From flame to firestorm
Olympic Torch relay focuses world's eyes on China's rights issues
It was in July 2001 -- on Friday the 13th -- that the International Olympic Committee awarded the 2008 Summer Games to China.
The tapping of Beijing, the huge capital city within the still-inscrutable country of 1.3 billion, was a shocker to many because China was then, as it is now, a massive, reclusive, homogeneous place riddled with human-rights and essential-freedom issues.
(AP file)
Even based on the simplest of criteria -- the ability to put on a modern and efficient Games -- Beijing was a reach.
As the International Herald Tribune wrote on the day before the announcement, choosing Beijing ''would be a gamble because Beijing's current condition does not warrant such a selection. The transportation and lodging infrastructure is quite inadequate, the city is blanketed by pollution and snarled by traffic, and many other aspects of daily life in the Chinese capital require improvement.''
Improvement certainly has come.
It came to Athens in 2004, and it came to Seoul in 1988, as it has come to other cities deemed lacking essentials.
Indeed, you send a lot of your citizens to the countryside, ban automobiles for a good stretch, and you even can change the color of the sky.
But for about 6½ years, most of the world has been distracted from the proceedings within China and Beijing -- specifically, lost in the immediacy of our own conflicts and fiscal issues -- and only now is that haunted award of 2001 starting to show its turbulent nature.
The ambitious Chinese Olympic torch relay, an over-the-top, 4½-month journey around the globe featuring nearly 22,000 runners and venturing to all continents but Antarctica, has become a flashpoint of anger and protest since it left China on April 2.
In London and Paris, protesters tried to extinguish the flame and near-riots ensued as the torch traveled through the streets in what stunned Chinese organizers had hoped would be a joyous celebration of brotherhood and good will.
But there are those who have grown nauseated with the Chinese abuse of human rights in the independence-seeking province of Tibet and with the Chinese business relationship with Sudan, which has inflamed and promoted the genocide in Darfur.
What goes on in China may stay in China.
But when China ventures in the world, there's a whole different ballgame going on.
The real reason China was given the Olympics was to promote fundamental change there and to propel the Communist country toward democracy and openness through reward and back-patting and adherence to rules.
As the IOC noted in its recommendation that preceded the favorable vote, ''a Beijing Games would leave a unique legacy to China and to sports.''
Yes, but it also could leave a fissure that could undermine the good intentions of the IOC and the very essence of China itself.
If you want to know about Chinese propaganda or its devotion to freedom of the press -- perhaps the most fundamental of democratic principles -- just read the official news story from the Chinese Olympics Web site of the chaos that took place April 7 in Paris:
''The fifth leg of the Beijing Olympic Torch Relay kicked off at the Eiffel Tower in Paris, France, at 12:30 (GMT +2) on April 7. Here, a 27-year-old woman named Jin Jing, the third torchbearer in the relay, garnered much attention from media for her bravery.
''A wheelchair user, Jin of Shanghai, China, had been repositioned one kilometer off the original course due to last-minute modifications to the route.
''Carrying the torch on the new course along the Seine River, Jin demonstrated great valor when a 'pro-Tibet independence' activist, attempting to disrupt and sabotage the torch relay, reached for her wheelchair and lunged toward her. Without concern for her own safety, Jin did her best to protect the flame, her face exhibiting courage and pride in spite of the chaotic situation.
''In that moment, it was easy to see why her friends call her the 'smiling angel in a wheelchair.'''
Well, Jin may be the bravest soul around. But expecting the Olympic torch to appear to people only as a symbol of innocence and brotherhood -- without acknowledging that those same qualities must be exhibited in spades by the host nation -- is either naivete or arrogance.
The United States is not pure, and it can only be hoped that our athletes are asked as much about our own venturings in the Middle East as they are about Chinese repression of Tibetan monks.
Already, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Nicolas Sarkozy have said they likely will not attend the Opening Ceremony, a huge affront to the Chinese, a people who care deeply about appearances.
We can only hope athletes don't boycott the actual sporting events of the Games, since we have seen the disaster of such self-imposed sacrifices, in both the 1980 and 1984 Games, by first Western and then Eastern Bloc athletes.
Yet the current Olympic storm is growing, as perhaps it should.
We don't live in a bell jar, no matter what the Olympic credo wishes for.
Today, the torch is scheduled to pass through San Francisco.
And more rioting is expected.
The Beijing Olympic motto is ''One World, One Dream.''
Could it be a nightmare forming?