BS: Avoiding The Olympics

Subject: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 20 Mar 08 - 10:40 AM

Now some people might think I mean "Blacklist" or "Ban" ...

And it really has little to do with current happenings in Tibet - after all nobody has heard of the area in the North East of China once known as "East Turkistan" (which China annexed after WWII), where much the same has been happening, with the exception that the area is rich is natural resources....

No, I remember the Olympics in Russia. I also remember that Brisbane tried to bid after a successful Expo 88, only to be kneed in the gnoolies by Sydney...

Actually I blame the USA (why not!?) - who lavished heaps of money, turning it into a Circus...

Actually last time I mostly avoided much of it...

Personally I think the rot set in when they allowed 'Professional Sports Players' in...

The whole thing now is mostly a huge Commercial Circus.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Peace
Date: 20 Mar 08 - 10:48 AM

I won't be competing this year so I shan't be there.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Donuel
Date: 20 Mar 08 - 10:50 AM

NBC lost big time when they tried to use pay per view for most of the events.

The typical American coverage shows a background video of the training, the family and the family dog of the athelete in the spotlight. It plays like plastic honey.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: John on the Sunset Coast
Date: 20 Mar 08 - 10:55 AM

The shan't you say!

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Folk Form # 1
Date: 20 Mar 08 - 10:55 AM

I HEARD IT DESCRIBED RECENTLY AS A GLORIFIED SPORTS DAY, WHICH JUST ABOUT SUMS IT UP, AND I HATED SPORTS DAY.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: irishenglish
Date: 20 Mar 08 - 11:00 AM

I used to love the Olympics, but now sadly, with the influx of professional atheletes into the mix, and even the "professional" way almost all of the events are handled makes it unenjoyable. Between the sappy US coverage-focused more on the drama, than the events (why can't we just watch an entire event, maybe something we normally don't get to see on tv?) and the quest for gold by someone who sees it as a moneymaker, rather than a reward for dedication just turns me off.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 20 Mar 08 - 11:08 AM

Hopefully that means I'll be able to catch up on the videos I haven't watched, the CD's I haven't listened to and the tidying I haven't done.

Never been a sports fan... and never been a big fan of China in Tibet either.

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Peace
Date: 20 Mar 08 - 11:11 AM

Shan't.

How are you, John?

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Richard Bridge
Date: 20 Mar 08 - 11:13 AM

I shall not be watching. Shall we lump those who do in with "Nascar Voters"?

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 21 Mar 08 - 07:38 AM

So glad to see I won't be alone then!

How about an online music session? :-)

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: maire-aine
Date: 21 Mar 08 - 09:29 AM

I don't think I'll intentionally watch any of it. Not interested in sports. The way it's presented on TV, you'd think USA was the only team competing.

M

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Rapparee
Date: 21 Mar 08 - 09:50 AM

They show little or nothing of the sports I am interested in: fencing, shooting, modern pentathalon, archery and so on. Why should I bother?

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Rapparee
Date: 21 Mar 08 - 09:51 AM

And while we're talking about the decline of the Olympics, please don't forget that the Soviet Union fielded what were in essence professionals, only they were disguised as "Army officers" and others.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: bankley
Date: 21 Mar 08 - 10:23 AM

and don't be fooled by those fancy Reboks that China wears for the Games... there's Jack-boots underneath.






aum mani padme hum

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Michael
Date: 21 Mar 08 - 10:42 AM

Sorry,did someone mention Olympics? they only happen every 4 years so we aren't due for any for a while yet.

Mike

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: GUEST,saulgoldie
Date: 21 Mar 08 - 10:44 AM

I don't think I'll be watching much, either. Good reasons given here.

But hey, what does this mean: aum mani padme hum? I have heard it before. Either from "Hair: the Musical" or from Firesign Theater. Whatsit mean? Thanks.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: GUEST,saulgoldie
Date: 21 Mar 08 - 10:46 AM

Nevermind. A quick Google search turned up the answer. Thanks anyway.

Saul

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: fat B****rd
Date: 21 Mar 08 - 11:31 AM

What's wrong with The Olympics? I thought "Western Movies" was a    great record.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: redsnapper
Date: 21 Mar 08 - 11:43 AM

No I shall be playing music instead. Like Rapaire, the things I have done (e.g. fencing) and do now (archery) are almost neglected. Recent Chinese activities in Tibet have made me even less inclined to watch.

Hi Saul! You got the answer? Hope it was a good one! Aum mani padme hum is generally considered to have a very broad meaning indeed as each of the syllables has a broad meaning of its own.

All the best,

RS

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 21 Mar 08 - 11:54 AM

The Olympics have been nothing since Steve Ovett & Seb Coe!!

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Bert
Date: 21 Mar 08 - 11:55 AM

The only sport is "Who dares to take the most drugs?"

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Becca72
Date: 21 Mar 08 - 12:37 PM

I've made it 36 years without ever watching the Olympics...why change that now?

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: WFDU - Ron Olesko
Date: 21 Mar 08 - 02:49 PM

"Actually I blame the USA (why not!?) - who lavished heaps of money, turning it into a Circus..."

Yeah, the USA fucked up the Olympics. I guess that is what happens when you offer money to the European whores that run the event. It seems like on that side of the pond that folks are willing to grab their ankles and bend over at the promise of a few Euros.

Short term memories. Look at the lavish spreads that have been put on for decades.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Rapparee
Date: 21 Mar 08 - 03:51 PM

Yeah, the Olympics haven't been the same since Homer & Jethro.

I'd like to see some new sports, too. Like javelin catching and tenniskeet and skate fencing.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: open mike
Date: 21 Mar 08 - 04:23 PM

the sanskrit heart mantra "The All is a precious jewel in the lotus flower which blooms in my heart".
hear it here: http://www.iloveulove.com/spirituality/hindu/omaum.htm

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: SINSULL
Date: 21 Mar 08 - 04:35 PM

The Olympics rate along with football, basketball, and hockey in my world. Giant YAAAWWNNNN. Sorry - I know young people break their hearts trying to get there but I still can't care about it.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: WFDU - Ron Olesko
Date: 21 Mar 08 - 04:39 PM

"The Olympics rate along with football, basketball, and hockey in my world. Giant YAAAWWNNNN. "

Sort of the effect that shanty singing has on others.

Comeon, everyone has their own likes and dislikes. I'm not a big fan of the Olympics either, but what sort of jollies do people get from knocking what gives others pleasure? Around Mudcat, that seems to be a huge pastime.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: WFDU - Ron Olesko
Date: 21 Mar 08 - 04:58 PM

I'm sorry... my last post was probably harsher than it should have been, and I certainly did not mean to knock Sinsull or shanty singing, which I love.   

My problem is the negativity that seems to still rise here on Mudcat. Even the title of this thread smacks of a smarmyness that just doesn't help anything. I loath the fact that everything seems to be blamed on the U.S. and there is an air of superiority that comes across - as if our friends overseas were never guilty of crass commercialism.   I hate the fingerpointing at the expense of others.

Sinsull's comments, which I am sure were meant innocently, struck a nerve because out of all those atheletes from around the world - there are many hard working "kids" who work very hard to reach their goal. There always seems to be a snobbery about atheletes, and perhaps it is because of all the high profile clowns who tarnish the image, but at the heart of it - the Olympics is still about the kid down the street who excels at something and works hard to be a success.

Again, my apologies for my own addition to the bile that get spewed around around here. It did not help.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Rapparee
Date: 21 Mar 08 - 05:36 PM

There are also the "nearlys" -- those who try and try but never get quite good enough.

But at least they try. It's those who sit on their duff and complain and who have always done so that annoy me.

And let's face it: the networks only broadcast what they feel to be the most politically and economically astute sports. How many people actually ride? Or shoot skeet? Or fence? And let's face it: some sports, such as shooting targets, are simply boring to watch -- someone standing up shooting holes in paper with a VERY expensive .22 rifle hardly has the action appeal of, say, a gymnast, even if it does take the same amount of training and ability.

Also, shooting, archery, fencing, wrestling, tae kwan do, judo, boxing and similar sports are considered by many to be "politically incorrect" because of violence. Never mind that discus, shotput, javelin, and even marathon are just as violent in their ancestry.

