true then, true now
From The price of gold, published Aug. 4, 2004.China's Olympic prowess, though, is hardly a reflection of a nationwide passion for sweaty competition. Unlike Americans or Australians, the vast majority of Chinese are not sporty people who tote racquets or join gyms. China's international athletic success is about nationalism; it is the physical expression of a resurgent country, a rebuttal to its history as the "sick man of Asia" exploited by colonialists during the waning days of the Qing dynasty. The average Chinese--for whom supporting the motherland in athletic competition is one of the few instances in which mass, spontaneous celebration is allowed--is conditioned to see sporting victories as a metaphor for China's ascendance. "Our current national sports policy is called 'Winning Pride at the Olympics,'" says Hao Qiang, head of the State General Administration of Sport's Competition and Training Department. "By being successful at the Olympics, China will erase our shameful past of being humiliated by foreign powers."
If anyone had any doubt, let it be known that the Chinese people do not easily forget an insult or a grudge. The existence of such a stereotype in America, though waning in popularity, contributes to racial sympathies with Chinese success in American professional sports and globally at the Olympic scale. It's hard for me to not cheer for the Chinese lightweight rowing squad when they storm the world championship stage, as they did last summer out of the blue, but I know that they are all products of a twisted system that dehumanizes and is probably worse than anything at Guantanamo Bay. Any bets on whether the Chinese lighties were on substances of some sort? Yeah...as a Chinese friend of mine said, the Department of Medicinal Chemistry might have been very pleased.
The Chinese say we shouldn't make sport political or make the Olympics into a political issue by boycotting the games, etc. This is true. But, you know, they started it. Wasn't landing the Olympics and putting these kids through the meat grinder to win golds nothing short of a political statement? It's not as if Beijing had any intrinsic interest in sport. So yeah, when they say that politics shouldn't interfere with the spirit of athletics, they're being two-faced hypocrites, which, for the Chinese government, is par for the course.
If anyone had any doubt, let it be known that the Chinese people do not easily forget an insult or a grudge. The existence of such a stereotype in America, though waning in popularity, contributes to racial sympathies with Chinese success in American professional sports and globally at the Olympic scale. It's hard for me to not cheer for the Chinese lightweight rowing squad when they storm the world championship stage, as they did last summer out of the blue, but I know that they are all products of a twisted system that dehumanizes and is probably worse than anything at Guantanamo Bay. Any bets on whether the Chinese lighties were on substances of some sort? Yeah...as a Chinese friend of mine said, the Department of Medicinal Chemistry might have been very pleased.
The Chinese say we shouldn't make sport political or make the Olympics into a political issue by boycotting the games, etc. This is true. But, you know, they started it. Wasn't landing the Olympics and putting these kids through the meat grinder to win golds nothing short of a political statement? It's not as if Beijing had any intrinsic interest in sport. So yeah, when they say that politics shouldn't interfere with the spirit of athletics, they're being two-faced hypocrites, which, for the Chinese government, is par for the course.