So the Olympics are in full swing now, and it seems like the Chinese government is botching it, in the way that only a nouveau riche totalitarian collectivist government can. The Chinese government knows that the Olympics is their big coming out party, and they want it all to go perfectly and counter the Western criticism they receive. Unfortunately, for them, their tactics seem to just confirm all the criticism.
First, the Chinese government has the torch do a world tour, and there’s protests around the world about human rights and Tibet, and the Chinese seem confused. Maybe they believed the crap that Western corporatists spout about how nothing is appropriate for politics.
In the lead up to the Olympics, the Chinese promised clean air, and open access, and they fell short. It wasn’t surprising. When it came to air quality, they pulled a communist trick and promised much more than could be accomplished, even pulling communist tricks like banning cars and closing factories en masse. If anyone really thought that the Great Firewall would be off, was a fool. They want to look like a modern Western city, so they ban spitting, order menu changes, and round up all the stray cats. It’s like the Chinese government doesn’t realize that performing these actions is what draws the negative publicity, not what they’re arguably correcting.
Now the Olympics have started. It’s the ham-handed attempts we thought were gone with the collapse of the Soviet Union. But as I told people when I got back from China, it’s clear that the old guard still exists. (”1. Maintain the social harmony” as the sign I saw in Beijing read.) Basically, they want everything to go beyond perfect, so they fake fireworks at the opening ceremonies, and fake the singer because the actual singer wasn’t cute enough. What the hell? There was absolutely nothing wrong with ceremony, and then they try to gild the lilly and pull stunts like this, and come off looking like comical insecure control freaks at best, and creepy at worst.
They want to sell out events, and yet there’s empty seats everywhere. Were the tickets not distributed, or were the seats sold to foreigners that couldn’t come? And what’s the Chinese solution? Bus in uniformed trained cheerleaders.
Now it turns out that the Chinese women’s gymnastics team is underaged. (Not that it mattered for the Americans. They choked.)
This is just so bizarre.
