I'm getting rather steamed up about the complete silence by the perky staff on the Today Show about the fact that China is an authoritarian government that has a spotty record on human rights and lacks free elections and a free press. Instead, we getting dreamy montages of the Chinese culture and loving descriptions of the Bird Nest stadium. All that is fine. But right after they show a reporter wolfing down roasted bugs in the markets of Beijing, they should also mention that China has denied visas to athletes who have dared protest China's position on Darfur.
Who gagged our media? Is NBC so afraid of getting kicked out of China that they happily serve up dishes of cultural puff pieces and can't even mention that China has refused to allow its citizens to protest?
Yes, and it's shameful. China is proving that American companies will throw freedom of speech out the window if the price is right.
I would wager than many of NBC's viewers are well aware that China is a communist dictatorship. What purpose would be served by reminding them of this, I am unsure. Most of us just want to watch the Games, not be hectored about things over which we have no control.
I'm constantly a little weirded out by the picture of history's most prolific mass murderer over Bob Costas' shoulder.
This is a joke, right? Someone hacked McCardle's account? What exactly would NBC accomplish if its reporters sat around whining about Chinese authoritarianism (other than possibly getting themselves kicked out of the country)?
As if getting oneself kicked out of an authoritarian country for speaking truth to power were not an end in itself.
There are specific olympics-related controversies, like rampant Chinese cheating in gymnastics, and denying a visa to a former gold medalist who also happens to be a darfur activist. NBC has given these little-to-no coverage, as far as I can tell.
Bob Costas grilled George Bush over this issue. What are they supposed to do Megan, only talk about this? That would get pretty old wouldn't it? NBC's job is to cover the Olympics. They were not the ones who put the Olympics in Beijing. If the fact that Beijing is the capital a pseudo communist police state bothers you so much, then you should have pushed for a media boycott. Not coming makes sense. What doesn't make sense is to go and spend the entire two weeks ripping China. Then, you just look like a bad guest.
I was for boycotting the games at first. Now I think we did the right thing showing up. Regardless of the government, this is really important to the Chinese people. We don't do ourselves or the world any good insulting the Chinese people. Everyone knows China's human rights issues. There is certainly a time and a place to hammer them over it. But, this is not it.
I lived in Hong Kong during much of the 1990s, teaching business students, and it was shocking how willing American companies were to ignore anything China did in order to get business, even though the idiots were all losing money due to their naivete about the Chinese Communist Party.
And European companies were worse. Every time the US government tried to make any sort of stand or statement on China's frequent violations of human rights, European companies fell all over themselves to say "our governments don't care who you kill! we'll be happy to do business with you."
But worst of all were the Western journalists, who were pathetically easy to manipulate. If, say, the Olympic organizing committee was coming to consider Beijing for the Olympics, all the CCP had to do was to let two or three political prisoners out on parole (usually prisoners that had served around 16 years of their 17 year sentences). Western journalists would flutter on about how China had changed. A week or two later, the political prisoners were re-arrested (many had been under unofficial house arrest the whole time), but of course that didn't get reported in the West because the enchanted journalists had stopped noticing.
China has improved very gradually over the last couple of decades in terms of human rights, but for every 4 steps forward, there have been at least 3 (sometimes 5) steps back again. The Western media only covers the steps forward and conveniently ignores anything that doesn't fit their preconception. They tell a story of steady, enormous progress, but the truth is that China was always worse than they thought and is still pretty unstable (in part because they're willing to sacrifice so much for 'stability').
Ann,
I am firmly convinced that China will break apart and Han domination will end in my lifetime. No one ever believes me. But, I think China is much more unstable than it is made out to be.
they should also mention that China has denied visas to athletes who have dared protest China's position on Darfur.
From my googling, this is untrue. They have denied a visa to a former speed skater who intended to use his trip to publicize the genocide in Darfur. Actual competitors have not been denied visas. That makes this "controversy" kinda weak; "Spectator denied visa" is not exactly earth-shattering.