But it doesn't matter -- it's unlikely I'll be watching. I'm more likely to be out and doing.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: WFDU - Ron Olesko
Date: 21 Mar 08 - 06:49 PM

Good job Rapaire! Nothing better than going out and doing it for yourself.

Your note reminded me, the Olympics makes all sports available - and not everyone is seeing the same show as we get in the U.S., and I am sure the Brits are seeing something different as well. Each country can bid on the rights to the sports they wish to show, and would be of interest to their own citizens.

It should also be noted that revenues from broadcasting, while I am sure is lining a few pockets, is also going to enable amateur sport around the globe.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 22 Mar 08 - 12:25 AM

But since the Chinese have suggested that they may prohibit live broadcasts of "some events" the political implications should drive us all to watch just to see if they do it.

The headlines, of course, imply that it's an oppressive political decision probably related to the Tibet situation and with moral implications related to the "one child per family" policy, etc. ... etc. ...

Maybe if I get really bored, I'll read one of the articles and see if that's what the Chinese said (if they said anything).


But later.



Maybe much later.


John

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Jeanie
Date: 22 Mar 08 - 05:08 AM

For those of us in the UK, it's going to be harder than this time around to avoid the Olympics in 2012. I must admit, it is not something I am looking forward to, and my heart sank when London won the bid instead of Paris.

*However*, people are already planning some alternative/parallel British events for 2012. This one is already getting under way. How about nationwide "British Tradition in Music, Dance and Song" events for 2012, on the lines that the Shakespeare people are planning ?

- jeanie

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: catspaw49
Date: 22 Mar 08 - 06:10 AM

I'm just an ignorant shitkicker myself so although I hate much of what has happened to the Olympics I still tune in sometimes to both the winter and summer games.

There's never enough coverage of sailing or the other less popular sports as some of you have mentioned. And I figure that "Wide World of Sports" changed the way sports was covered over 40 years back and the very thing that made it work, the sappy personal stories, still drives the dollars today. I guess a few folks like that stuff. Its sorta' like running long threads on Curling and Cricket and Football and Hockey and ............oops, sorry, that never happens does it?

That's the problem with me though 'cause I'm a NASCAR voter........NASCAR is all caps btw. I actually prefer dirt track racing with Sprint Cars and Midgets which is really pathetic huh? Yeah...Sucks to be me..........Jackie Stewart liked it too though. He was taken to his first dirt Sprinter race in Indiana one year and all the racers in the pits were excited to meet him. After watching several heats he went through the pits shaking hands. Someone offered him their car to run in a heat but Jackie said, "Thank you but nooo....I left me helmet in Indianapolis." Someone offered a helmet and the wonderfully quick witted Scot answered, "Nooo, I left me balls there too."

Gotta' go now as another daily early AM NASCAR show is on The Speed Channel.

Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: GUEST,Shimrod
Date: 22 Mar 08 - 06:20 AM

What I call "the chucking stuff (javelins, discuses etc.) events" are mildly diverting, for about 5 minutes, if there really is nothing else on the telly ... and I'm really, really bored. But most of the TV coverage seems to be the running round a track stuff. Now that is REALLY boring:

A few thin, wiry people hop around for ages (in fact whole geological epochs often go by while they do this). Then they they slowly, slowly get into blocks and assume uncomfortable positions with their bony bottoms in the air. Then some bloke fires a starting pistol and they all start running. Then a mis-start is declared and they go back to hopping about some more whilst adjusting their shorts over their bony bottoms ... and on and on and on. Eventually, days or weeks later the race starts and someone from Ethiopia wins.

Why is this interesting?

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: catspaw49
Date: 22 Mar 08 - 06:35 AM

Some fat fuck stands on stage in front of an orchestra screaming out words in a foreign language for seemingly an hour and then does it again and again til the program ends.

Why is this interesting?




Spaw

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Bob the Postman
Date: 22 Mar 08 - 09:38 AM

As someone whose tax dollars will be helping to pay for the next winter olympics I say to hell with the olympics, they globalise elite athletics, enclosing the commons of individual achievement so that media herds can be fattened for market. Whatever the olympics used to be, now they're just something on TV. Every sport has its own world championships, that oughta do. No need for a warehouseful of fresh pork barrels every two years, there's venues aplenty already. As to whether the Americans or the Europeans are more responsible for debasing the olympic ideal, the real guilty party is us, the folks who watch it on TV. Avoid.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: The Walrus
Date: 22 Mar 08 - 12:26 PM

I am arthritic, I detest televised sport, I have no interest in the olympics at all, I live in South West London, so will get no advantage from 2012 (not even the much promised 'improved infrastructure'), the only sport I am interested in will receive no advantage from the games, and I didn't want the bloody thing here in the first place.
How do I avoid paying for the Olympics?

crabbily

Walrus

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: GUEST,Shimrod
Date: 22 Mar 08 - 12:31 PM

"Some fat fuck stands on stage in front of an orchestra screaming out words in a foreign language for seemingly an hour and then does it again and again til the program ends."

As it happens I don't find opera very entertaining either. But at least there's something happening for most of the time!

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: catspaw49
Date: 22 Mar 08 - 01:03 PM

LOL......What would that be? Being aggressively annoying perhaps?

I understand your point of course, but understand mine as well. Everything is boring as hell to someone.......including shanty singing, folk in general, Morris dancing, and researching the 4th word in the 17th line of the 92nd verse of "Lord Randall" or something approximating that title.................

Spaw---NASCAR Voter

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: WFDU - Ron Olesko
Date: 22 Mar 08 - 01:47 PM

Right on Spaw!!!   

I felt bad after I postged my remarks, but reading some of the new posts, it seems the ignorance continues. It is a lack of tolerance and poor education that contributes to their isolated view of the world.

Bob the Postman makes some good points, and I respect anyone who will boycott the games for political reasons. I also respect anyone who doesn't care for the sport - I've watched and felt bored by exhibitions of rugby and cricket. Yet, I am not going to demean those who excell in those sports, nor try to make someone who enjoys watching those sports feel bad.   

There is an insane notion among our Brit friends that they need to demean the sports that they cannot excel in - and it comes across as a defense against a lack of skills and a poor eduction. What would possess someone to contribute negative comments that serve little purpose?   Does it make you feel better about yourself?   Maybe it is a cultural thing. The empire has been lost and clinging to a feeling of superiority might be the only joy left in their lives.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Ebbie
Date: 22 Mar 08 - 05:50 PM

I am in Spaw's corner. When I get the chance I watch the Olympics. I only wish they showed entire events and more of them. I have only basic cable and it tends to air only snippets of selected contests and participants.

The reason(s) I watch when I can is the afore-mentioned knowledge that these people have worked hard for years to get there. Honest effort and persistence is not to be sneezed at by the likes of me.

As for China this summer-

*I can't imagine how they are going to pull it off, what with the air pollution. I'm afraid that many wins will be compromised by reactions to the particulates and allergens.

* Secondly, I truly do think they should cancel the games this summer if China persists in its efforts to suppress Tibet's protest.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: JohnInKansas
Date: 22 Mar 08 - 09:41 PM

At least one world-class distance runner has already announced his intention to skip this one, based on his belief that the polution levels could permanently damage him.

Most teams are arranging practice sessions considerably removed from the "performance areas" to avoid as much of the polution as possible.

And the latest threat to unhindered performance is the announced concern that virtually all toilets that will be accessible in the area are "squat toilets." Arrangements are being made to provide "more conventional facilities" for VIPs (the Olympic Committee of course) and to some athletes, but for the rest ...

Without cable, in the US about the only athletic event I get on TV is "high stakes poker."¹ Even a good golf match has more action ...

¹ Unless one counts screaming preachers as "athletic." Some of them do appear to get more exercise than the wall-to-wall "infomercials" on "ab-builders" and weight reducing exercise machines.

