Don't Boycott the Olympics

Calls to boycott the 2022 Olympics in China have been increasing recently.  China's human rights record continues to be deplorable, but I don't think the Olympics are the appropriate place to express our dissatisfaction.  The whole point of the Olympics, it seems to me, is to be a place where countries of the world can come together regardless of political differences.  Even though China's actions toward the Uyghurs are reprehensible, I question whether they are so much beyond the pale that it is worth turning the Olympics political over them.

I say that because I do leave open the possibility that a country could do something so egregious that it would seem to be tacit acceptance to participate in an international event that it hosts.  I would expect most human rights issues to be addressed when deciding on the host country, however.  China's treatment of Uyghurs may have gotten worse recently, but their record has been bad going back at least 30 years and probably as long as the Uyghurs have been part of China.  The time to speak out against China's hosting the Olympics would have been when the IOC awarded the Olympics.  I don't know exactly when that was, but it appears that future host cities have been determined out to 2028, so it was very likely within the last ten years.  I'm pretty sure that China's treatment of Uyghurs has not gotten exponentially worse in the last decade, although I am willing to be proven wrong on that point.

There is also the issue of the athletes who have trained for years who are denied a chance to compete.  This is also a serious concern, and a reason not to boycott lightly, but it is secondary.  If we discovered Auschwitz-style extermination camps where the Chinese were killing massive numbersof Uyghurs, I would consider that sufficient reason to boycott the Olympics, and athletes' plight would not seriously enter into it.  Mass killing is more important than sports.  But to choose an ongoing issue, not raise concerns about it for ten years, and then call for a boycott:  that seems irresponsible on the part of politicians, and something that athletes should not be punished for.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Science and Philosophy, Part I: Hume and Popper

I've been listening to a lecture series on philosophy recently, and, even though I haven't gotten past the Greeks yet, it has reminded me of a number of issues that trouble me about science. I want to take the opportunity to express my concerns here. Along the way, I will probably oversimplify philosophy a great deal -- not on purpose, but rather because I have only a simplistic understanding of it. I welcome responses to clear up my misconceptions. One of my issues with science is the famous idea of Karl Popper that it can never establish positive claims, only falsify wrong ones. The history of this goes back to David Hume, the 18th century Scottish sceptic. He shook up the philosophical world by claiming that science could never prove anything through induction -- that is, drawing conclusions about physical laws based on observations. The classic illustration is the sun's rising. Even though the sun has risen every day for our whole lives, and for countless human l
Read more

Country Music

I noticed a long time ago that there isn't much difference between the sound of country music and rock music nowadays. If I'm surfing my radio and I come to a station playing jazz, classical, or rap, I recognize it right away; but if I come to a country or rock station, I often can't tell which it is until the song is half over. Country songs often have screaming guitars that would fit equally well in a hard rock song, and only a minority have a recognizably country instrument such as a fiddle or a banjo. All the same, no one could listen to a country music station for more than a few minutes without realizing that it is definitely not a rock station. What are the differences? There are some stylistic differences. Country songs are more likely to have a boogey beat or certain western-sounding bass lines. They also tend to be more formulaic: if you can't predict how a country song ends, you probably don't listen to much country music. But those things aren'
Read more

What Are Pronouns For?

 Here's what I don't get about people defining their own pronouns (and I use "their" advisedly):  If I am talking to you, your pronoun is "you."  No one disputes that.  If I am talking about you to another person, the pronoun I use to reference you is none of your business.  I am in a conversation with someone else; you are not a party to it, and you are not entitled to impose rules on it.  Ideally, you will never know what we say -- but if you do find out, it doesn't matter because the pronouns I used were for my convenience, not for your feelings.  Heck, I may not even have met you, may not have any idea what you identify as or even what sex you really are (as sometimes happens when people have names like "Leslie" or "Ashley" that get used for both sexes, or foreign names that I am unfamiliar with).  So mind your business and there will be nothing to get offended about.
Read more