Cheating in gymnastics, that's an important story, assuming there's anything but speculation to back it up. If there isn't, then yapping about it is pointless.
As Han Chinese constitute about 92 percent of the population of the People's Republic of China even if they do break apart it statistically 'unlikely' that they will cease to dominate as an ethnic group.
Also why did nobody mind when Hong Kong was under British rule and wasn't a democracy? Or are we only concerned with human rights abuses? In which case whats the threshold before human rights abuses become significant enough to punish the country involved?
NBC's job is to cover the Olympics, NBC is owned by GE and like any other division of a public company are commercially orientated. If you want to admire a public service broadcaster who always sticks to its mission regardless of the commercial impact look at CCTV.
I was for boycotting, but I decided that that wouldn't do anything as I don't have a Nielsen box and besides there's hope that "Team Darfur" supporters win a medal. I keep hoping an athlete will mention human rights issues in one of those "athlete interviews" things, but it seems like most of these athletes have little to no life outside of sports. (I think we're meant to admire their dedication, but mostly I find it slightly dispiriting to hear one after another story of "her only hobby is her sport", "he trains 12 hours a day", etc)
On the gymnastics thing every time a Chinese girl wins anything they mention it. The problem is there's not much you can really do on it. I don't think age can be tested the way drugs can be tested. (Well presumably you could do a blood or urine test to see if they hit puberty, but no one is seriously claiming they're under 13 so that wouldn't prove much) It kind of seems to work on an "honors system", which is a bit of a joke but I don't know what else you do.
When it comes to the "Today Show" though they are fluff. They've pretty much always been fluff. Although maybe on their last day there they can have their US anchor, surely they still have one, interview Chinese dissidents.
I am firmly convinced that China will break apart and Han domination will end in my lifetime. No one ever believes me. But, I think China is much more unstable than it is made out to be.
John, history bears you out. The current vogue among China observers, including mainland nationals, sees the communist regime as the latest in a parade of dynasties that rode to power on peasant discontent and then festered in legalism, nepotism, and guanxi. There have been three modes of governance in mainland China: foreign domination (e.g. Qin); peasant usurpers (Shun); and anarchy (e.g. the 16 Kingdoms).
None of which is to discredit the resilience of Chinese culture. The Chinese diaspora, in demographics and linguistic influence, rivals the European expansion of the last 500 years (and is roughly contemporaneous).
The Chinese girl's gymnastics team has at least two girls on it who are, to a virtual certainty, well under the minimum age of 16. Media outlets have done extensive searches of the public records, and those girls did not exist in 1992. The Chinese government has handed the IOC passports saying they're sixteen, but their own records contradict their statement. The IOC has ignored this, as has NBC, even though if you look at the girls, they are visibly pre-pubescent. (Though of course, their apparent willingness to starve promising gymnasts to keep them small and light probably contributes).
The new open scoring system overvalues difficulty relative to execution, which makes it a winning tactic to put up very young girls, who are smaller and lighter relative to their muscle mass, and recover faster from injuries. That gives them a vast unfair advantage over teams who are obeying the rules. This was nowhere mentioned in the gymnastics coverage I saw.
Are people here brain-dead? Who owns NBC? Last time I checked, NBC(except for KO) wasn't a bunch of bleeding heart liberals. GE isn't going to do anything to jeopardize making a profit, especially when the CEO of GE came out yesterday and said he expects GE's business in China to double in the next two years. As always, follow the Benjamins.
John -
I agree that China is unstable, and it's frightening. It may still all work out, but that's not the only likely possibility.
Rob Lyman -
I think the real story is how the government has been going back and changing or deleting past stories that accidentally gave the 'wrong' ages or birthdates for the gymnasts. Here's a link to one story on it:
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/GAM.20080816.OLYBLATCHFORD16/TPStory/TPComment
And here are two quotes from that article:
"What is really creepy about what's emerged from the reporting of the gymnastics controversy is how state-owned agencies have rewritten themselves online to "correct" the record - in other words, rewritten history and attempted to expunge any contrary evidence."
