Spain’s Olympic basketball teams ignited a furor over separate photographs showing the men’s and women’s teams posing while using their fingers to make themselves slant-eyed. They were going to China, get it? It’s amazing that the pictures, a promotion for a team sponsor, didn’t set off bad taste alarms with anyone.
Some defended the pictures as being done in a spirit of fun. Even granting that, these images were offensive and never likely to endear the Spaniards to their Chinese hosts.
21 Comments
Were the Olympics in Africa, would the team have rolled towels up inside their pants?
The article linked here really is mostly background/opinion. I’ve read elsewhere that the furor is mostly among Chinese Americans, not the Chinese themselves. Yes, the pictures were a dumb idea, and I think someone like Pau Gasol, at least, with his lengthy NBA experience, could have foreseen a negative reaction to something like this. At the same time I’m a little more concerned and offended about what the Chinese do in Tibet and Darfur, where people are being slaughtered, than what the Spanish basketball players do in an insensitive photo shoot.
Generalissimo Fransisco Franco will take care of such nonsense as soon as he wakes up from his long winters nap.
Oh my God. We sure can’t offend the ChiComs. Do the Chinese really even know or care about this? Or is this the ravings of the liberal/progressive PC crowd. Heres an idea. Why don’t you take your sensitivity training and stick it.
As a proud member of the one class of people ( white, Christian, hetro, male) that it is still fair game for any and all to bash and make fun of with impunity, I demand that all other classes of people on planet Earth immediately attend sensitivity training. Or in lieu of that, lets just abolish free speech worldwide and severely punish anybody who dares to say or do anything that might even remotely be construed as offensive to someone else. Oh, I forgot, we are already well on the way to that, aren’t we.
“Political Correctness”, “Civil Rights” and “Women’s Equality” are distinctly American ideas. I remember a black Marine who made an ass of himself in a Tokyo bar. The owner called the cops. When the cops got there, the Marine mouthed off and got beat up pretty good. He screamed about how his civil rights were being violated as he was dragged out the door in cuffs and leg restraints. News flash: in Japan, there are no civil rights.
The Spaniards have no concept of what you’re complaining about and don’t care.
I forgot, the Spanish already do that.
I think the US Team just gave them a little “sensitivity” training.
Goooooooo USA!
I always root for the other guys.
Meanwhile, many Democrats, on this Blog, make fun of the religious clothing of Mormons.
Non-news
No big deal. The Chinese got revenge by giving out gold colored medals made of lead.
“Spanish sport has been placed under severe scrutiny for a number of recent incidents, including the monkey chants aimed at England’s black football players by football fans at a November 2004 friendly international in Madrid, for which the Spanish football federation was fined by world governing body Fifa.”
Have any of you read up on the link?
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Franklin
Posted August 16, 2008 at 12:01 pm | Permalink
Meanwhile, many Democrats, on this Blog, make fun of the religious clothing of Mormons.
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I believe that falls under, stupid, boring and utterly phony headlines.
The Chinese are assholes, go ask a Tibetan
JM
It happened.
Several of the Democrat/Liberal posters on this Blog have made “magic underwear” comments, concerning Mitt Romney.
You, JM, are just so partisan that you never notice a fault in anyone who happens to be on your side of the argument.
And YOU Paul “Franklin” Rosell most likely wear george w. bush underoos.
Oh yeah, “Franklin” –
How dare those “Democrat/Liberal poster” point out reality! Sure gets in the way of your political agenda, doesn’t it?
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Franklin
Posted August 17, 2008 at 11:54 am | Permalink
JM
It happened.
Several of the Democrat/Liberal posters on this Blog have made “magic underwear” comments, concerning Mitt Romney.
You, JM, are just so partisan that you never notice a fault in anyone who happens to be on your side of the argument.
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One person makes a snide comment, and you’re going nuts? And you ain’t guilty of doing the same thing? Are you now claiming you’re so un-partisan you have never posted internet bs about Obama?
I believe everything you write falls under, “I believe that falls under, stupid, boring and utterly phony headlines.”
By the way, you still ain’t answered XXX’s question.
When I lived in China, some teen-agers used to look at me with their fingers circled around their eyes–i.e., look at the “round eyes.”
Who cares? It’s true, I have round eyes.
What the Spaniards did was immature and boorish, but it’s not racist, IMHO.
That reminds me–when I lived in Japan, 15 year olds loved to practice the only English phrase they knew when they saw me: “f*** you.”
Except the Japanese have a problem with that word. Their “F” sound is pronounced something like our H or W, so I came out as “HWuck you.”
It was too funny to get mad about . . .
me i don’t know, but i’m not really sure it’s would be ok 4 my family. KIT