Olympics should be boycotted

This blog should give up its false pretense and just call itself a venue to regurgitate Nicholas Kristof opinions:-) His blog entry today links a bbc article proving the Chinese have been providing military equipment and training to Sudanese forces and groups committing genocide in Darfur.

Does this change any people's opinions on whether a boycott of the Beijing olympics would be justified or not? I constantly hear the argument that it is the spirit of the olympics to put differences aside and unite through sport. The ancient greeks would stop their wars for the games, but I'm not sure that's a legitimate argument. Would anyone argue today that a boycott of the 1936 games in Berlin would have been unjustified? I sincerely doubt it, and I'm not sure why people think what is happening in Sudan is so much less worse than what happened in Europe during World War II. If the olympics were supposed to be in Khartoum there would have been an international backlash years ago, and in my opinion aiding militarily and economically the Sudanese govt. makes China just as guilty. Spirit of the olympics, whatever you want to call it, does not make up for aiding genocide. I just dont' see how people can argue otherwise.

I do get it though, it's economics determining the positions by most governments. If China ever becomes less of an emerging giant, and is generally less important to the world economy than it is today (which is unlikely to happen in my lifetime), all of a sudden world leaders with no connection to today's governments will make statements that it was a mistake to have had the olympics in Beijing. Of course it will be too late, hundreds of thousands more people will probably have died, but the world is exceptionally good at apologizing after the fact for having done nothing and making empty promises to do more in the future.

I guess the real spirit of the olympics is now turning a blind eye to genocide. I'd like world leaders, in person, to explain to victims of the genocide in Darfur how they can justify going to the games. I'm not sure they could do it in person.

First Post

Nicholas Kristof, columnist for the New York Times, wrote an editorial this week that is the perfect way to start this blog. Click here for the article.