"In one example from May of this year, the online version of the China Daily newspaper cheerfully reported the dazzling arrival of a new face, the aforementioned He, and her age as 14.
Now the same edition of the story - identical in all other regards - reports He's age as 16.
Only the 'cached' version of the original story unearthed by the researchers points to the truth."
Wait seriously? Since when has Olympics coverage been characterized by anything other than puff pieces?
If Bob Costas were forced to sit in front of a picture of Nixon we'd never hear the end of it.
Ann:
As smart as the Chinese are, it sounds like they forgot there is such a thing as the internet way back machine.
"Also why did nobody mind when Hong Kong was under British rule and wasn't a democracy?"
Well, for one thing, the people of Hong Kong had most of the protections of a democracy. The only reason that the British didn't pull out and allow Hong Kong to be self-governing after World War II, or in the decades to follow, was because the Chinese made it clear that they would move in and retake it. As Josh pointed out, Mao was the most prolific mass murderer of all time, so turning over millions of people to his control, or even to Deng's, wasn't considered an attractive option.
OH MY GOD you just realized that companies will sacrifice ethics for profit? WOWZA!
For what it's worth, NBC Nightly News on Sunday did a lengthy story from Beijing about one of the leaders of the Tiananmen Square demonstrations in 1989 who is now stuck in the U.S. without a passport, without a visa, without a Green Card. NBC interviewed his aging parents stuck in China. I was watching "gym style" with no audio, but I think it was Wang Dan.
Ignoring all the china battles on here (I am just not watching the olympics..) and getting back to Megan's original statement about American firms throwing free speech over for profits...
Why again is this surprising? Aren't corporations pretty much legally bound to do--within the context of the law--everything that they can to increase shareholder value? Giving a shit about free speech in a foreign country isn't in their preogative.. so why should anyone expect them to do so? Most people aren't going to bitch at them for covering the olympics nearly as much as they would if they didn't cover them.. so they are just doing what corporations do.
If you want corporations to care about such things, then change the laws that they have to pay attention to... it is not their job to care about chinese oppression of its own citizens unless they think we will care.. and obviously.. most of us don't really care..
Joe (or JKC?) -
The "Great Firewall of China" has been more effective than I would have thought. Some people get around it, of course, and it's pretty costly, but China's attempt to block certain ideas has held up better than I would have expected.
I've come to believe the "Olympic ideal" is a concept that sounds noble but fundamentally corrupts everything it touches. Once you accept the big lie that we can make the world a better place by declaring a temporary truce and competing in sport as if politics didn't exist the rest is easy. The particulars of NBC's coverage, their agreement to televise the games, the USA's agreement to participate, the IOC's awarding the games to China, the IOC's rampant corruption all follow from the same fundamentally flawed concepts. NBC's particular sins are way down the list.
Megan,
As an act of conscience, one could choose not to watch, and all you would miss is swimming, diving, gymnastics, and volleyball.
Megan, I don't know what coverage you're watching, but NBC has gone over the underage gymnasts thing many times.
Why hasn't Retroactive Telcom Immunity come up in this discussion? I mean, if we're arguing that corporations should stand against government authoritarian nonsense, how about we get that started in the US before we whine it hasn't been exported to China?
I'm joining the chorus of people who don't think this is a big deal. I'd like to see NBC make a bigger issue about the coverup of the girl's ages because it directly influences the competition. I'm interested in other issues related to the actual games such as the edited fireworks, the smog issues, and the empty seats in the areas although I certainly do not want that coverage to dominate the sports coverage. Anything that doesn't directly influence the competitions at hand is a side issue that is really moot at this point (but was a good discussion during the awarding of the games and the run up towards the games).
All of us willingly give up our rights for money. For example, when we give up our property rights in exchange for money, we call it "selling".