John

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Barry Finn
Date: 22 Mar 08 - 11:49 PM

I haven't the slightest interest in watching any sports, the Olympics, any of the college or pro sports games on TV, nor world challange of poker, etc. I do mind that they take up space on the airwaves, newspaper type space, the events cause traffic tie-ups, smog & useless noise. I also mind that it's pitched to kids as a way towards a better life & that the development of the body is Spartan & prosperous economically & far above the development of the mind & intellect. When I see that structures are build for kids that compete in Science Fairs & centers of learning cease building state of the art gyms while completely neglecting Writing Halls & Art Centers & coaches & teachers & schools train/teach kids to actually suceed in the ways of the world that would make them productive as well as happy & focus more on world citizenship than whose car is faster & whose jumps higher.
I've always loved any water sport & when in better shape & when younger I would sail, scuba, water ski, para-sail, snorkle, I also love martial ARTS & enjoy watcking good practioners but the body is only at it's prime for a short time & few ever are able to make mega bucks at it. Well the mind lasts a lot longer & there's more potential for making money & being happy with the development of knowledge than for the body. All the very poor inner city kids & the backwood yokels that see basketball or any other sport as a way out of poverty get sick to death when the find that the pill they've been sold is nothing more than a bitter dream that they've swallowed & it's to late for them to focus on the development or their best asset, the brain.
When society gives the brain as much limelight as it gives the sports body then I won't care a hoot about which one causes a traffic jam or who gets a broken leg.

Barry

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Ebbie
Date: 23 Mar 08 - 03:02 AM

Barry, in my opinion it is not an either/or proposition. Music and writing and teaching the art of thinking will always remain important but an active, healthy body is also important. As for your hypothetical kid who learns "too late" that focusing on reaching a professional level in his or her chosen sport- I don't think it is ever too late.

I think it's a matter of interests- you gravitated to activities of the sea. Wonderful. But another person may love anything to do with cars (even NASCAR!) and another person may love everything to do with horses or perhaps fishing in the solitude of wild places.

In the best of all worlds we would have a balance in all things at the same time as we enabled and encouraged each person to pursue their own dreams.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 23 Mar 08 - 03:14 AM

"As someone whose tax dollars will be helping to pay for the next winter olympics"

Bob the Postman - WILL be helping? Matey, we've been paying for the 2012's ever since it was announced we'd be getting them, nearly 3 years ago.

So far, all we've seen is an increase in migrant workers - despite the promise that a vast percentage of the work would go to local firms. We've seen an increase in traffic - despite promises that this would not be the case. We've had an increase in air pollution - especially after the major fire there last summer, where the sun was blotted out by a huge pall of smoke, hundreds of people were evacuated and thousands more with chest problems told to stay indoors with the windows shut, on one of the hottest days of the year. We've had one delay after another, the bill has already doubled and it's our council tax that's being diverted to pay for it.

I live only a few miles away from what will be the 2012 Olypmic Park... I have no chance of avoiding the Olympics in life - the wretched torch arrives next Sunday - but at least I can turn the television to a different station, or off altogether and go read a book.

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 23 Mar 08 - 03:49 AM

"There is an insane notion among our Brit friends that they need to demean the sports that they cannot excel in - and it comes across as a defense against a lack of skills and a poor eduction."

I'm British, well-educated, an accountant, musician, ex-amateur footballer, ex-squash player, ex-competitive rower (all ex- due to age and health problems) and I love sports - ESPECIALLY the ones we cannot excel in at the moment, like Rugby, Football (the real version played mostly with the feet), Cricket and Athletics. Hell, I even watch American Football and Baseball during the night when its on Sky and sleep evades me! :-)

And I love the Olympics, no matter what the event, I'm glued to the Telly. Shame the next lot will take place overnight for us here, so I won't see it live, just the recorded highlights. But I'm due to retire in April, 2012, just in time for the London Olympics - what a great Summer that will be - Olympics and Cricket dawn-to-dusk! BRING IT ON! :-) :-)

The only so-called 'sport' I detest is Darts - fat drunks playing pub games. No more a sport than crochet or quilting. Including Darts in sports programs is an insult to real sportsmen and women.

BTW, why do Americans think we have no skills and no education? Many of us have those in abundance, and we also have grace, charm and a sense of humour. And we can spel. LOL.

IMHO, of course. :-)

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: gnu
Date: 23 Mar 08 - 05:14 AM

Backwoodsman "... Darts - fat drunks playing pub games. No more a sport than crochet or quilting. Including Darts in sports programs is an insult to real sportsmen and women."

What??!! Hey buddy, you try hittin them thar little spaces and counting backwards in various multiples after a dozen pints. That takes keen physical coodination and accoutantability!

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Sandy Mc Lean
Date: 23 Mar 08 - 07:49 AM

Well the recent history of the Olympics is one of bribes, drugs, cheating and $$$$ it is probably a better way for nations to compete than total war. China hopes to gain stature by hosting them this year and they seem willing to trample their citizens to make it happen. I think that to pander to China is a huge mistake and the world could use the games to send them a message. Send the athletes but no politicians or dignitaries and no TV dollars.
However Bush says that he won't miss it. With luck Harper's rule will end before then. The Dali Lama holds honourary Canadian citizenship so perhaps we could send him to represent our government.
In the early Olympics the athletes were naked. That might make it a bit more interesting for some.
   Remember Tiananmen Square !

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: GUEST,Shimrod
Date: 23 Mar 08 - 07:52 AM

"What would that be? Being aggressively annoying perhaps?"

Catspaw49,

I've never heard opera described as, "aggressively annoying" before. It can be annoying ... but aggressively so(?)

Oh, I see, you think I'M agressively annoying (or am I being paranoid?)! Well, I suppose I can be ... but there's no law against it. Do you find it annoying that my opinions are often different from yours and that I often express them forcefully?

As for your other remarks, concerning "folk in general" - do you find it boring? Just wondering ...

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 23 Mar 08 - 10:42 AM

"What??!! Hey buddy, you try hittin them thar little spaces and counting backwards in various multiples after a dozen pints. That takes keen physical coodination and accoutantability!"

LOL Gnu! You got me there mate! I can't even count backwards sober :-) :-)

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 23 Mar 08 - 10:48 AM

Well that proved interesting....

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: skarpi
Date: 23 Mar 08 - 12:01 PM

never mix politics with sports , dont belong together .

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Ebbie
Date: 23 Mar 08 - 07:52 PM

Joel Connelly, New York Times Service columnist, has an article here about the Olympics.

Among other things he reports that Steven Spielberg cancelled his commitment to help stage opening and closing ceremonies in Beijing.

He also says that the British Olympic Association had planned to require that "British athletes sign a gag order prohibiting them from criticizing China's human rights record" during the games.

I don't know if the BOA followed through.

I didn't know - or had forgotten - that Jesse Owen and Ralph Metcalfe, both Black, were inserted into the 1936 Olympics competition in Nazi Germany to replace Marty Glickman and Sam Stoller, both Jews and evidently considered by the US to be too incendiary.

Hurray for Jesse Owen! Hitler got a real pie in the face that time.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 24 Mar 08 - 03:01 AM

Unfotunately, Ebbie, pies in the face don't stop bastards like Ay-dolf and inscrutable Chinese political leaders.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: folk1e
Date: 24 Mar 08 - 06:18 AM

"never mix politics with sports , don't belong together ." .... Skarpi

Hey you could be on to something here!
How about having a combined games section?
Party Official Arrow Catching Event! Javelin Dodging Event! Discus Ducking?
With all the pollution it could be realy interesting!

On a serious note (honest)
The take up of my own favourite sport, ARCHERY went up dramatically due to the last olympics. The archery (all 10 minuits at 03.35) was a joy to watch, even if the camera shots were controlled by someone who clearly had no idea of what archey is!

I will not be watching too much of the games, but then again I will not be watching NASCAR eather, or OPERA, or .....
but I am sure someone will, and I wish them well!

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 24 Mar 08 - 07:21 AM

Actually, last time we had quite a lot of footage of the clay pigeon shooting - but then we had both male and female high ranked athletes.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Joe_F
Date: 24 Mar 08 - 08:54 PM

"Nearly all the sports practised nowadays are competitive. You play to win, and the game has little meaning unless you do your utmost to win. On the village green, where you pick up sides and no feeling of local patriotism is involved, it is possible to play simply for the fun and exercise: but as soon as the question of prestige arises, as soon as you feel that you and some large unit will be disgraced if you lose, the most savage combative instincts are aroused. Anyone who has played even in a school football match knows this. At the international level sport is frankly mimic warfare. But the significant thing is not the behaviour of the players but the attitude of the spectators: and, behind the spectators, of the nations who work themselves into furies these absurd contests....

