London 2012 Olympics

sport can be a political tool, yes, but the long sporting boycott of south africa accomplished nothing to end apartheid - the world just moved on and the old hardline nationalist men (Botha and his cronies) died or moved out of power (combined with sustained trade restrictions and political pressure). nor did the boycott of the moscow olympics affect soviet policy in afghanistan - they pulled out when it got too expensive. i think change in tibet is likely to follow a similar course, china is gradually loosening up anyway and getting more liberalised, and protesting against the olympics being held in beijing is basically useless. raising awareness and increasing political pressure on the chinese government over a sustained period will be far more effective.

unfortunately most western economies are far too dependent on chinese-produced goods (and in some cases, like Australia, on china buying raw materials) to really put pressure on them in a trade boycott sense.

to make this relevant, there are lots of bicycles in china (not sure if they're fixed though).

well said.

thing is, it's very obvious why the protestors didn't choose another time to start a fire. they could obviously have done it any other time before.

i'd like to add that i think most people are actually rather ill-informed of the whole issue due to the way it is portrayed in the media. to be honest, anyone who thinks that this is a protest about china's human right's records doesn't know half of the story. tibet independence is a very complicated issue - the population consists of at 3 major ethnic groups and that means it could well end up like what was known as yugoslavia if the original tibetans simply declare independence. also, whatever is happening there at the moment - the riots, the suppression, equates to nothing apart from suffering at the level of the common citizen (both protestors on the street level and the army that was sent there). the chinese government was blamed for suppressing without negotiating - but was there any chance for them to negotiate? that's exactly what the minds behind the protests are obviously aiming for - they wouldn't open up their doors for any form of negotiation. in fact the suppression is pretty much your standard issue riot suppression policy of any other government on the planet (well, done the chinese way). there isn't a clean, easy solution to this. all this is obviously done to garner western media attention at this very time. the dalai lama has also been rather quiet about the whole thing. he's a great great spiritual leader, but also a politician all the same, and he knows how to play his cards.

yes, i'm chinese, but i'm not taking sides on this issue. i just think i'd like to voice my opinion as it seems that everyone is summing up the thing as 'chinese government violence'. the fact is there are injured soldiers and burning army vehicles you weren't shown.

bicycle numbers in beijing are dropping. as they get more affluent they prefer cars - it's a status symbol. it's getting like america now, get in the car for a journey you could have done in 3minutes walking, or even worse, just driving around in a car for the sake of driving it. vanity.