Should any of us be surprised that we will also give up our rights to speech in exchange for money? I'm not allowed to divulge the code that I write for my current employer to 3rd parties. I agree to these terms in exchange for money. But so what? In that case, I'd rather exercise my right to trade than my right to free speech.
Is anyone here immune to this?
Why hasn't Retroactive Telcom Immunity come up in this discussion? I mean, if we're arguing that corporations should stand against government authoritarian nonsense, how about we get that started in the US before we whine it hasn't been exported to China?
NBC doesn't highlight the bad side of anything that the Chinese government has done during their Olympic coverage. Perhaps they are simply being polite to their hosts, or there may be some contractual obligation that they made in return for the exclusive television rights. Perhaps, having wagered so much they fear any repercussions of any "uncomfortable" reporting; like their whole crew being thrown out of the country.
I believe that they feel an admiration for the Chinese government, at least politically. It's no secret that NBC has drifted to the political left over the last several years; letting the mask slip completely and not even attempting to maintain a pretense of objectivity-thereby sacrificing their journalistic integrity.....
Whether it's not mentioning the party affiliation of misbehavin' Democrat's, tolerating a Journalist who confesses he is "in the tank" for Mr. Obama (Lee Cowan) as well as other who confess of a "chill up my leg" (Matthews)when hearing his oratory, or simply allowing their "reporters" and "commentators" to take their talking points from the Daily Kos (Mitchell and Olbermann)the meaning is clear; NBC and MSNBC have become the "Pravda" of the socialist American left and as such will simply not criticize the "workers paradise" unless forced to by egregious episode. I mean, they took pert in the sham fireworks of the opening ceremony-silently, obediently, complicit......
'NUFF SAID......
And to top it all off, they have provided simply the WORST coverage of any Olympics that I can remember......
I can see the argument for not covering the obvious issues surrounding China's authoritarianism. These are things most of us already know about. What I am curious about is whether the lack of coverage about contemporary protests/snafus implies 1) there simply are not ongoing protests, or 2) they are being ignored.
For instance, does anyone remember the "thing" (it looked like a little drum to me) that landed in the pool during one of the women's races (was it a relay?)? How did that get there? Don't tell me there aren't enough cameras around to figure it out. Any chance that was related to some sort of direct action protest that was simply ignored? Maybe I'm a conspiracy theorist, but I thought for sure NBC would try to figure out how something ended up in the pool during a race. Yet, they never really talked about it. Is this another example of NBC kowtowing to the Chinese, trying to make it appear that everything is going swimmingly?
It's no surprise that A) The IOC was so corrupt as to 'believe' Chinese promises of openness and adherance to international (read: Western) standards of free speech/assembly/religion, etc.; and B) that NBC is willing to gloss over the Chinese heavy-handedness in favor of retaining the ability to broadcast.
No one in their right mind thought that these games would be anything other than a Chinese attempt to show how great they are AT ALL COSTS. I'm just glad that we're still ahead in the medal count. If we can reign supreme I think that'll really rain on the CCP's parade. To think that their brutal state-run athletic system would be shown up by our decentralized, for-the-love-of-the-game athletes is great.
And, by-the-by, female gymasts always look young and small, but one look at those Chinese girls and I (and I'm sure everyone else with eyeballs) knew they were too young. I really hope they end up stripping their Gold medal. Better yet would be to ban the Chinese women's gymnastics team from competing in London in 2012.
Posted by Ann | August 19, 2008 9:58 AM
Ann, you're spot on here......
Posted by John | August 19, 2008 10:02 AM
John, I hope you're right also; though I fear what will happen with their nukes......
Posted by Paul S | August 19, 2008 10:19 AM
Paul S, you contributed excellent points of fact and provided fascinating historical context to the discussion.....
As usual Megan, an interesting, thought provoking, topic!
Perhaps they are simply being polite to their hosts, or there may be some contractual obligation that they made in return for the exclusive television rights.
