The Winter Olympics Are Sadder, Quieter, Scarier. (wsj.com) 98
Isolation rooms, fears of positive Covid-19 tests and the absence of cheering crowds are squeezing all the joy from the Beijing Games. From a report: On the day Team USA flag bearer Elana Meyers Taylor was supposed to march her country into the Olympic Stadium, she was in a Chinese isolation hotel. She had tested positive for Covid-19 and watched the Opening Ceremony on TV in a room she wasn't allowed to leave. Ms. Meyers Taylor was one of the lucky ones. She has since recovered and is scheduled to compete as one of the medal favorites in two bobsled events. In the gloom of the Beijing Winter Olympics, luck is a relative term. The Games are supposed to be an ebullient, global sporting bonanza, but they have never felt so downbeat. Rather than "Faster, Higher, Stronger -- Together," the Olympic motto, the Beijing Games so far have been sadder and quieter.
Olympians compete in nearly empty arenas without friends or family. Some wear N95 masks, in practice and even in competition, to limit the risk of infection. The rest live with the daily fear of testing positive, being sent to isolation and watching years of training slip away. Natalia Maliszewska, a short-track speedskater from Poland, was awoken at 3 a.m. one night this week, before she was set to compete, and transported to isolation before learning that authorities had made a mistake. It later turned out that she had tested positive and was returned to isolation. "To me, this is a big joke," Ms. Maliszewska said. "I hope whoever is managing this has a lot of fun. My heart and my mind can't take this anymore." The usual stresses, strains and tolls of competing at the Games have been amplified by a pandemic that has shrunk the event to fit into a suffocating bubble. American figure skater Vincent Zhou felt a sense of desperation from inside his isolation hotel room this week after he tested positive for Covid-19. With his chance to compete now over -- he skated in the team event but missed his individual event -- he was awaiting the two negative PCR tests that would return his freedom.
Olympians compete in nearly empty arenas without friends or family. Some wear N95 masks, in practice and even in competition, to limit the risk of infection. The rest live with the daily fear of testing positive, being sent to isolation and watching years of training slip away. Natalia Maliszewska, a short-track speedskater from Poland, was awoken at 3 a.m. one night this week, before she was set to compete, and transported to isolation before learning that authorities had made a mistake. It later turned out that she had tested positive and was returned to isolation. "To me, this is a big joke," Ms. Maliszewska said. "I hope whoever is managing this has a lot of fun. My heart and my mind can't take this anymore." The usual stresses, strains and tolls of competing at the Games have been amplified by a pandemic that has shrunk the event to fit into a suffocating bubble. American figure skater Vincent Zhou felt a sense of desperation from inside his isolation hotel room this week after he tested positive for Covid-19. With his chance to compete now over -- he skated in the team event but missed his individual event -- he was awaiting the two negative PCR tests that would return his freedom.
Irrational and lying dictators (Score:2)
I was really surprised that Xi didn't jump on the excuse of Omicron to cancel the Olympics. It really is crazy to put "international prestige" over the virtual certainty that Omicron will wedge in with the Olympics and cause huge economic damage to China. Also a nasty lie when you look at all the proclamations of putting health first.
But in general the Olympics has become a kind of insanity. The positive economic side is tiny compared to the costs, and when things go bad (as in 2020 and this year, too), the
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The Olympics put massive strains on any city government. They're really a losing event and no mayor with long term plans should ever desire to host one. Massive amounts of stuff have to be built for little payoff.
With CCP controlling everything, they can easily shift things around to make up for the loss better than non-autocratic states, but it still eats away at China's bottom line. It's a dying breath for a dying empire that will be sure to try to bite into Taiwan and pull it down in its jaws.
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My position on China (and towards Xi) is rather more nuanced, but I was specifically referring primarily to the medical costs of mass hospitalizations. There is substantial evidence that China's own vaccines are not that great, and when you consider the total size of the population, it looks like they are liable to have a major medical disaster within a few months of Omicron breaking the containment. And I think that is now inevitable.
It doesn't make much rational sense, even in the limited financial focus
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NAK
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The Olympics don't have to be be an event that loses massive amounts of money. When they are held in places that already have most of the facilities, like the 1984 games in Los Angeles, they can actually turn a profit. The 1996 games in Atlanta also made a very small profit; that event needed more new facilities but they were mostly built with private investment. The upcoming 2028 Summer Olympics in LA are also likely to be profitable.
