VANOC CEO John Furlong has set a precedent that could come back and bite him, Charmaine Crooks, and Vancouver in the ass.
Above the fold on the March 20 Vancouver Sun, Furlong is mentioned in the back end of Jeff Lee and Gary Kingston's twin byline story stating the basic position that a boycott of the 2008 Beijing Olympics would be "unfair".
The message is clear: do not rock the boat in 2008, much less ahead of 2010, or else we may cause a financial rupture with the Chinese government that is currently putting the boots to ethnic Tibetans inside and outside what is now the Tibet Autonomous Region.
Somehow, Furlong has managed to find ex-podium darling Crooks as willing athletic apologist human shield, using her sickly line in the same Sun story: "I was a victim of boycotts in the past, and I know how it affected athletes and still does."
Oh boy. With comments like that, we are in for a long, brutal summer leading to Beijing 2008. As Straight writer Craig Takeuchi so eloquently pointed out on this same blog, that is precisely the kind of thinking that gets people pointing at us and laughing at our supposed compassion.
Vancouver Mayor Sam Sullivan has followed Furlong's slippery lead by also refusing to criticize Beijing openly. Premier Gordon Campbell's staff did not make him available for an interview on this urgent topic, adding he was away until the end of the month.
The Irish-born-and-raised Furlong has seen first-hand the misery of loss of life in the British-IRA conflict, which makes his position even harder to take. And never mind Crooks, who had to miss the 1980 Moscow Olympics due to the Canadian position to follow the U.S. into boycotting Russia, which had just pounced in Afghanistan and was later to put down an uprising
in Poland.
So for now it's about Easter long weekend breaks for Gordo, who had nothing to say on a matter that could yet come and haunt him in the future.
Keep in mind that Tibet is under bombardment and Tibetan Buddhist monks are getting bludgeoned in the streets. But both Premier Campbell and former prime minister Kim Campbell were more than willing to be seen and photographed with His Holiness at UBC and splash the event all over the B.C. government Web pages. Here is what our premier said when the Dalai Lama visited in September 2006 to open the Dalai Lama Centre for Peace and Education.
"His Holiness is a beacon of hope for millions around the world," Premier Campbell said on September 10, 2006. "His work reminds us that the flame of that hope may fade, may flicker, may falter, but it will never fail."
If Campbell can make that phone call to the Straight, perhaps he and other local obsequious nobles can clarify whether or not Tibet's hopes are fading, flickering, faltering or failing.
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Blog - Politics Archive
There is no question .. Tibet is a monster problem .. it requires an immediate solution but NOT on the backs of innocent athletes .. many who come from war torn countries themselves .. often the mere ability of some athletes to make it to an Olympic Games is an accomplishment and a triumph over evil!
Every four years we send athletes to represent our country in their chosen sport .. Winter or Summer .. we demand that they perform .. for the most part they are barely making ends meet financially. Yet we demand that they WIN .. make us proud and all that! Heaven forbid if they place fourth or worse .. they are then useless and an embarrassment to Canada ..
Yet ...when there are critical matters that require global political action .. people like you come up with the brilliant idea that the athletes who have at minimum slaved away at their sport for four years to reach their goal be used as a way to launch a protest ...
The 1980 Olympic boycott was totally and utterly useless .. hmm WE ARE NOW IN THE SAME place that was used as a reason to boycott .. So what good did that do ..
Nobody really wants to see an Olympic boycott. It will be divisive and it will be ugly. However, as I pointed out above, VANOC tipped its hand a little by virtually ruling out a boycott and bending over backward attempting to reassure the public here of that, despite the public sympathizing strongly with the people of Tibet. Rather than valuable inches being squandered hashing out how upset athletes are at a boycott that has not yet happened, Prime Minister Stephen Harper did the right thing and asked that China meet with the Dalai Lama.
This would be a good outcome...
Tibetans inside and outside Tibet would view this as a good step based on what has been on the table over these past 50 years.
I am not telling the athletes what to do. I just think China should be made to realize that a direct conversation with the exiled Tibetan government is needed, preferably over the next month.
Where that would begin is Dharamsala, India, where the Dalai Lama and many exiled Tibetans are based. Chinese staff would be welcomed there with open arms, it is a short flight from Beijing, with maybe one transfer from Delhi, and the repercussions would reverberate around the world. It may be seen as a huge concession the Chinese are not willing to make, but imagine if it really could be set up. That would get things rolling and maybe result in Olympic opening ceremonies in China that are not totally disrupted because minorities under Chinese rule are not being listened to, or worse, are totally insulted and dismissed as a "clique".