This is the one thing that has bugged me, the west coast gets no live Olympic coverage. NBC puts it on a 3-hour tape delay from the east coast. Because they have the exclusive rights to the Olympics, there is nothing I can do about it. Saturday night I ended up shutting of the internet and not answering phone calls so I could watch Phelps without knowing the results beforehand.
The use of underage gymnasts by China is indeed infuriating, but Béla Károlyi, NBC's gymnastics correspondent, rants about this to Bob Costas on the air everyday. So you can't say NBC isn't talking about it. Considering the Chinese government's strict control of information in their country, I highly doubt the underage allegations will ever be proven. So what can we really do about it at this Olympics now that most of the gymnastics events are over?
The IOC has ignored this, as has NBC, even though if you look at the girls, they are visibly pre-pubescent
My mom is from the Philippines. A few years ago, I went there with her and was shocked to see how young my cousins looked. There were several times where I asked how one my aunts could have such young children. To my eyes they looked to be teenagers (at the oldest). I was quickly corrected that those "kids" were all 30+ years old with children of their own.
My point is that my eyes are accustomed to judging age by the standards of where I live. I'm skeptical of my ability to visually identify the age of the Chinese gymnastics team.
$.02
China is proving that American companies will throw freedom of speech out the window if the price is right.
The profit motive at work. Are you really that shocked?
@Aaron: Is this another example of NBC kowtowing to the Chinese, trying to make it appear that everything is going swimmingly?
We're running a special today, use two puns, get one free.
(Though of course, their apparent willingness to starve promising gymnasts to keep them small and light probably contributes).
Something about the idea of an American network lecturing another country about promoting athletic body cultures that are harmful to kids seems vaguely hilarious to me. Is there some evidence that Chinese girl gymnasts' diets are inferior to American girl gymnasts' diets? Or that the freakishly insane regimens these girls are subjected to are more freakishly insane than those of their American counterparts? Or is it that, China being a communist system, these 12-year-olds could not have meaningfully consented to the training regimens, whereas 12-year-old American kids...?
I find girl gymnasts both beautiful and a bit unnerving or upsetting. But I think one tends to allow the otherness of a foreign culture's team to unblock all the moral anxieties one has about a sport, when those anxieties ought equally to apply to your own side. But, yeah, the Chinese girls do look very young.
yeah, the Chinese girls do look very young.
Asian girls always look young to Westerners, as you of all people ought to know. My wife has been asked if she is our son's babysitter or nanny. I can't see that He "looks" any younger than Johnson, correcting for ethnicity.
I can't see that He "looks" any younger than Johnson, correcting for ethnicity.
I corrected for ethnicity by looking at the other girls on the Chinese team!
And I also don't agree with your comparison of your adult wife to teenagers. That's not surprising, considering both are past puberty. We are talking about the differences between pre-pubescent to pubescent girls. As any female who went through puberty can attest, there's a lot that changes. Even with a pretty tough training regimen, puberty might be slightly delayed, but it does progress normally. A gymnast who is 16 could conceivably look 14, but not 11 or 12.
Here's my issue:
JIANG Yuyuan is supposedly turning 17 on 11/1 and is an astounding 4'7 and 70lbs.
He Kexin similarly is supposedly turning 17 on 1/1 and is an 4'8 and 73lbs.
The idea that both of these girls are not only post-pubescent but almost 17 is highly suspicious.
I have lived in China. Those girls (except for Cheng Fei) are like 12.
"Perhaps they are simply being polite to their hosts, or there may be some contractual obligation that they made in return for the exclusive television rights."
I think it's the latter. Whats-her-name's puff pieces have come off as a bit "Ugly American" to me - Oh no, it's cow stomach! - and she seems scared of everything. (Some of the best things I've eaten in China have been chicken hearts on a stick and solid blocks of duck's blood.) She has not been a good guest. If she is already being a bad guest, why not talk about China's human rights record and other forms of wrongdoing, especially as it relates to the Olympics: kicking out about 1.5 million people out of Beijing and demolishing their homes with adequate compensation to build new Olympic venues, media crackdowns, putting out false stories about the Dalai Lama being behind terrorist attacks in Lhasa, not granting enough visas to foreign athletes' families, not allowing foreign athletes to come to China before the Olympics to look at the venues while the Chinese teams got to make use of them, etc.