Those examples were all Summer Olympics; what about winter? Salt Lake Cit
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Do you realize that you sound like an irrational liar? With a peculiar smell that might be bigotry ior racism ior senility xor possibly even the stale smell of a corpse account faking it for money?
Returning to the story, in the case of Omicron, it would be a true claim. But Xi should still be liable because hosting the Olympics was optional, not imposed upon China. That was only the starting point. Your "reply" did nothing to advance the thread. (Well, actually there could be a tangential but deeper linkage
pants on head level stupid (Score:1)
The difference between 1.8 (Influenza CFR) and 280 (COVID-19 CFR) should be easy for you to grasp. But it probably contradicts your gut feeling and politics. Rather than adapt to reality, you chose to destroy it. That's certainly ... a choice.
MSNBC's fault (Score:2)
The Olympics are also kind of hard to watch, if you're in the US.
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MSNBC isn't showing any Olympics this time around. Previously it caused them to have to produce news shows for international feeds that couldn't see the American coverage.
CNBC on the other hand has preempted Fast Money and Mad Money without giving them other time slots, so they may be at fault for the down market this week.
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Fire up the vpn and watch the feed from Canada.
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I'm watching it on OTA TV channel 11-3 KNTV-HD in Bay Area. Costs me zero to watch.
Certainly better than previous Olympics where it was behind a huge paywall.
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You can't just ... turn on a tv to a free to air channel and watch it, or tell your set top box to record it and watch it later?
I mean, isn't the USA the land of the free, with more tv channels than hot meals?
Why can't you watch the Olympics?
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USA is the land of exclusive licensing deals.
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No sex fest (Score:3)
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Re:No sex fest (Score:5, Informative)
that is already showing clear signs of causing heart problems, blood clots and reproductive tract issues with tens, if not hundreds of thousands of people, in every country.
False. There are no reproductive tract issues. What you are referring to is a possible temporary change to a woman's period [nytimes.com].
“I want to make sure we dissuade people from those untrue myths out there about fertility effects,” Dr. Taylor said. “A cycle or two where periods are thrown off may be annoying, but it’s not going to be harmful in a medical way.”
But you know what can cause harm to fertility or even a possible child? Being an unvaccinated woman and contracting Covid-19 [yahoo.com].
“We have never seen this level of destruction from an infectious illness before. It rendered the placenta unfit to carry out its duties,” said Dr. David Schwartz, a perinatal pathologist in private practice in Atlanta, who led the study. “These fetuses and newborns died from asphyxiation due to lack of oxygen.”
“It’s almost the exact opposite of what we see in other infectious diseases like zika, rubella or syphilis,” he said. “It’s not the fetus that is being attacked and destroyed by the virus. It’s the placenta.”
As to your other two whinings, you know what else causes heart problems and blood clots? Covid-19 [upi.com].
The analysis of U.S. health data found COVID-19 patients are at increased risk of heart complications for at least a year after infection.
Those complications include heart rhythm problems, inflammation, blood clots, stroke, coronary artery disease, heart attack, heart failure and death, according to findings published recently in the journal Nature Medicine.
"For people who were clearly at risk for a heart condition before becoming infected with SARS-CoV-2, the findings suggest that COVID-19 may amplify the risk," said senior author Dr. Ziyad Al-Aly, an assistant professor of medicine at Washington University in St. Louis. "But most remarkably, people who have never had any heart problems and were considered low-risk are also developing heart problems after COVID-19."
If you don't want to get vaccinated, fine. But then you don't get to go to the hospital and take up valuable bed space. You knew better than the experts, you can suffer the consequences of your knowledge. And if you die, don't expect sympathy.
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We built the hospitals long before Covid-19 was a thing because, surprise, people need hospitals for other things too!
Re: No sex fest (Score:2)
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Do you have an actual source for that?
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False. There are no reproductive tract issues.
Of course not. Don't feed the troll. The stupid fuckwit does not even know the difference between a drug and a vaccine.
Re: No sex fest (Score:1)
Interesting quotes, they look almost believable. Care to provide citations
Even the snow is fake. (Score:2)
Comment removed (Score:5, Funny)
It's sad for a wholly different reason (Score:5, Insightful)
The fact the games are even still being held there at in China is sad given the fate of the Uyghur minority there.
