Tag: olympics

Another Disability for Paralympians

Post author By Redactor
Post date August 2, 2024
2 Comments on Another Disability for Paralympians

The Paralympic Games, being held this year from August 28 to September 8, in Paris, are a “major international sports competition for athletes with disabilities.”

We should cheer their efforts — not undermine them.

Meta’s Instagram apparently disagrees. In mid-July, Instagram restricted the account of McKenna Geer, member of the American shooting team, so that it could be viewed only by current followers.

The “problem” seemed to be that she had posted photos of herself in competition. With firearms. For similar reasons, Instagram has also censored the accounts of other athletes. (Skittishness about pics of guns may be why an Olympics.com photo of an Indian athlete “shooting” shows only head and arm.)

When the restrictions were imposed, Geer observed that she and other athletes use social media to spread the word about their sport and firearm safety, “build our personal brand, and connect with potential sponsors.” Her livelihood and ability to continue shooting competitively were thus at stake.

Geer’s Instagram account is again accessible to non-followers. But the problem has not been resolved permanently. As aaronalvarado asserted at her account, “a bad AI program with no monitoring” may be to blame. “We appeal and the program shadow-bans everything.”

If so, at least a human being is not consciously choosing to censor Geer or other athletes because they shoot competitively. But somebody wrote the programming. And Meta must be aware of these problems.

It’s time to remove the “guns bad, context irrelevant” line of code.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Tags censorship, gun control, guns, Instagram, olympics

ideological culture

Blue in Paris

The Olympics is about athletic excellence. There’s also a patriotic-nationalistic component that uneasily fits with the games. And then there are the rites and glamorous “artistic” ceremonies that start the quadrennial shindig — an uneasy mix we usually ignore as we focus on the contests.

But it was hard to ignore the bizarre showpieces at the opening ceremonies in Paris, for the “Games of the XXXIII Olympiad.”

“The ceremony received a mixed reception,” Wikipedia records, “with many praising the performances of Gojira, Aya Nakamura, Celine Dion and Lady Gaga, while criticism was directed at the length, poor weather conditions, technical issues, and some elements of the production itself.” The Guardian, however, titled its coverage “Most French newspapers praise the Olympics spectacle but far-right commentators reject ‘woke propaganda’” — but that begs a question: were the “woke” parts really propaganda?

I mean, can repellent things be propagandistic?

Celebratory for the woke, sure; but at some even low level of repellence the effect becomes merely off-putting. And then … repulsive.

Sure, most woke media was enthusiastic — “artistic audacity” was a phrase used by the New York Times. But, as The Guardian summarized, the British were “less flattering. ‘La Farce’ was the verdict of the Daily Mail, describing it as a ‘surreal opening ceremony dubbed “the worst ever,”’ while for the Times it was ‘a damp squib of a show.’”

At issue on social media was a drag-queen parody of The Last Supper — mischaracterized by the woke and Wikipedia as “a bacchanalian feast.” Bacchus himself, though — or Dionysus or whoever — was portrayed by a pudgy near-naked male singer painted in blue.

Ugh.

It is wrong to purposely offend someone’s religion. Not illegal. Just wrong. And it informs Christians that yet another major institution of official society does not like us.

Someone might not unreasonably suggest Christians need to present politically. God helps those who help themselves.

Or we could go back to the old ways, where the artists didn’t flaunt their sexualities or heresies or even pride — not horning in on the athletes’ attention at an athletic contest.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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general freedom international affairs

A Naïve Victory

The warning was loud and clear. It came from China’s government and was echoed by Nancy Pelosi: during the Beijing Olympics, don’t dare protest the brutal policies of China’s government lest it come down upon you like a ton of bricks.

An Olympic athlete has found a way to both heed and spurn this counsel.

In what the New York Times calls a “rare rebuke,” Swedish speedskater Nils van der Poel has given one of his gold medals to the daughter of a Chinese-born Swedish publisher being imprisoned by the Chinese government.

Last November, Nils saw a production by Civil Rights Defenders that told of how Gui Minhai, a publisher of works criticizing the Chinazi regime, is now incarcerated in China. He had been abducted by Chinese operatives while vacationing in Thailand.

The skater felt obliged to do something in protest “since I had the opportunity that very few people have.”

