Posted by
beltway girl on Friday, April 11, 2008 1:09:50 AM
There is no way the President of the United States should be playing the role of spectator in the upcoming Olympic Games in Beijing.
Tibetan monks, engaged in a peaceful demonstration, have been killed in cold blood by Chinese police. Nuns and children were also among the dead.
The symbol of the wish for Tibetan independence is the snow lion, a fearless, celestial animal of Tibet. The Chinese government has splattered blood on this wish.
Not all of the protesting of late has been so peaceful, granted. However, there are claims that the originally peaceful protests only become violent in the face of police suppression.
Moreover, accurate information is arguably hard to come by as Communist authorities have barred foreign journalists from the area. One has to wonder what could have motivated such a maneuver.
Or do we? Do we really have to wonder?
China is the globe's ultimate pragmatist. There's no gridlock in China. And that pragmatism has paid off. The nation is an up-and-coming economic titan.
Child slave labor is acceptable to these pragmatists. So is the importation of dangerous lead in toys to American children.
Forced abortion and sterilization is okey dokey in the face of the overpopulation problem. The sale of women and children occurs in China, in the midst of all of its dogmatic oppression; the sale of women doesn't cause the government much concern.
It's good to see they've really embraced market capitalism.
And there's been a resurgence of such traditions as female infanticide and abandonment of female infants.
China's famous one-child policy seems to have brought about a practice that would curl even the hair of the average pro-choice feminist. Prospective mothers really want a boy, so they're doing gender determination testing and aborting the girls. (Excuse me. The gender-evolving but currently female-apparent fetuses.)
The Chinese orphanages are filled with disabled children and little girls. In some places, mentally ill women are sterilized. Women with hereditary illness may also be sterilized. It really does put our pre-existing condition crisis in health care in a whole new light.
And now, we have Tibet trying to break away from all that the Chinese Dream has to offer. And the punishment for such flagrant displays of ingratitude is, possibly, death.
It's not a very appealing menu for China when it comes to human life. The average American probably has a lot of trouble digesting this.
In terms of the upcoming Olympics, there is a lot at stake.
Driving Hitler crazy with Jesse Owens was arguably the right thing to do. But will such an effect to be found in Beijing? I doubt it. In fact, it may well produce an effect that makes the US appear to be a weak and frightened power.
Sports are an appealing thing for people from all civilized societies. Unfortunately, China's government does not comport itself in a civilized manner. If President Bush sits in the stands and plays the spectator in Beijing, he will be indulging a government that has evolved into one of the simultaneously strongest and most oppressive regimes in the world.
China's blindness towards the sanctity of human life shouldn't be a spectator sport. Hopefully, the President of the United States will let them know it.