The petty complaints of a sparse Olympic Games pales in comparison to rape, torture and concentration camps.
Sorry Uyghur, I guess you were the wrong kind of Muslim and the world chose to ignore your plight.
Re:It's sad for a wholly different reason (Score:5, Insightful)
I've met a few, the ones I met were really nice. I am really sad that China is committing atrocities against them
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I've met a few, the ones I met were really nice. I am really sad that China is committing atrocities against them
Since we are doing anecdotes, my experience in China was different. Still, even thieves and scammers do not deserve to be sent to concentration camps.
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Western governments don't try and wipe out entire cultures just because they harbor terrorists. They try and wipe out the terrorists, they don't always do a good job at that, but they do their best. China is different, they make no distinction for human decency. They harvest organs, use forced labor and other horrible things against their own people.
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Re:It's sad for a wholly different reason (Score:4, Insightful)
They are a muslim population and the news is full of what happens in regions where that particular sky-friend is the dominant ideology.
It is never happy news either.
I am much more concerned with the harvesting of donor organs from the Falun Gong:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/... [wikipedia.org]
Or the annexing of Hong Kong and Tibet and no doubt soon Taiwan.
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Re: It's sad for a wholly different reason (Score:2)
This piece of shit saying that Uighurs deserve it and is upvoted to the sky.
Fuck you, you miserable piece of shit
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Can someone who is not a bot for china take the troll mod off these posts? It's really disturbing that someone could even mark these as 'troll' (unless they were working for china)
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Did anyone miss all the terror attacks committed by Uighurs against the Chinese? They would run through train stations hacking everyone they saw with machetes. It was January 6, only many times over. The Uighurs are separatists who want to secede from China. Do you think the Chinese just decided one day to start for no reason?
Sorry, but it's only terrorism when you hurt White People's feelings...
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Are you implying that it's ok to imprison huge numbers of innocent people, commit genocide and have huge dystopian brain washing concentration camps (and more) because of what some terrorist did?
That makes you some kind of racist/bigot.
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I do take a dim view of religions. Killing people for what they think is worse than people being religious. The problem with humans isn't what they believe, it the laziness that those people have that they choose to let others do their thinking for them, many atheists are just as stupid and dangerous as religious people in this respect. Far too many atheists they may not be religious but instead of a sky fairy they believe the planet they live on somehow has practically infinite resources and nothing bad wi
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It's certainly not our fight. What I don't get is that supposedly China is genociding Muslims, and yet where are the terror attacks? We did far less than this and we got a global jihad declared against us followed by the worst day in American history, where more Americans died than even at Pearl Harbor. And if you want to say China is closed due to the pandemic, they can easily get at China's overseas outposts, just like Muslims attacked American embassies and companies all over the world.
If there were
Re: It's sad for a wholly different reason (Score:2)
A few reasons.
One, many Muslim countries get aid from China.
Two, many Chinese Muslim minorities are not be targeted.
Three it's not as bad as the West is saying it is and must Muslims know America lies about these things.
Four, the actions being taken target Chinese citizens on sovereign Chinese territory.With the except that in Afghanistan the Chinese are helping deal with Uyghurs there whom once again represent a terrorist group bent on separatism -- and that's the Taliban calling Uyghurs "terrorists"... fu
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Re: It's sad for a wholly different reason (Score:2)
Muslim countries get aid from America primarily after we invade. Most aid or building projects do not go to countries we consider our enemies or harbors for them. I am happy to be corrected but please provide some proof.
But it's not that bad. It's systemic cultural assimilation which people are calling cultural genocide but go back to Tibet where the same happened and no one called it genocide. In fact the guy who first wrote about these camps in Xinjiang also wrote about them in Tibet and yet again the foc
Re: It's sad for a wholly different reason (Score:2)
Qinghai, not Qingdao. Typo.
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Oh, a sexpat. Hey, do everyone a favor and stay there.
I bet you don't know that the lamas in Tibet had the entire population enslaved until the Red Army marched in and started educating women. Now all Tibetan women can read. Scientific athiests stomping religious nutbags. Go ahead and cheer, it's OK.