Besides, if the CCP would lie about which girl sang at the Olympic Opening Ceremony (and publish a puff piece about the entire nation falling in love with her in the official media), why wouldn't they lie about the athletes' ages, especially when they are the ones who also make their passports?
why wouldn't they lie about the athletes' ages
Of course they would. The only issue is, can anybody actually prove it?
"Of course they would. The only issue is, can anybody actually prove it?
Posted by Rob Lyman | August 19, 2008 1:35 PM"
Sadly, probably not because the CCP has a monopoly over this information. But the fact they are going back and changing info published in their own press is rather fishy.
Why wouldn't they be afraid of China? They are afraid of the whitehouse.
The price of access is silence. We've seen over and over again that our media is willing to pay that price.
I'll tell you what really steams me, and it has nothing to do with underaged Chinese athletes; it is all of these pundits that keep blathering on about how China and Russia and innumerable third world countries are so bad and the elections are questionable and there is no freedom of press and blah blah blah.
It's all nothing more than American propaganda of the most facile sort; the myths of American exceptionalism.
Did it ever occur to this woman that the government here in the USA is rather authoritarian by Western standards, has a spotty record on human rights, questionable elections, and a mainstream press that is controlled by only a few powerful corporations?
I'm sure it helps her to continue living in denial, to believe the USA is so great and that she really does live in a free country to ignore the real state of the political system here and just blindly criticize other countries. Let's get real: what we have here is not great just because you can cherry pick an example somewhere else that is worse. Why don't all of these folks turn their critical eye inward and think about how we can get our own house in order here before hypocritically condemning other countries for behavior which is not all that far removed from that of our own leaders.
"China is proving that American companies will throw freedom of speech out the window if the price is right."
Please explain how morality trumps profit in the marketplace.
Have you seen Europe lately? England has CCTV's everywhere, France bans head scarves, Germany bans Holocaust denial.
Maybe you have a different definition of Western?
STC,
Before you start making sweeping statements about the rest of the world, I would encourage you to go live in the rest of the world. Do you know anything about European law and the rights Europeans actually have? I suspect you know little or nothing and have spent no more than the occasional vacation outside of the US. Otherwise, you wouldn't be making such stupid and sweeping statements.
As long as ML&J keeps posting here, I'll know that Amerikkka is doing OK on the freedom front.
STC is one of those history-ignorant folks who believes that human rights as we understand them have existed in all cultures from time immemorial, and that America, rather than being the first nation founded upon those principles, is somehow their most egregious violator.
STC, please tell us about the Bills of Rights they have in those other countries and the court cases that have upheld laws based upon them. I'm all ears.
You cannot hope
To bribe or twist,
Thank God! The
British journalist.
But, seeing what
The man will do
Unbribed, there's
No occasion to.
--Humbert Wolfe, "Over the Fire", 1930
China is proving that American companies will throw freedom of speech out the window if the price is right.
Not only that, but there's gambling going on at Ricks.
Couldn't it be that the audience doesn't care?
Guys,
Do me a favor and consider the true human rights achievement of China over the past 30 years. Since Deng Xiaoping's reforms, managed with brutal efficiency by savvy technocrats, the Chinese Communist Party has lifted a billion people out of poverty and want. Tens of millions continue to leave behind lives of soul crushing, desperate penury in the countryside to seek better lives in the fast growing cities (yes, even run-down sweatshops are better). Say what you will about the Chinese Communist Party, they have delivered economic propserity by marrying capitalist principles with the authoritarian structure alive and legitimate in China's historical memory.
China opened itself to the world three decades ago. Compare political and civil freedeom in today's China to those of that earlier era. There's that famous line from Zhou Enlai who, when asked what he thought of the French Revolution, supposedly said, "It's too early to tell." The Beijing Olympics marks a milestone in China's progress towards a rich, free, liberal society. They're moving in the right direction, and the wealth and growing freedom of that mass of humanity is something all liberal humanist westerners should applaud.
