 5:45 PM | Absolutely boycott them. Look at all the earthquakes!
Janrae Frank
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| Posted By : Jaqhama - 5/20/2008 9:48 AM |
cussedness said...Absolutely boycott them. Look at all the earthquakes!
Those Tibetan mantras may be more effective than any of us thought? 
You can read some of my stories here:
Swamp Story. Down South. Florida Haze.Wild Justice...
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