Gui’s daughter, Angela, shrugs off any suggestion that the skater’s gesture, lacking immediate power to free her father, must be naïve.

“A little bit of naïveté is important to try to effect change,” she says. “I think it’s very important that Nils giving me his medal to honor my father is understood as honoring political prisoners like him, many of whom are increasingly Hong Kongers and Uyghurs.”

What about it, fellow Olympic winners? If you follow Nils’s example, you’ll no longer have your medal. But you’ll still have your victory.

And a little more.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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First Amendment rights general freedom international affairs

Virtual Private Communist

“China censors Olympic gold medalist’s defense of China’s internet censorship …” informed Mashable.com’s ironic headline.

The medalist in question? Eileen Gu, the 18-year-old phenom who just became the youngest ever Olympic freestyle skiing champion. Born in San Francisco to an American father and a Chinese mother, Gu is an American citizen, but chose to ski on the Chinese national team at the Beijing Olympics, which means she is also a Chinese citizen. (Which is completely against Chinese law. But ssshhh.*)

Miss Gu’s now-you-see-it/now-you-don’t Instagram post of February 7th garnered a reply from a Chinese netizen, who inquired, “Why can you use Instagram and millions of Chinese people from mainland cannot, why you got such special treatment as a Chinese citizen?” The commenter added, “That’s not fair,” noting that “millions of Chinese … don’t have internet freedom.”

Gu quickly replied, “Anyone can download a vpn its literally free on the App Store.”

Virtual Private Networks (VPNs) are indeed easily available outside of China, but “it is illegal to use them to get around China’s Great Firewall,” Mashable explained.

“And, as the Weibo post featuring Gu’s Instagram comment started to gain traction on the social network, it was subsequently censored.”

“Let them have VPNs,” mocked a column in the Taiwan News, dubbing it Gu’s “‘Marie Antoinette’ moment.”

The reality of VPNs in China? Not so easy, and the laws against VPN usage are increasingly enforced.

Gu’s ignorance about the reality of living under Chinese rule may be caused by the wealth showering over her. “Eileen Gu’s China choice pays off for now,” says Yahoo News, noting she has made over $30 million since the beginning of 2021 and is poised to make far more.

This makes her a Communist Party asset, and thus a danger to herself and the rest us.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

* “China does not allow for dual citizenship,” Mashable informs, “and there is no record that Gu has given up her American citizenship.” It appears we can add “looking the other way” and “duplicitousness” to the Chinazis’ long rap sheet of crimes against humanity.

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general freedom ideological culture international affairs media and media people

Changing the Chinazi Channel

Post author By Redactor
Post date February 10, 2022
No Comments on Changing the Chinazi Channel

“Is there a more beautiful phrase,” Jim Geraghty asks his readers at National Review, “than ‘cataclysmic loss of audience’?”

Geraghty shares Dan Wetzel’s term for the good news that viewership of NBC’s coverage of the Winter Olympics in Beijing hit “a record low for the Opening Ceremony.”

“Through the first four nights of competition,” reports the Associated Press, “NBC is on track for the lowest-rated Winter Games in history.”

What’s going on? Americans are voting with their eyeballs! And TV remotes.

An Axios-Momentive poll shows why: “Seven in 10 survey respondents disapprove of allowing China to host these Olympics.”

“The host country, China,” explains Yahoo columnist Dan Wetzel, “is a serious problem.”

Wetzel called China’s use of a Uyghur athlete to light the Olympic torch “a propaganda prop to cover up a campaign of slavery, torture, forced abortions and internment in reeducation camps.”

“Some Americans want U.S. corporations to take a stand as well,” informs FightThirtyEight, the polling website. “When asked whether they think ‘companies should withdraw their advertisements for the February 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics in response to human rights violations by the Chinese government,’ 54 percent of U.S. adults said probably or definitely yes.…”

One sponsor, Coca-Cola, “has dialed back its marketing efforts outside of China.” The Atlanta Journal-Constitution notes that “soda aisles in grocery stores are bereft of Olympics-themed displays” and “the main page of Coke’s U.S. consumer website made no mention of the Games.”

“Congratulations to the athletes,” offers a Boston.com reader, “but the pomp and circumstance can’t hide what’s really happening there.”

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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