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I'm doing what might be called "boycotting" the Olympics. I'm not watching it, and letting people know why. I've very little idea about who's leading, though I'm sure it will remind us of the USA-USSR showdowns of old, only with a different communist nation of similar moral decrepitude. I do know Finland got a gold medal. Ain't that cute?
I play pool with a Chinese expatriate. He asked me if I was excited about the Olympics. I had to tell him why I was loathing the idea of it being in China. He was singularly unaware of Chinese early modern to modern history, which is, I'm sure, no different than your average American teenager's knowledge of our own country's seedy past.
But there is a difference between the US and China. I know a lot of people may disagree with me on this. They have been raised, as I have been, on the idea of the moral bankruptcy of the Western world, effectively cutting off any ability on our part to criticize evil actions. How, they would ask, can we condemn China when we have done (or are doing) so much worse?
Bull.
The fact that I can sit here and condemn the US for its past and present actions speaks a world of why China is so odious to me. The fact that I can look at our Constitution and see that through the efforts of Antifederalists -- the LOSING side -- a Bill of Rights was added -- and to see that eventually, those Rights became more than scraps of paper. To know that there are groups of lawyers out there whose entire lives are dedicated to defending such rights. To be able to do something about the injustices of my country, and to watch our actions stand condemned by ourselves. To be able to vote jerks out and put lesser jerks into office. To be a jerk in office myself. To practice my religion where I wish, in what manner I desire, which worrying about being taken to an internment camp for daring to pray in my house. To have more than one child without worrying about a forced abortion.
Need I mention Tibet?
I've a knowledge of history. I can catalogue more atrocities in the past of the Western world than I've ever learned about China. The point is, however, that despite Mao's death and the ending of the so-called Cultural Revolution, China is by no stretch of the imagination FREE. They don't even have a dialogue about being free. And frankly, postmodernists, FREE is not entirely in the eye of the beholder. There are plenty of Chinese Christians and Muslims, plenty of people in Tibet, who would be glad to tell you they aren't OK with a communist state of non-democracy. We can debate what it means to have free will all we like, but the point of the matter is that there is no protection for having a contrary opinion in China.
So here I am. Being contrary. Condemning the actions of the Olympic Committee and the free world for attending an event of this magnitude in China. And, in no small measure, nauseated by the number of Westerners who don't care.
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pwwka's journal
curious