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Oh... so you're just a fucking idiot. Got it.
You don't fucking go to Qinghai to be a sexpat. You basically go there because either 1) you're a missionary 2) you're a pakistani, or [be prepared for mind to be blown] 3) you actually believe there are things to learn in the world, especially in the most obscure places.
If you are a sexpat, there is Shanghai, Chongqing, Thailand, Japan... there are basically countless other places to get your dick wicked and simultaneously continue to eat the dogfood of being we
Gimme a break! (Score:2, Insightful)
China may be an authoritarian society. but that has nothing to do with this.
These athletes trained for decades, with demanding training regimes. They made a lot of sacrifices in the pursuit of excellence. Then they entered the country without COVID ( I don't know what exact protocol they had, either they had to enter negative, or quarantine until negative, or whatever). OK, now all they had to do was avoid getting infected. Compared to what they done for years and years, not getting infected should be easy
Re: Gimme a break! (Score:3, Insightful)
Or it could be that the reported C19 rates in China were always bullshit and it is significantly more prevalent than they let on. Then all they would have to do is use fake tests for their own athletes and foreign athletes and staff would naturally catch it and be sent to the gulag, sorry, quarantine.
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Sure, that could happen. But given that host nations with strong sporting cultures do well in Olympics, is China's performance unusually good?
Also, do we know that no Chinese athletes tested positive?
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"All these athletes" implies some huge percentage. But seems like the rate is consistent with tests that aren't 100% accurate, and so sme athletes or support staff unknowingly spreading it.
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An athlete goes to the land that tried to cover up the first covid infections and that is the origin of the virus, and gets infected, and you blame the athlete?
You are a moron of the highest caliber.
Doesn't pass the sniffle test. (Score:5, Insightful)
Blaming the victims will lead to blaming everyone, once everyone's had it.
No, I haven't caught it yet. Not patting myself on the back for that, and I fully expect to catch it at some point.
Strangely enough. (Score:1)
Nobody cares.
China sucks (Score:1)
Re: Forgot Tokyo Olympics? (Score:2)
Because Jaoan is a US ally...
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Re: irrational, backwards measures. (Score:2)
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add a comma and a phrase to each one and it's easy and funny.
", is what goddamned idiots think"
", is what a tin foil hat wearing nutjob thinks"
etc.
China and Freedom. bwahahahahaha (Score:5, Insightful)
Not even an Olympic athlete can that naive.
I assume they all had to go for their contracts, and their sponsors, but I cannot imagine a single athlete went willingly.
Also, it used to be, as the author said, 'an ebullient, global sporting bonanza' but for the past few decades it has been 'an ebullient, global finance bonanza'.
Not really sure where sports come into play anymore.
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I have been to China, and the level of freedom was comparable to the UK.
The only time I encountered police was at the airport where my wife asked them for directions. There are surveillance cameras all over the place, including ones on roads, but the UK has that too.
The internet censorship was far worse. Slashdot was accessible but most Google services were blocked, as was the BBC. On the other hand border security was much less invasive and was more welcoming than the UK. Coming back to the UK I've been sc
Big deal (Score:2, Insightful)
Hardly (Score:5, Insightful)
They have always been sad.
Amateurs from small and or poor countries against highly paid professionals with million dollar sponsoring.
Who watches that?
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Herb Brooks: "... now that we have dream teams, we seldom ever get the dream."
Anybody still interested in the Olympics? (Score:2)
I talked to someone who's interested. (Score:2)
This is the only person I know who's watching.
Me, I care somewhat about human rights. But there's not much I can do about that. Gongfei gonna gongfei. Xi doesn't give a flip what I think.
Nice double standard (Score:2)
Look on the bright side! (Score:3)
Look at it this way. Here in the US, the TV network who has the rights to the games, NBC, in this case, love to saturate their shows with sob stories about the trials and tribulations athletes had to endure to make it to the show. If there is another winter olympics in 4 years, they'll have plenty of material from the chinese olympics of '22 that veteran athletes had to endure. At least it'll be a break from the usual tales: death of a sibling or pet, sick parent, paper cuts, and hang nails. Of course, like this year and the last several winter and summer games, I won't be watching.
Olympics we deserve (Score:3)
We should have skipped the Olympics (Score:1)
West is copying China (Score:1)