. . .

"Organized games are more likely to flourish in urban communities where the average human being lives a sedentary or at least a confined life.... In a rustic community a boy or young man works off a good deal of his surplus energy by walking, swimming, snowballing, climbing trees, riding horses, and by various sports involving cruelty to animals.... In a big town one must indulge in group activities.... Games are taken seriously in London and New York, and they were taken seriously in Rome and Byzantium: in the Middle Ages they were played, and probably played with much physical brutality, but they were not mixed up with politics nor a cause of group hatreds.
If you wanted to add to the vast fund of ill-will existing in the world at this moment, you could hardly do it better than by a series of football matches between Jews and Arabs, Germans and Czechs, Indians and British, Russians and Poles, and Italians and Jugoslavs, each match to be watched by a mixed audience of 100,000 spectators....

-- George Orwell, "The Sporting Spirit" (December 1945)

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 06 Apr 08 - 05:26 PM

So they want to gag the competitors? They'd better start gagging the spectators if today's procession of the torch through London was anything to go by? The Torch travels through London...

Personally, I'd like to find the guy with the fire extinguisher and buy him a pint... and my reason for doing so would have nothing to do with my opinions of Chinese politics.

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Nick E
Date: 06 Apr 08 - 07:35 PM

First I will comment on the "Professionals" being part of the games. It was just a way to level the playing field so to speak, as there were any number of "Army Personnel" from countries that did very little soldiering, and a lot of Hockey, volleyball, whatever. The fact is they were professional athletes. I am all for seeing the best compete.

And as for most of the rest of the comments, what a bunch of joyless curmudgeons! Don't watch people trying to be the best at something, trying to represent their country, stay in your funk, getting gray and growing crustier at each and every ominous tick of the clock while you add up the imaginary cost of people having fun.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: McGrath of Harlow
Date: 06 Apr 08 - 07:45 PM

"...people having fun" - that's the last thing the Olympics today seem to be about

Now a "Fun Olympics", that might be worth something.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 07 Apr 08 - 03:30 AM

It's certainly no fun for us who live in the Stadium zone, who are already paying for the damned games in more ways than monetary ones, and I can sure as sh*t tell you the council tax won't go down when it's over... especially as the construction is already way past its budget. It affects the council tax of everyone within the M25, so I'm not the only one.

Oh, and now there's the security bill for protecting that wretched torch that must never be allowed to go out.


If you want to have fun watching them, then have your fun, I shall be having my fun with creative crafts and my extensive DVD collection.

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Backwoodsman
Date: 07 Apr 08 - 10:27 AM

"I shall be having my fun with creative crafts and my extensive DVD collection"

Ooooh Liz, you just made an old man come over all unnecessary! LOL!

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Ernest
Date: 07 Apr 08 - 01:33 PM

I generally avoid the Olympics - as I do with sports in general.

And now this is p.c. too...

LOL
Ernest

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Mr Red
Date: 08 Apr 08 - 02:32 AM

Well I may be at festivals, dancing - the ones with decent dancing that is. Or at a ceilidh or happy-tapping but I doubt I will be watching much of the Olympic drugfest.

Mind you I do want to know what the world champion at the diving will achieve. Not only is Tom Daley British (and English I think) but Gordon only Bennett mate - he is only 13! No side on him either.

And If Miss Breeze is competing in the weight lifting maybe that too. She would make an excellent commentator too.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 08 Apr 08 - 07:42 AM

Found a brillant newspaper cartoon - a while ago - which showed the torch trunner in the middle of a circle of armed guards beating back a huge faceless angry mob... prophetic, wasn't it?

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: GUEST,LTS pretending to work
Date: 09 Apr 08 - 06:52 AM

Backwoodsman - I think I need to rephrase that but I'm not entirely sure how...

Latest news today - the 2012 Olympic park is going to cost more than twice the original estimate - the Water Stadium alone has quadrupled in cost...

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: kendall
Date: 09 Apr 08 - 07:53 AM

I have no strong feelings one way or the other about sports, except when they show some silly ball kicking thing instead of Law & Order reruns.
When I was a boy I loved to play baseball. I outgrew it.
I also was a fight fan. Did some boxing myself, but the day I hurt a guy real bad, I outgrew that too.

My two brothers will sit and watch a gang of Bubbas going round and round all Sunday afternoon. I just don't get it.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 09 Apr 08 - 08:43 AM

Aussies to turn backs on torch

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Don(Wyziwyg)T
Date: 09 Apr 08 - 05:20 PM

Horses for courses folks.

People who hate sports can raise enough energy and co-ordination to find and use the TV "OFF" switch.

Everybody has his/her likes and dislikes, and I can't see why we find it so hard to be nice to people who don't share our particular preferences.

I will watch as much of the Olympics as arouses my interest, and ignore the rest, and I would expect everyone else to do the same.

I will not decry the morals or sanity of those who do not share my interests, and I hope they will afford me the same respect.

I WILL moan about having to pay for 2012, as I think that the corporations who stand to make a fortune should foot the bill, and if they cock it up, with overspends and oversights, I should not be asked to help make good their losses.

The one serious comment I would want to air is this.

I believe I have the answer to the human rights protest, and it's really very simple. All participants from beyond the Chinese border to ignore the opening ceremony, and turn up for the start of competition.

The Chinese government couldn't hide THAT from the population.

Don T.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 10 Apr 08 - 01:55 PM

Then they'll probably slip in a rule that states no team is allowed to compete unless they participate in the opening and closing ceremonies which are there to promote peace and harmony (and sell Coke/Budweiser/Depends). Bit like not being able to drive a fork lift unless you've read the safety manual.

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: fat B****rd
Date: 10 Apr 08 - 03:37 PM

If Beijing is seven hours ahead of us does that mean that all you lot reading, dying handycrafts and loathing the Olymlics will be doing all those things overnight?
For some strange reason I used to be wary of putting my real feelings in these threads. Then I thoiught Fuck it. I like to watch female athletes in little shorts, so there.
AS it happens I think the 2012 Olymics in London, or proposed for London, will be a shambles, costing a fortune and if it does start on time it'll be only just.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: PoppaGator
Date: 10 Apr 08 - 05:43 PM

I like sports ~ yes, even spectator sports, especially as I grow too old to participate as I used to ~ and I usually enjoy most of the Olympics.

The customary approach to network TV coverage of the Games in the US is not completely to my taste. I'll watch, because bad coverage is better than none at all, but that doesn't mean I have to like it.

The network "suits" seem to think that their broadcasts need to appeal to a "general public" that is not particularly interested in or knowledgable about sports, so they invest hours in maudlin "human interest" pap when they could be showing us actual Olympic competition.

They also seem to think their viewers are xynophobic superpatriots who have no interest in witnessing great athletic feats by human beings from around the world, but are interested ONLY in watching Americans win. This precludes not only coverage of great international competitors, it also rules out showing us sports that the US is not expected to win ~ even when there are American participants falling short of medal-winning status but putting on a decent show nevertheless.

And to those of you who bemoan the advent of "professionalism" ~ Puh-leeeeeeze!

The nineteenth-century European cult of "amateurism," within which the modern Olympic movement developed, was the private reserve of the idle rich. Young adults able to live off the interest earned by their family fortunes needed something to do with their time, since they fancied themselves above actually working for a living, and so they developed amateur athletics.

Much of the early distaste for professional athletes stemmed from the fact that young athletes who could compete in sports ONLY if they were able to earn a living thereby were ipso facto members of the despised lower class, and often of the "wrong" ethnicities.

I would think that that competitors whose livelihood depends upon their competitive and athletic skills are those most likely to give us a good show: not only great physical skills, but also superior gamesmanship and a "never say die" approach that is always admirable and often provides high drama. But not to the 1890s aristocrats who founded the Olympics based upon their cult of amateurism, which really meant "only for true gentlemen, like us."

