As Canadians, do you feel slighted by this?

SFMIKE

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Jul 3, 2004
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The Olympic torch was ignited on April 1 in Greece and spent the weekend passing through Paris and London where it encountered some large protests for China's handling of the Tibet situation.

Now, tomorrow it will be in SF where I can assure you it will face considerable disruptions of the event.

http://abcnews.go.com/Sports/story?id=4609265&page=1

Now, my question. Vancouver is the next host to this event in 2010, you also have a significant Chinese population like SF has, why is it that the only North American stop is being held here and not in your city, or better, in both places?

Am I missing something here?

Tomorrow could prove to be a lot of fun.
 

Ima

Banned
Feb 26, 2008
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Vancouver has a significant Chinese population??? :confused:

Be honest, doubt most people care, the damn torch will be here in 2010 for 2 weeks and we have enough drama with that, no need to add fuel to 'anti poverty' hoodlums cause...


Ima fairly liberal guy, but get turned off by these pseudo hippies on the extreme left as much as the neocons do on the extreme right...
 

Quarter Mile'r

Injected and Blown
May 17, 2005
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Couldn't have said it better myself.
I feel exactly the same as you about the whole thing Ima. :cool:

Yeah I get turned off to by all the left and right political stances of
it all.


................QM'r
 

Thatotherguy

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Jan 31, 2008
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I could be wrong, but I think there's a tradition of the torch not passing through the country that will be hosting the next olympics.
 

Ima

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Feb 26, 2008
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I could be wrong, but I think there's a tradition of the torch not passing through the country that will be hosting the next olympics.
And there is a long tradition of giving the olympics to occupying nations that have ignored human rights and brutilized segments of society...

I will protest by not watching, which isn't a big loss to the networks... But I still will watch womens tennis and womens diving... :eek:
 

smackyo

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May 18, 2005
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your mom says hi.
i could way off here but i remember something about vancouver being a strong consideration but because of our governments stance on china human rights issues and taking them to task on it that we were dropped as a possibility.

do i care or feel slighted???

no, not really.

if not for all the athletes that have put in their time and hard work to compete in this event i'd say that the beijing olympics should be boycott by all responsible nations.

however these athletes that have dedicated so much deserve to not be pawns in the political arena.
 

Primeval-Nick

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Feb 10, 2007
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I could be wrong, but I think there's a tradition of the torch not passing through the country that will be hosting the next olympics.
Well, there really isn't any "tradition". Up until 2004 the flame tended to take a fairly direct route between Greece and the host city. For example in 1976 the route was Olympia-Athens-Ottawa-Montreal and in 1988 it was Olympia-Athens-St. John’s– Québec City – Montreal – Ottawa – Toronto – Winnipeg – Inuvik – Vancouver – Edmonton – Calgary.

This whole idea of the flame passing through a variety of countries for the sake of it is just a new idea that is now being promoted as somehow being part of the established mythology of the Olympics. A bit like the idea of the having any kind of flame relay, which of course was only invented by the Nazis for the 1936 games as a propaganda ploy.
 

Sonny

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Sep 12, 2004
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While the Olympics is an international sporting event, and while in sports and economics everyone is supposed to be conscience-dead, I have no difficulty in that the PR trip that is the flame relay offers an opportunity for folks to make known their displeasure with Chinese totalitarianism and abuse of basic human rights.

The Chinese government is a controlling big brother in a massive way, and takes Karl Mark's "temporary dictatorship of the proletariat" to the extreme.

Many of us in western society really do take for granted the great blessings we have in being born here - freedom, democracy, the right to dissent, etc.

It wouldn't be so pleasant for you if you were a free-minded individual in China - just ask the socially conscious writers in China who get jailed for years for just writing a blog.
 

uncleg

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Jul 25, 2006
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Any reason why we should feel slighted ? It's not like we feel we are the leaders of the free world or anything like that. Let's face it, why should Vancouver or any other city in Canada want the police bill that's coming with the torch visit to SF.
 

rimas

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Jan 3, 2007
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I will protest by not watching, which isn't a big loss to the networks... But I still will watch womens tennis and womens diving... :eek:
I'm with you. Not watching.

I read an editorial today about how boycotting the Russian olympics didn't accomplish anything. Bollocks! A few years later and the walls came tumbling down. Same thing would happen in China.

I just can't stand giving credence to a bunch of idiots keeping people in line and themselves in luxury hidden behind the cloak of culture or religion. These are bullies and should be treated as such.

In the big scheme of things, a bunch of jocks running around a field dodging javalins do not amount to a hill of beans.

But, what do I know?
 

d_Duck55

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Aug 11, 2004
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I read an editorial today about how boycotting the Russian olympics didn't accomplish anything. Bollocks! A few years later and the walls came tumbling down. Same thing would happen in China.
It would be nice, but Russia was broke and China is booming. It makes a difference you know...
 

FortunateOne

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Jan 29, 2008
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And there is a long tradition of giving the olympics to occupying nations that have ignored human rights and brutilized segments of society...

I will protest by not watching, which isn't a big loss to the networks... But I still will watch womens tennis and womens diving... :eek:
So, by this you are saying that when the Olympics are held in the US, you protest by not watching. :D
 

Very Veronica

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Aug 2, 2004
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Your math doesn't include torture & executions. China can control it's own population but its ego overlooked the full impact of hosting an international PR spectacle aka the Olympics.

As to their human rights record check out this comparison: The US has more of it's population in jail both per capita and in absolute numbers by a huge margin than any other country--including China--in the world. It's easy to see just google it and find out. Most of the people doing time in US prisons are in for non-violent crimes. 13% of black males between 25 and 29 are in jail. Compare: the US with a population of 350 million or so has over 2 million of its citizens in jail--China, that abuser of human rights, has 1.4 million but their poplation is over a billion. You do the math--if you can.
 
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