Dick Pound (love this name btw) and the IOC

The BBQ Pit
1

So, Mr. Dick here is a member of the IOC and recently gave an interview defending the IOCs decision to award the winter games to China. Here is the article I’ll be quoting from in a bit, for anyone wanting to read through it. Basically, most of this is just the standard bullshit handwaving and trying to have it both ways. One part of this, however, rubbed me the wrong way, so I felt I’d go ahead and pit Mr. Dick and the IOC and give them a hearty Fuck You(tm…arr)!!

Based on my previous Pit experience, this will probably mean this will all be turned around on me, but what the hell…consider it an early Christmas gift to all those who want to flame me! :stuck_out_tongue:

Anyway, here is the part that rubbed me the wrong way:

Pound was asked what would happen if an Olympic athlete, during the Games, posted on social media about reported genocide against Uyghurs.

“I don’t know enough of the facts about this,” he said. “I hear them, see them in the media, but you know enough about your own media to know that sometimes what is asserted as a fact is not necessarily so. It would be helpful if there was an independent review of what was going on and so forth. Maybe that’s a step the Chinese would be prepared to consider.”

Basically, he’s calling the Uyghur genocide fake news, and also…what a joke to suggest the Chinese would allow an independent review! Basically, he’s counting on his target audience being so bone stupid ignorant that they think this is an actual, actionable suggestion and Mr. Dick is being reasonable!

Some other things that annoyed me, in no particular order (just venting here):

“In the sense of having a host country that could organize and put on excellent Games from a Games perspective, there is absolutely nothing wrong with China,” Pound said. “It’s a very good and very organized country.”

Well…the fact that there isn’t any snow, and there NEVER is any snow at this facility, might be a thing wrt a host country hosting the WINTER OLYMPICS. Just a thought. I mean, even if we leave aside the whole genocide stuff, the horrible environmental conditions, the stifling of speech and heavy-handed actions in Hong Kong, the whole organ harvesting thingy…leaving all of that minor stuff aside, maybe ensuring the host country actually has snow for the winter games might be a good thing. :stuck_out_tongue:

“I must say I’m really puzzled by that assessment of it,” Pound told Amanpour when asked what he said to those who felt it was an unsatisfactory intervention. “Basically, lots of people around the world were looking to see what happened to Peng. Nobody was able to establish contact. Only the IOC was able to do so.”

Well sure, Mr. Dick…that kind of begs the question though, don’t you think? I mean…why ARE you guys the only ones who can establish contact? It’s a puzzlement, to be sure…

Good grief…what a Pound this guy is. He really needs to go Pound Dick…

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To be honest, the IOC didn’t have many options. The only other interested party was Kazakhstan.

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Gah…I hate when reason gets in the way of a rant!! :stuck_out_tongue:

Ok, yes…that’s a valid reason. And if the IOC basically said ‘yeah, the CCP are dicks, but our only other choice was Kazakhstan, which isn’t exactly a model of human rights!’ I’d probably be ok with that. But it’s pretty clear that the IOC is running interference for the CCP and ready to cave in on demand. I have my doubts that if another, not so heinous country did bid on the Winter Olympics that they would have made a different choice, regardless because…money.

I mean, plus, they actually have an official named Dick Pound, so…fuck them. :laughing:

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They were forced to eat a bowl of shit and are rubbing their belly talking about how good this chocolate pudding is. Because their other alternative is a bowl of arsenic. But I don’t fault you for your rant, because who wouldn’t cringe at someone’s shit-smeared grin, shoving a spoonful of feces at you and asking you to try a bite?

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Sochi, Russia, where the Winter Olympics were held in 2014, has a subtropical climate. They too were basically the highest bidder.

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Indeed so. The number of countries/cities who’ve been willing to make serious bids for Olympic Games has dropped dramatically over the past twenty years, as more and more governments have realized just how much of a boondoggle it is. The Winter Games also suffer from being limited to colder-weather locations (though, as @nearwildheaven notes, that apparently didn’t stop Sochi).

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Breaking news: International sports is fundamentally corrupt. Film at 11.

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Yeah, everyone’s all, “We should boycott the Olympics because of the Chinese,” and I’m here already boycotting the Olympics because of the Olympics.

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Where’s that fucking “like” button?

Oh well. :+1:

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No flaming of the OP from me. The IOC has pissed me off for various reasons for many years.

As most here probably know, a number of major countries have announced a diplomatic boycott of the Chinese Winter Olympics. I don’t know the complete list but I believe the USA initiated it, and Canada and Australia as well as others have joined. In fairness to the athletes, they’ll be able to participate, but there will be no official representation from any of those countries. The Chinese are pissed and are threatening some unspecified retaliation.

The enormous cost of staging Olympic Games is becoming ridiculous and I don’t think it’s sustainable. I think the Olympics will continue but will likely be scaled down to become less grandiose events. Another idea that’s been floated is to host them at one permanent facility, likely Greece as a tribute to the ancient Olympics.

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Which is exactly why Olympics and World Cups keep getting awarded to dictatorships - governments that answer to voters aren’t willing to spend the extravagant amount of grift and big stadiums the organizers want, whereas authoritarian regimes see it as a way to impress their citizens and propagandize to the world about how “modern” and “progressive” their cities are.

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There was an obvious third option, but greed is greed.

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Qatar?

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No-declaring there were no acceptable bids.

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And just skipping the winter Olympics on account of the lack of a viable country to hold the games. I’m all for that and think it should have been considered.

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What reason would the IOC have to declare that the bids from China and Kazakhstan were unacceptable?

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Human rights abuses and genocide? ETA: since we’ve already ruled out that you actually need snow to have a winter games…

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I really doubt the bid requirements call that sort of thing out. And if it did, that would open a whole can of worms of countries pointing out the human rights abuses in other countries. (For example, China might point to the US holding people prisoner in Guantanamo Bay without charges or without trial, or the US bombing civilians in the Middle East, or US police killing civilians.)

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I could see Kazakhstan making this argument with some valid points, but China? What you describe here is nowhere near an actual genocide where millions are in concentration camps simply because of their ethnic makeup, or the 10’s of thousands killed a year for organ harvesting which is for-profit by the state, or even the crackdown in Hong Kong verse your ‘US police killing civilians’…a hand full on the US side verse 10’s of thousands every year on the Chinese side. We aren’t even scratching the surface on the Chinese side here either…just hitting a few highlights.

But, fine by me…the US can’t have games either. No worries.

I think the point is…they should be.