Since at least a half-century ago, the idea of amateurism in world-class internation sport has been a joke, anyway. In some sports ~ skiing is the best example ~ there were no skilled competitors who were not professionals, and so the rules were bent further for some events than for others. And also, of course, as several folks have mentioned, many nations groomed and trained full-time athletes for international competition by signing them up for the military assigned to positions that they never truly filled as they trained and practiced and competed in their respective sports on a full-time basis.

I'm glad that the obsolete, hypocritical, and completely inconsitent requirement for amateurism has finally found its way into the dustbin of history. At the Olympics, I want to see the best competing against the best, and in most sports, that means pros.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 11 Apr 08 - 12:40 AM

The best meet at the Olympics. Like Poppagator, I was glad to see the end of the amateurism nonsense.

I suppose that I am a minority of one here, but I wish the Chinese the very best with the Games.
For millenia, China has been governed from the top down (imperial or communist, it's all the same), but with the rise of a middle class dependent on developing globalization (like the rest of us), change is taking place.
They have become a major player in the world. It may take a generation or so before the Uigars, Tibetans, etc. become a proper part of the development in China, and the, as a whole, conservative Chinese learn how to ignore or deal with cuckoo cults.

It was only a hundred-two hundred years ago that Britain et al. were showing how to boss wogs and blacks and how to plunder the Chinese, the U. S. built a fortune on slaves and later took over the Philippines and parts of Colombia, etc. etc. and it was manifest destiny that American Indians were herded into hardscrabble reservations and Mexico was torn apart. The U. S. is now trying to dominate the Middle East but is doing a poor job of it- perhaps a last gasp of their imperial days.

I believe that the Chinese will move much faster towards what we call democracy, the rights of man, or whatever, than we did.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 11 Apr 08 - 01:25 AM

It never will as long as they restrict families and encourage the abandonment or termination of female babies.

A good friend of mine was teaching in China when the riots started in the 1980's. All non-Chinese inhabitants were forcibly expelled from the country. He vanished. Enquiries to the Chinese Embassy in Britain were ignored or else they said they'd never heard of him and several others. Enquiries to the British Embassy in China received a similar answer, no one knew what had really happened to him. Everyone, including his parents thought he was interred, or worse, dead.

He was lucky. He and his girlfriend were actually on holiday 'up country' when the rioting started and they managed to get out of the country on foot.

On their 4 month journey through China, where they were helped and supported by the general populace, they saw first hand the life of the average Chinese country person, and it is not good. Later, when they married and decided to adopt children, they chose to adopt a Chinese baby. On their journey through China, they'd spent a couple of nights hiding in an orphanage and worked out that over 2/3rds of the children there were girls, and most of them had been abandoned shortly after birth.

Incidentally, also on their journey out, they passed one of the remote internment camps and were able to confirm that there were Europeans being held there, for no reason other than they didn't leave China quickly enough.

This was only about 20 years ago... China has a very long way to go before they're anywhere near the democratic state we would all wish for.

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 11 Apr 08 - 12:12 PM

China should be congratulated on their attempt to control population. The one child policy has, of course, raised problems, but estimates by the family planning minister are that 400 million births have been prevented, and that the population will peak at 1.6 billion before stabilizing. We consider the policy draconian, but it was necessary.
The policy is enforced most strongly in urban areas; two children are permitted in many rural areas, but with added tax in some, and allowance for two children in ethnic groups with small birth rates.

According to Minister Zhang, the policy will be adjusted in ten years; the percentage of older people will become a pressure on the system, and the problems of growth and globalism will require adjustments to meet needs. As more and more people adjust to 'middle class' lives, they will practice their own controls and less state intervention is necessary.

Our population in Europe and North America has stabilized as people have realized that birth control is necessary in our social system.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: GUEST,dianavan
Date: 11 Apr 08 - 01:43 PM

I like sports but I am not an armchair athlete except when it comes to figure skating. As a resident of Vancouver who will be hosting the 2010 Olympics, I can tell you that my property taxes have sky rocketed, construction is booming and many people have been displaced. There is a critical shortage of rental accomodations and the condos that are being built are way out of the price range for most folks. The city is becoming home for the elite only.

Now the mayor says he wants the city to be open 24/7 so that it will be one continuous party during the Olympics. I'm selling my house and moving. I do not want to be here for the Olympics.

As to China - Their human rights record is deplorable. Read about the number of people in China who have been displaced (with little or no help from the govt.) by the Three Gorges Dam. The Chinese govt. treats those poor farmers like disposable human beings. People have no worth in China.

If anything, lets hope the Tibet/Olympics controversy, forces China to the table with Tibet. Its time for China to wake up and realize that human beings have rights. If China wants respect, the brutality must stop.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 11 Apr 08 - 06:37 PM

It's one thing to make birth control a conscious and self realised decision, it's completely different to be told by the State that you may only have one child.

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Q (Frank Staplin)
Date: 11 Apr 08 - 07:28 PM

Countries like China (and India), must control their populations; it does demand government direction, implementation and management. The alternative is frightening.

Projects like the Three Gorges Dam (The Yangtze Project) for the development of hydroelectric power is necessary if China is to become a great power. The system of locks will permit access of large vessels to central China, as well as control the water flow. People will be displaced, natural vistas changed, but outside of massive nuclear development, there is no alternative. Feasibility studies go back to 1919, and the development was not unexpected or precipitate. Approximately 400 sq. mi. will be flooded, and 1.2 million people displaced. China burns 50 million tons of coal a year, and the amount must be reduced.
New farms for 300,000 farmers are planned, and many rural workers will be displaced to urban jobs. Planning is complex, and will not be without problems.

The U. S. made its major strides in developing hydroelectric power and stream control in the first half of the 20th c.; people seem to forget the disruptions caused by the Tennessee Valley Administration and similar projects. Now one of the limits to U. S. growth is the lack of capacity for energy growth; stagnation is looming.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Sandy Mc Lean
Date: 11 Apr 08 - 11:26 PM

Birth control has a terrible down side in China. Sons are more desired than daughters so girls are much more likely to be abandoned at birth or aborted before. If only one child is allowed they want it to be male. As the father of three loving daughters I find this to be an obsenity.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: GUEST,dianavan
Date: 12 Apr 08 - 01:18 AM

Yes, Q, the sacrifice of a few for the many plays well in China.

1.3 million plus the other millions who are being displaced by other hydro-electric projects.

Yes, Q, hydroeclectricity is needed, but how about a little support from the govt. for the poor farmer who is displaced and displaced again and again. This is about human rights, not simply about energy needs.

As far as I'm concerned, the hardship imposed on these people (homelessness, hunger, backbreaking labour, lack of clean water) should be considered crimes against humanity. China has created this human catastrophe in the name of progress. Where's the accountability???

...and btw, apparently, an earthquake in the Three Gorges could cause another human disaster. Its all a crapshoot.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 12 Apr 08 - 08:00 AM

"If only one child is allowed they want it to be male."

Yes, and NOW, those families are discovering that most Chinese males can never marry! Daughters are now becoming "Little Princesses", and are much in demand from those families who have them - they can now demand whatever 'bride price' they want... law of Supply & Demand!

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 13 Apr 08 - 03:50 AM

But it has also resulted in a generation of young Chinese men leaving China to find brides elsewhere in the world. How many do you think go back home to a land where they know their own child will have the same problems?

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 13 Apr 08 - 09:07 PM

That's ONE way of keep the population of China down... but it doesn't help the world situation...

You should read "Play Little Victims".

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: PoppaGator
Date: 14 Apr 08 - 01:25 PM

After I posted my wonderment about how and why the torch was in San Francisco so soon after the start of the "relay," I got my answer in a newspaper article accompanied by a world map showing the route of this year's torch relay.

The Olympic flame is being flown all over the world, on an apparently random zigzag course, visiting major cities only. It is by no means the traditional relay whereby the torch is passed from one runner to the next along a route from Mount Olympus more-or-less directly to the current site of the Games.

I hate to say anything nice about the Nazis, but the original concept of the torch relay had some positive symbolic meaning and appeal. After 1936, when subsequent Games were held on contnents other than Europe, of course, the torch had to be flown across an ocean or two on part of its journey, but its route was basically point-to-point, and all overland segments of the journey involved hand-carrying by volunteer runners. No skipping and jumping from one capital city to the next.

