OPINION:
I can’t stand China.
It is a despicable dictatorship in every regard and it is certainly our rival, if not our enemy. I have cursed it all of my adult life, and am not about to stop.
But we need to be clear about the Olympics. The Olympics are not about politics, they are not about making a point, they are not about thumbing your nose at a country you do not like. The Olympics are about sports and about laying aside your differences long enough to let some athletes compete.
Calls for boycotts or demonstrations against the looming Beijing Olympics are wrong and should be stopped. They are not honorable.
Again, I do not like China. I think its communist oppression and one-child policy — like the religious and gender discrimination of the Muslim world — is the greatest moral wrong since the Holocaust. I think nowhere in modern history is there a parallel for the current Chinese raiding of the U.S. economy. I think anyone who can’t see China building military might with the sole intention of dominating the United States is purposely blind.
I think the poisoning of Chinese products destined for American markets is the result of a society that lacks the fundamental morality to honorably keep a contract.
I’m not kidding. I don’t like or trust China.
But it is the Olympic host. And it earned that right by competing in a longstanding process with other nations. And all of China’s failings and evils were public and known before it was chosen for the Olympics. It’s not like they were hiding anything.
To now try to embarrass China or exploit the Olympics over pre-existing wrongs is not right.
In recent weeks, there has been unrest in Tibet, a country invaded by China about 50 years ago. Tibetans don’t like being occupied, they don’t like seeing the cultural and linguistic genocide which have been bedrocks of Chinese policy toward Tibet.
All that is understandable. But none of that has anything to do with the Olympics.
Let me repeat something: China has been in Tibet for 50 years. And except for the occasional hippie bumper sticker, not that many people seem to care. If it weren’t for Richard Gere, and the media’s fascination with the Dalai Lama, nobody would know about this.
And arbitrarily bringing it up now, because of the media scrutiny the Olympics bring to China, is exploitative. No nation has in 50 years wanted to come to Tibet’s aid. No grand upset in the United Nations has been recorded. There is not some tidal wave circling the globe of concern for Tibet.
And though the cause of these people may be just, it has nothing to do with the Olympics. Ditto for any one of the myriad other offenses by this ruthless society.
If somebody had a legitimate argument against China hosting the games, the time to raise that was during the selection process. We had the evening news back then, too. The monks and everybody else were just as capable then of making a stink as they are now. But the games were awarded.
And the Olympic games are about more than just putting odd sports no one watches on international TV. Frankly, the best international sporting competition does not take place at the Olympics, except in the most obscure sports.
The Olympics are about more than just sports. They are also about laying aside antagonisms for innocent and friendly competition. They are about relaxing your fist and extending, if only temporarily, the hand of friendship.
The Olympics are specifically for showing the world and its peoples that grudges and hard feelings can be laid aside. It’s the competition with enemies as well as friends that makes the Olympics unique and worthwhile. Certainly, the Olympics have not always been friendly, or even peaceful, but the general principle still stands.
China sought an Olympic games. It received them. Those who participate in the games — be they political leaders or athletes — are duty-bound to honor the spirit and intent of the games. There is an obligation of respect to the games themselves and to the host country.
Rip on China all you want to. Believe me, I do. But when the Opening Ceremonies begin, as the torch is about to be lit, the time of conflict and contention ends, and the time of competition begins. And it stays that way until the flame is extinguished at the end of the Closing Ceremonies.
Those who picket or disrupt the Olympics and their host countries do not stand for principle or wisdom. They just make fools of themselves. Jimmy Carter was wrong to boycott the Moscow Olympics in 1980. And for anyone to call for similar national, athlete or sponsor boycotts of the Beijing Olympics is similarly foolish.
Like I said, I can’t stand China. But this isn’t about China, really. This is about laying aside our hard feelings for a couple of weeks and just playing sports. Anyone who would want to disrupt that is no friend of peace and no friend of principle.
Hopefully the reporters and the actors and the politicians will remember that.
BOB LONSBERRY
Commentator and talk show host. See lonsberry.com.
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