I cannot help but find Stephen Harper’s comments regarding a boycott of the Beijing Olympics more than a tad hypocritical.
Harper is quoted in the Toronto Star as saying
“I think that experience would suggest that such boycotts are generally not effective and really, in the end, only harm the athletes involved who have trained for so many years to compete in these events.”
One can easily say the same thing about economic boycotts that this government is taking part in, and who really gets hurt by them.
Does anyone here really operate under the delusion that Canadian economic boycotts against Iran are hurting Mahmoud Ahmadinejad?
Does anyone really think that the Western boycotts imposed against Zimbabwe affect Mugabe in the least? Or that the economic boycotts against Iraq under Saddam Hussein caused him any sleepless nights?
The argument offered for these actions is generally the same, ‘you’ve got to start somewhere‘, or ‘we’ve got to send a message that this is unacceptable‘ - even if it hurts people more than it hurts governments.
My question to those, including the Prime Minister of Canada, who are claiming that an Olympic boycott would “only hurt the athletes” is, “why are these athletes so much more important than oppressed and poor people in countries led by tin pot dictators who we do support imposing boycotts on”?
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They’ll say because they are Canadian athletes. I guess the Canadian Olympic Committee ought to have made it clear to the athletes that they were political toys, and subject to both the whims of China and Canada. When you boil things down, amateur athletes either make their money through government grant, corporate sponsorship (advertising to sell more crud), or have real jobs that produce something for sale.
I don’t want to tell the next Catriona LeMay Doan to stay at home and protest, but I also don’t want to tell all of the people the Chinese government is hurting that they matter less than a two week World party designed these days to sell more Coke and Big Macs.