I don't know if the current abbreviated and watered-down version of the torch relay is new this time around for Beijing, or if this has been going on for a while without my having noticed. But transporting the flame primarily by airplane, and by runners only for brief stretches in and around a few cities, completely negates the original athletic aspect of the relay and reduces it to an exercise in pure public relations.

And, of course, while the Chinese government may have hoped that the torch's puddle-jumping world tour would grant them positive PR, it has instead become very little more than a focus for protest. The Olympic flame touches down and disembarks from its airplane only at large population centers where activists can easily gather and try to dusrupt the exercise.

I suppose it serves them right (the bureaucratuc serrvants of the totalitarian state).

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Amos
Date: 14 Apr 08 - 01:35 PM

The Real China and the Olympics the letter written on September 10, 2007 by Teng Biao and Hu Jia. They issued the open letter calling for the international community to look beyond the veneer of "munificence and normality" put up in Beijing for the Olympics, and to seriously examine to what extent China had fulfilled the promises it made to improve human rights ahead of the Games.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Amos
Date: 14 Apr 08 - 01:37 PM

"We are going to tell you the truth about China. We believe that for anyone who wishes to avoid a disgraceful Olympics, knowing the truth is the first step.

Fang Zheng, an excellent athlete who holds two national records for the discus throw at China's Special Sport Games, has been deprived of the opportunity to participate in the 2008 Paralympics because he has become a living testimony to the June 4, 1989 massacre. That morning, in Tiananmen Square, his legs were crushed by a tank while he was rescuing a fellow student. In April 2007, the Ministry of Public Security issued an internal document secretly strengthening a political investigation which resulted in forbidding Olympics participation by 43 types of people from 11 different categories, including dissidents, human rights defenders, media workers, and religious participants. The Chinese police never made the document known to either the Chinese public or the international community.

Huge investment in Olympic projects and a total lack of transparency have facilitated serious corruption and widespread bribery. Taxpayers are not allowed to supervise the use of investment amounting to more than US$40 billion. Liu Zhihua, formerly in charge of Olympic construction and former deputy mayor of Beijing, was arrested for massive embezzlement.

To clear space for Olympic-related construction, thousands of civilian houses have been destroyed without their former owners being properly compensated. Brothers Ye Guozhu and Ye Guoqiang were imprisoned for a legal appeal after their house was forcibly demolished. Ye Guozhu has been repeatedly handcuffed and shackled, tied to a bed and beaten with electric batons. During the countdown to the Olympic Games he will continue to suffer from torture in Chaobei Prison in Tianjin.

It has been reported that over 1.25 million people have been forced to move because of Olympic construction; it was estimated that the figure would reach 1.5 million by the end of 2007. No formal resettlement scheme is in place for the over 400,000 migrants who have had their dwelling places demolished. Twenty percent of the demolished households are expected to experience poverty or extreme poverty. In Qingdao, the Olympic sailing city, hundreds of households have been demolished and many human rights activists as well as "civilians" have been imprisoned. Similar stories come from other Olympic cities such as Shenyang, Shanghai and Qinhuangdao.

..."

From above link.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Shanghaiceltic
Date: 14 Apr 08 - 06:32 PM

Sorry Q you sound like you are spouting the Party Line.

The 3 Gorges Dam is going to be an environmental disaster. Few cities and town behind it have proper water treatment, that and the problem of silting are already affecting the area. The relocation of the people there has been a big problem and many have been relocated hundreds of miles away from the area. Some to areas where they cannot farm.

The Olympics will go ahead but it is going to be very nationalistic. Especially given the Tibet protests, The boys in Beijing will roll out a media frenzy to prove how good they are and how much they have done for the country. While that may be true in many areas they still control all media, so unless you are an educated Chinese with good language skills so you can read what is on the internet outside of China you will never be able to read anything but happy stories.

I have just left China and there was no mention of the protests over the torch on Chinese media. While I disagree with the violence of the protests, it is a case of you reap what you sow.

The work done in Beijing for the Olympics has been incredible, but at a cost to many people forcibly removed from their houses to make way for the sites.

I will watch the Olympics, or should I say I will watch what the Chinese Department of Media and Propoganda allow us to see.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Ref
Date: 14 Apr 08 - 07:32 PM

Modern Olympics has always been corrupt, from de Coubertin's dream of making better soldiers of the upper classes to Brundage's blind insistence that Soviet professionals were not pros to present "athletes" and their drugs. I'll still watch, in hopes of seeing some wrestler, weight lifter, or race walker do something utterly transcendent.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 14 Apr 08 - 11:31 PM

"in hopes of seeing some wrestler, weight lifter, or race walker do something utterly transcendent."

If that happens, it will be on the News... :-)

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 23 Apr 08 - 06:55 PM

AgggggghHHHH!

I got caught!

I turned on the TV just now and ALL the stations have the lighting of the torch, etc...

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Bainbo
Date: 23 Apr 08 - 07:48 PM

Why the fuss? If you're interested, watch it. If you're not, turn the TV off. It's not rocket science.

I manage to avoid "reality" shows, glorified talent contets, and freak shows along the lines of "half-man, half-tree" without any real difficulty.

I'd probably watch the Olympics, though.

If I had a TV.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 23 Apr 08 - 07:55 PM

It would be nice to have the OPTION to not WATCH... i.e. have the option to watch some other program...

Maybe I'll go and watch some of my collection of Warner Bros original cartoons... at least Stalling's music is brillant.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Bainbo
Date: 23 Apr 08 - 07:59 PM

TV not have an "off"button?

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 23 Apr 08 - 08:14 PM

Yep - and there's the Radio... :-P

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Joe_F
Date: 23 Apr 08 - 08:20 PM

And all the world over, each nation's the same:
They've simply no notion of playing the game.
They argue with umpires, they cheer when they've won,
And they practice beforehand, which ruins the fun. -- Michael Flanders

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 23 Apr 08 - 08:29 PM

ROFL...

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 23 Apr 08 - 08:44 PM

Rival demonstrators face off in Canberra

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 07:07 AM

I was planning to not watch anything from the Olympics, but now I may just Change My Mind ...

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Ebbie
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 09:59 AM

NBC News last night had a segment on the current water situation in China. In order to ensure that Bejing does not run out of water during the Games rice farmers surrounding the city have had their water cut off. Their fields are dry and dusty.

While Bejing has fountains that are spouting high.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: GUEST,Dv
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 10:44 AM

I find my planning this year was perfect--we'll be on a 10 day camping trip, leave tomorrow!

Yeeeeehaw!

What Olympics? What election?

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: GUEST,leeneia
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 10:49 AM

Ebbie, that is so sad about the rice fields.

My husband spoke recently of taking a trip to China. I told him, 'I'm not going. You can go and report back.'

As for the Olympics, I set up house in 1969, but I never have got round to buying a television.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 03:56 PM

I've prepared - I'm working three whole days instead of four half days, I've bought in a whole heap of DVDs to watch, planned days out for the ones I'm not working and I've got the bookshop on speed-dial....

Hopefully I'll miss all of it.

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: SINSULL
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 04:21 PM

According to the evening news, it seems the best way to avoid seeing the Olympics is to buy event tickets, fly to China and discover that the ticket agent is either a fraud or has been able to get more money for your seats and refuses you either a ticket or a refund. Try it Fool. It has worked for a whole bunch of people.
SINS

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 07:48 PM

A Techie friend said that a mate gave him all the episodes of Hogan's Heroes on CD - about 100+. He's been saving them up to watch starting 8/8/08...

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Joe_F
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 10:28 PM

...I am always amazed when I hear people saying that sport creates goodwill between the nations, and that if only the common people could meet one another at football or cricket, they would have no inclination to meet on the battlefield. Even if one didn't know from concrete examples (the 1936 Olympic Games, for example) that international sporting contests lead to orgies of hatred, one could deduce it from general principles.

