Libsmasher
Well-Known Member
- Joined
- Jan 9, 2008
- Messages
- 3,151
Chinese Taipei? Huh?
IOC President Jacques Rogge has repeatedly spurted the old phony mantra that the olympics shouldn't be "politicized". But in the "parade of nations" during the opening ceremony in Beijing, the team members of the Republic of China were forced to follow a sign that said "chinese taipei". I've watched a number of olympics, and seen how this political degradation of the ROC has proceeded. You can see old films from the 1950s where their sign says "Republic of China", the name of the country. I remember seeing it as "Taiwan", which is the name of an island - a geographical feature, not a country. That's as if Denmank marched behind a sign that said "Jutland". From there, the sign was downgraded to "Taipei" - the capital of the ROC - the same as if the french marched behind a sign saying "Paris". Finally this time, they have a sign saying "chinese taipei" - an advertisement of the PRC's territorial claims. This is as if puerto rico, which marched behind a sign saying "puerto rico", had to use a sign saying "American San Juan". An added insult is that they had to carry the olympic flag, not the flag of the ROC. Meanwhile, "palestine", a non-state that is basically a bunch of polyglot arabs penned up in a few places, marched and carried their flag and had a sign that said "palestine".
No politicization?? Yaaa sure - the IOC politicizes it themselves.
IOC President Jacques Rogge has repeatedly spurted the old phony mantra that the olympics shouldn't be "politicized". But in the "parade of nations" during the opening ceremony in Beijing, the team members of the Republic of China were forced to follow a sign that said "chinese taipei". I've watched a number of olympics, and seen how this political degradation of the ROC has proceeded. You can see old films from the 1950s where their sign says "Republic of China", the name of the country. I remember seeing it as "Taiwan", which is the name of an island - a geographical feature, not a country. That's as if Denmank marched behind a sign that said "Jutland". From there, the sign was downgraded to "Taipei" - the capital of the ROC - the same as if the french marched behind a sign saying "Paris". Finally this time, they have a sign saying "chinese taipei" - an advertisement of the PRC's territorial claims. This is as if puerto rico, which marched behind a sign saying "puerto rico", had to use a sign saying "American San Juan". An added insult is that they had to carry the olympic flag, not the flag of the ROC. Meanwhile, "palestine", a non-state that is basically a bunch of polyglot arabs penned up in a few places, marched and carried their flag and had a sign that said "palestine".
No politicization?? Yaaa sure - the IOC politicizes it themselves.