In the meanwhile, why don't you guys hyper-ventillate about Singapore's autocratic one-party (one-family) rule (monarchy)?
Rob, Asians tend to look younger than Caucasians, and yet I still find the Chinese gymnasts look pretty young. But that doesn't necessarily mean anything.
Fair enough Aubrey. But those achievements would look at lot better if they would stop crushing Tibet, threatening Taiwan with annihilation, propping up North Korea, and supporting genocide in Darfur.
STC is one of those history-ignorant folks who believes that human rights as we understand them have existed in all cultures from time immemorial, and that America, rather than being the first nation founded upon those principles, is somehow their most egregious violator.
STC, please tell us about the Bills of Rights they have in those other countries and the court cases that have upheld laws based upon them. I'm all ears.
Brooksfoe, the Chinese girls team averages three inches shorter and 30 pounds lighter than the American team. Either a) they're using very young girls b) they've found some secret source of dwarfs without musculoskeletal problems or c) they're doing something very disturbing to those girls' diets. American gymnasts are subjected to already unpleasant dietary extremes to keep their weight down; I can't imagine what the Chinese can be doing.
"Since Deng Xiaoping's reforms, managed with brutal efficiency by savvy technocrats, the Chinese Communist Party has lifted a billion people out of poverty and want."
If we're going to give the CCP credit for lifting so many people out of poverty, we surely need to first recognize who put them there. How much do you know about the Great Leap Forward? In addition to killing between 10 million and 30 million people, it wrecked an already not-that-strong economy. Melting down all the plows to make useless lumps of metal, killing most of the birds, wrecking the harvest and then robbing the peasants of what few bits of food they had in order to fill the warehouses and export grain while people died - are you honestly defending the CCP on the basis that they've done a good job economically?
And what did Deng's 'savvy technocrats' do to make farm output skyrocket? They got out of the way and stopped holding things back. Output increased dramatically because it went back up to only somewhat below where it would have been all along if the CCP hadn't caused so much deliberate and on-going damage.
If someone beats you repeatedly and then finally stops, you feel much better when the attack stops but does that mean that your attacker deserves credit for making you feel good?
The talk on San Diego sports radio (through their business associates) was that NBC was expecting the Chinese to impound/arrest 25% of their people and equipment. While I'm totally sure that's completely false, threats like that would be sure to generate some level of cooperativity. There's a stick along with the carrot.
I hate the PRC gov't just as much as the next guy. But it's worth noting that above a certain level, criticism of either the PRC gov't or Beijing will be seen as rudeness by the Chinese people. When someone invites you over to their house, you don't make cracks about the shades and how they treat their children.
That being said, I'm interested to see if NBC or other American press will have interesting things to say after they leave the country.
When a corporation has paid nearly a billion dollars for broadcast rights, no, the management isn't going to risk losing even a few ad spots to satisfy the professional demands of the news division. There's nothing even particularly wrong about this, as long as the broadcaster is open in acknowledging this fact. Somehow, I think NBC fell short of this standard.
Klug, I'm not completely unsympathetic to that view regarding being rude to the host, but perhaps the better analogy is being invited over to someone's house, with the expectation that you'll increases the desiribility of the host's house by saying nearly solely positive things about it, despite the host keeping the domestic help he has deemed too uppity in a cage in the basement.
I am quite late to this party, but...
I've been reminded often of late of Khrushchev's (?) comment to the effect that when capitalism hangs itself, it would be on a rope sold by a communist.
Don't get me wrong - communism as theorized has been proven unworkable without accompanying totalitarianism, bleg - but I still find the juxtaposition of that prediction with the current state of affairs to be more than a little illuminating.
I've been reminded often of late of Khrushchev's (?) comment to the effect that when capitalism hangs itself, it would be on a rope sold by a communist.