...On the village green, where you pick up sides and no feeling of local patriotism is involved, it is possible to play simply for the fun and exercise: but as soon as the question of prestige arises,... the most savage combative instincts are aroused. Anyone who has played even a school football match knows this.... But the significant thing is not the behaviour of the players but the attitude of the spectators: and, behind the spectators, of the nations who work themselves into furies over these absurd contests, and seriously believe -- at any rate for short periods -- that running, jumping and kicking a ball are tests of national virtue.

-- George Orwell (1945)

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: pdq
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 10:37 PM

So, China is hosting the Limp Dicks.

Almost as exciting as Nixon playing ping pong.

My 12" black'n'white TV will stay in the closet where it has been for most of the last ten years.

Back to some important qusestions like "will my old reefer keep the beer cold in 100 degree weather?"

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Peace
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 10:40 PM

'"will my old reefer keep the beer cold in 100 degree weather?"'

I don't get it!

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: pdq
Date: 06 Aug 08 - 10:43 PM

Well, out here in God's country, "reefer" may mean sumpthin' different that it does to you city boys.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: RangerSteve
Date: 07 Aug 08 - 08:14 PM

I want a counter-Olympics. Anyone is encouraged to compete. The games will include Monopoly, Jacks, Simon Says, Knock Hockey, Pick-up-Sticks, Go Fish, a yo-yo competition, bobbing for apples, eating contests, charades - anything that doesn't require physical fitness to play. No official beverages, cameras, cars, toilet paper, dog food, or any of that other crap. The only prize will be the satisfaction of a job well done and the knowledge that you had a good time. Photogenic people will not be featured over others. Really touching stories of competitors triumphing over tragedy will no be mentioned. You won't be competing for your country, just for yourself. Games will be held in small towns that most people haven't heard of. Anybody with me?

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: RangerSteve
Date: 07 Aug 08 - 08:21 PM

Just saw the Yahoo home-page, there's Lance Armstrong staring at me, endorsing some crap. Maybe I should just ban handsome, athletic people from my olympics altogether. I would at least discourage product endorsement by competitors.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 08 Aug 08 - 02:20 AM

"I want a counter-Olympics. Anyone is encouraged to compete. ... Anybody with me?"

Most of that is covered by the Paraolympics... :-0

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 08 Aug 08 - 08:46 AM

The TV is on .... Agh!

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: kendall
Date: 08 Aug 08 - 09:36 AM

Now that I'm older, I thought it was great that I seem to have more patience. Turns out I just don't give a shit.

Sports? I'd rather watch cans rust. So, is there anyone out there who gives a damn what I think of sports?

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: SINSULL
Date: 08 Aug 08 - 01:28 PM

"Now that I'm older, I thought it was great that I seem to have more patience."

Seems to whom, Captain? I haven't noticed an improvement.



SINS, on her way to the cellar.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Stringsinger
Date: 08 Aug 08 - 02:06 PM

The Olympics has little to do with physical health. There are plenty of steroid users
they haven't caught yet.

Jesse Owens won under the Hitler regime.

China's human rights record is being ignored by the US because there is still
a Bush human rights record to be addressed. Yes, the US does torture.

I'm not interested in the Olympics except maybe for the ice skating during the winter.

Frank

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 08 Aug 08 - 03:47 PM

Bugger.. I saw a picture of the opening ceremony today - it was on the freebie trash newspaper being hurled around the London Underground.

We went to the pictures instead and saw 'The Mummy - Tomb of the Dragon Emperor' instead. Much better value for money (don't tell me I'm not paying for the Olympics, our rates have been paying for the bastard things for 2 years now).

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Raptor
Date: 09 Aug 08 - 08:13 AM

Keep your god dammed TV's off, and don't watch, but for gods sake QUIT BITCHING about it!

This thread is unblievable.

You act like it would be fatal if you see any coverage of it at all.

Some people enjoy watching it.

You would have anything you don't like or understand banned.

What kind of Natzi crap is that?

I agree it shouldn't be in China but I like the games.

I'm sorry I opened this.

Raptor

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Peace
Date: 09 Aug 08 - 09:40 AM

When are the Olympics starting?

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: kendall
Date: 09 Aug 08 - 10:11 AM

Raptor, no one is advocating doing away with the sports. We are simply swapping opinions.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Raptor
Date: 09 Aug 08 - 10:39 AM

I'm sorry, I'm reading that people don't want the olympics at all, not just that they won't be watching.


Raptor

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Jeri
Date: 09 Aug 08 - 10:51 AM

I'd watch Michaela Breeze (Mudcatter Breezy's daughter) in the weightliftig, but it looks like she'll be on (on Tuesday) when I'm normally avoiding being awake.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: kendall
Date: 09 Aug 08 - 05:17 PM

Today, I turned the TV on and counted 10 channels with sports. So, I'm on the computer.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 09 Aug 08 - 08:41 PM

"Keep your god dammed TV's off, and don't watch, but for gods sake QUIT BITCHING about it!

This thread is unblievable.

You act like it would be fatal if you see any coverage of it at all"


I started this thread. Once again, I put the proposition that Aussie humour does not translate well internationally.... :-P

After all on 911, when Little Fascist Johnny was in the hotel over the way, the general feeling (after noting that he was unhurt) was "Missed Him by THAT MUCH"... we did finally vote him out... one of the first serving Prime Ministers to ever lose his least in an Aussie election...


"You act like it would be fatal if you see any coverage of it at al"

Close, but no cigar... :-P

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Joe_F
Date: 09 Aug 08 - 08:54 PM

Tom Paxton had the right idea.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: kendall
Date: 09 Aug 08 - 09:05 PM

Tom has a way with words alright. That whole tape is a riot.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: GUEST,MaddyThe Moocher
Date: 10 Aug 08 - 05:06 PM

They should allow drugs, it would make the whole thing far more interesting. Especially the hallucinogenic events.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 12 Aug 08 - 05:14 AM

OK, we'll quit bitching about it if those who are watching and supporting it can stop making new threads for every single bloody event!

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: kendall
Date: 12 Aug 08 - 07:39 AM

What Liz said.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Raptor
Date: 12 Aug 08 - 10:08 AM

Fair enough!

I like the drugs idea. Syncronized freaking out.

Raptor

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Jeri
Date: 12 Aug 08 - 10:18 AM

Liz, I find the Olympics stuff much more preferable to the idiotic news re-broadcasting that assume people are too stupid to find out about things without help.

Synchronized freaking out is a pretty good. We can send a Mudcat team. Well, after we declare sovereignty. I submit the "Hey Look At Me, I Can Fly" event. It would probably be better for everyone if there were bungies.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: kendall
Date: 12 Aug 08 - 07:38 PM

An Upper class twit of the year marathon is one I would watch.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: GUEST,DannyC
Date: 12 Aug 08 - 07:40 PM

I just watched my cousin Jimmy McNally ref a boxing match between redheaded kid from GBR named Joe Murray and a young Chinaman. Jimmy did a great job.   It was startling to me to see how much he has grown to take on the look of our shared grandfather - an Irish boxer (and eventually a Philly cop) named John Marlin. Joe Murray was brave but decisively defeated. Jimmy kept it a fair fight... proud of him.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Bill D
Date: 12 Aug 08 - 08:07 PM

I like many Olympic sports...usually the ones which do NOT get covered in prime-time TV. Thus, it is almost scary to have just discovered today NBColympics.com, where I can see photos, videos and details of judo, archery, rowing...etc. Hours & hours of free videos ...*sigh*... technology giveth and technology taketh away my spare time - not that I had a lot to spare.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Donuel
Date: 12 Aug 08 - 09:32 PM

The NBC Bush Olympics has become a never ending cutting to W BUSH or a BUSH family member. (8 times in the opening ceremony alone.)

Bob Costas got W to say "I don't see anything wrong with America"



I think thats our problem

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: PoppaGator
Date: 13 Aug 08 - 03:58 PM

Thankfully, the W-adulation seems to be over with now that he's left Beijing.

The young competitors are generally, and very understandably, more-or-less awestruck at the position they're in, represnting the nation, and that feeling carries over to how they act and feel upon meeting the President in person. Even though I disagree stongly with GWB's policies (most of them) and consider him one of the worst, if not THE worst, President in history, I'm sure that if I were in their position I'd be civil to him in person, if only out of "respect for the office" and appreciation of the essentially non-political nature of the setting.

In a few cases, I've felt that certain Olympians have been overboard in "making nice" with the Pres. Respect and civility is one thing, but gushing adulation is quite another.

I used to have a serious case of the hots for beach volleyball star Kerri Walsh, but she cured me completely by the enthusiasm with which she greeted Georgie Boy.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: KB in Iowa
Date: 13 Aug 08 - 05:29 PM

I noticed today that Taiwan has two bronze medals. It got me wondering what sort of deals were made to allow a team from Taiwan into Beijing. According to China there is no such country, how can they be represented in the Olympics?

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: PoppaGator
Date: 13 Aug 08 - 05:41 PM

Re: Taiwan.

During the opening ceremony telecast on NBC, Bob Costas talked about this as the very small Taiwanese contingent marched into the stadium. The Chinese government conceded to the IOC on admitting all member nations, including this one that they do not recognize, but won the concession that it be called "Chinese Taipai" rather than "Taiwan."

I'm old enough to remember when we called it "Formosa." You?

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: olddude
Date: 13 Aug 08 - 05:53 PM

I will never understand why pros are allowed. I mean in tennis they had the William sisters. If noone can beat them professionally then why the olympics? more money or trophies ... Not to mention the NBA stars ... geeze
takes something away from the games for sure to my thinking anyway.
We are luck Bruce decided not to compete this year. Was it swimming? or the pole vault Peace?

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Donuel
Date: 13 Aug 08 - 05:58 PM

NBC is still showing Bush at the Olmpics a full 4 days after he left.

This bush mania is a pustule on the Olympox

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: robomatic
Date: 13 Aug 08 - 11:58 PM

Let's see. It's the last year for women's softball but how long has "synchronized diveboard" been a sport? It's a hoot, but even more useless than most of the other events.

And the Chinese women's gymnastics team: jailbait with fixed passports.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Big Phil
Date: 14 Aug 08 - 02:43 AM

Just watched the "vollyball" jobby with four bikini clad babes jumping up and down in the sand chasing a ball. I cannot believe ANY hot blooded male would not take to watching this "event". More please.

Beach Vollyball Convert Phil*

As for the human rights issues, China should NEVER have been given the games. The decision to give China this opportunity was a complete and utter mistake.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 14 Aug 08 - 04:25 AM

Hey, this is AVOIDING the Olympics - go talk about it on one of the many other Olympic threads if you must - leave this one to us who are happy for them to happen but don't want to watch or read about them.

I'm on my second Hitchcock film of the week... HMV have a '2 for £10' offer on his classics. Limpit was impressed with 'The Birds'. I'm not sure if I want her to watch 'Psycho', she might get ideas.

I'm off to hide the carving knives.

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Donuel
Date: 14 Aug 08 - 09:07 AM

I saw the syncro dives
WOW the only differences sometines were the skin tones.

IT does open up dozens of new events by just offering a sycro version. The syncro hammer throw, the syncro javilin, the syncro skeet shoot
all announced by a pair of moderators speaking in unison.
Watch it all with 3D glasses in stereo.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: PoppaGator
Date: 14 Aug 08 - 12:49 PM

Liz the Squeak has a point. This particular discussion was started by and for folks with no interest in watching, or even thinking about, the current Games. There are several other threads wherein those of us who enjoy various events are sharing reactions with each other.

If this thread were really confined to Olympic avoidance, it would probably have dropped off the bottom of the page shortly after the Opening Ceremonies. And maybe revived again, but maybe not.

Big Phil, you like that Women's Beach Volleyball, huh? Me too. I really get into any Olympic volleyball match, even men, even indoors, probably because it's the one sport I was able to continue playing until well into my 40s. When someone dives for a dink shot placed just out of reach, I'll involutarily jump up out of my easy chair with an audible grunt, as though I were able to reach out and save the ball myself!

But of course, the pairs of bikini-clad babes adds another whole dimension to the viewing experience. Six-foot-two-inch-tall Kerri Walsh, in particular, really caught my attention during her first Olympic appearances, back and she and I and all of us were eight years younger. I finally got over my fascination with her this time around, observing her too-too-genuine enthusiasm at meeting with President Bush (not a favorite of mine).

I've got a few things to say about the phony, irrelevant, and historically elitist concept of "amateurism," which has popped up here and in several other threads. When I work up the energy and have the time, I might start a separate thread to sound off on that volatile topic.

Liz, enjoy those movies. I assume you know that the great Alfred Hitchcock began his career in England. Here in the states, we have a cable channel TCM (Turner Classic Movies) which airs a huge collection of great old films with no commercial interuptions 24/7; I've seen many Hitchcock films, old and new, British and Hollywood, since we began receiving TCM.

Hitch made two films called "The Man Who Knew Too Much." The more recent is the better known, filmed in color in Hollywood and starring Jimmy Stewart. Last night (during a dinner-hour lull in the Olympics telecast) we had a chance to see the much earlier British black-and-white version. Very interesting to consider the similarities and differences. I think Hitch made a much better film the second time around, partly thanks to a bigger budget and more advanced film technology, but also thanks to his own increased maturity and artistry.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: KB in Iowa
Date: 14 Aug 08 - 01:09 PM

Thanks PoppaGator for the Taiwan info. I didn't (never do) watch the opening ceremonies.

I was against letting pros into the Olympics until I found out about the origin of the amateur ideal coupled with the pro-in-all-but-name status of eastern bloc athletes.

LtS, sorry about adding Olympic content to the thread about avoiding same. You do make a good point.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 14 Aug 08 - 06:30 PM

Hi Poppagator - I was aware of Alfred's English roots - he was born not too far away from where I live in east London, in Leytonstone, and there is still a funeral directors nearby called Hitchcocks, who are related (but I'm not sure how... might be interesting for a BBC film crew to investigate one day).

I've been a fan of his films for many years, but never had the money or space to make a complete video collection. With the issue of his works on DVD, I can at least start with the well known ones.

I also think you're right in that he did mature and improve on his previous works. But I don't think anyone could improve on his 'Psycho'.... the colour remake and the subsequent movies just didn't have that nervy edge that the original has. Somehow stage blood just never gets that same depth or frisson of horror as that shot of the chocolate sauce going down the plughole...

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: KB in Iowa
Date: 15 Aug 08 - 05:30 PM

I wouldn't even bother watching the remake of Psycho myself (not that others should avoid it as well). I guess if I heard from reliable sources that the reamke was masterful I might give it a go but such is not the case here.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: DannyC
Date: 15 Aug 08 - 05:47 PM

A Boxer's Story:

Jimmy

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 18 Aug 08 - 11:40 PM

http://au.sports.yahoo.com/olympics/news/article/-/4924862/olympics-beijing-olympics-medals-table

ROFK - but you might have to be quick to catch it...

QUOTE
Olympics: Beijing Olympics medals table
AFP - August 19, 2008, 12:52 pm

Olympics medals table at the start of Tuesday:
UNQUOTE

The rest of the page shows that SOMEBODY can't write HTML.... :-)

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Folk Form # 1
Date: 19 Aug 08 - 06:14 AM

This thing will be coming to London in 4 years. Oh no! I'll read a good book instead.

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 19 Aug 08 - 10:46 AM

A cartoon in the newspaper today after the news that Britain actually won something...

'Funny how everyone has stopped feeling sorry for the Dali Lama all of a sudden'...

LTS

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 19 Aug 08 - 06:48 PM

Picture in local paper:

Group of Aussies on top of Great Wall.

Holding sign.

"Built by Emperor Nasi Goring to keep the rabbits out"

Editor note: Only Australians could understand this.


Also

The other day, Aussies swimmers, now finished, toured the great wall. Was shown on the National News. One lady said "Musta worked, Don't see any rabbits"



Now THAT's Aussie Humour...

:-P

Subject: RE: BS: Avoiding The Olympics
From: The Fooles Troupe
Date: 24 Aug 08 - 07:39 AM

Well the closing ceremony will soon be the end of avoiding it for another 4 years.

But it won't be over till The Fat Lady Sings... in secret, and is mimed to by another far more Prettily Acceptable Lady...