I believe the expression was, capitalists will sell us the rope we use to hang them. Which as it happens, proved to be quite thoroughly false.
"If Bob Costas were forced to sit in front of a picture of Nixon we'd never hear the end of it."
Bingo.
Remember, if it ain't an American "injustice" it ain't worth bitching about.
I'm a bit curious - was there much politics inserted in the coverage of the 1936 Olympics? Was it mostly fluff pieces, or discussions of the actual events?
Were there any "Free Rhineland!" protestors from the US that couldn't gain entry?
Did somebody interview the local Gestapo official about what he thought of that Owens guy's chances? Would it have mattered, in the slightest, whether or not they did?
NBC has mentioned everything you've complained about.
Joey Cheek being denied a visa was brought up during the opening ceremony.
The American flag bearer being one of the Sudanese lost boys was discussed re: the message that sent to China.
Bela Karolyi flipped out multiple times over the Chinese gymnasts being underage.
Bob Costas had a long interview with President Bush that delved rather deeply into the conundrum of whether we should isolate or engage repressive regimes.
Mary Carillo talked to the artist who designed the Olympic mascots about artistic repression during the cultural revolution.
The list, I'm sure, goes on and on, I haven't watched every minute of coverage. But just because they don't bring it up before every commercial break doesn't mean there was been little to no coverage of China's transgressions.
It would be nice if NBC could have a few segments on the political atmosphere in China; at least, some interviews with human rights advocates should have been presented. They could even ask Chinese Party officials to defend their record on world TV. This would be better than showing some sports that no one outside of Scandinavia plays.
However, is NBC guilty of actively suppressing this issue? China is clearly not a free country: the 1st, 4th, 5th, and 6th amendments do not function there. On the other hand, it has changed a great deal from the halcyon days of the collectivizations, the great leap forward and the cultural revolution. Dissidents are often arbitrarily arrested, but they're rarely shot or exiled; religions are restricted, but not stamped out; many people can own the land they're living on, newspapers can carry some stories critical of the government, and it is possible to bring Party officials to court for corruption or incompetence. The international reporting that took place after the earthquake this year was limited; under Mao, it would not have existed at all. The men who run China are gangsters, but they are no longer the mass murderers of the old days.
Given the tectonic shifts that are taking place in China, I think it likely that NBC's coverage is warped more by ignorance than anything else. Even diplomats and experts can't describe what's happening in China with any consistency, and people like Chris Collinsworth, Bob Costas and Andrea Mitchell couldn't do an in-depth analysis of Rhode Island. Nobody's going to come away from watching the Olympics with any idea
of what's going on in China, pro or con; it's a sports event, and people will see it as that. Frankly, I doubt if NBC could do otherwise, given the general level of ignorance prevalent at TV networks nowadays.
Criticizing the Chinese system would be a waste of time.
What would it change? It might gratify foreign (i.e. non-Chinese) viewers. But that's about it.
Yeah, maybe a few minutes of it would be nice. But if you want poorly articulated and petty grievance airing, you can go to the NYTimes editorial board.
What ever gave you the impression that our mass media really cared about any freedoms but their own?
"Dissidents are often arbitrarily arrested, but they're rarely shot or exiled"
True, they're not shot anymore. They used to shoot them in the heads in stadiums, so that people could watch. But as the Chinese government's revenues from selling body parts grew, they realized that they were destroying valuable inventory. Now they use lethal injection in a special van that can be placed outside the appropriate hospital, so that all parts including the corneas and skin can be harvested and sold more efficiently.
They also have just-in-time inventory. The best prices and widest selection are before Chinese New Year (or this year probably before the Olympics opening ceremony; they take a proactive approach to such problems). But for an extra fee, you can have your prisoner killed to order.
It's not only dissidents, of course - they'll sell anyone's body parts. The orphanages have changed over time also, as they realized that instead of letting excess girls starve to death, they could sell them.
The changes in these industries would make a rather unique business school case study, if one could only get the data.