In contrast to the media coverage earlier in the year when the People’s Republic of China suffered such an overwhelming public relations disaster in the context of protests from human rights and Tibetan activists against the Olympic torch, very little has been heard of Tibet in the mainstream media of late. All that we’ve seen lately in the Australian press is the solemn warnings from the Australian Olympics Committee that any athletes wearing an innocuous t-shirt with a generic human rights message offered to those interested by the Australia Tibet Council would be immediately sent home. Lest they annoy the Chinese government, and violate the “spirit of the Olympics” presumably. The corporate sponsored Olympiad brooks no petty “mixing” of politics and sport, of course.
Terry Hill and Gorden (Raging Bull”) Tallis were not the brightest sparks who ever played State of Origin rugby league, but their 1999 confrontation provided perhaps the most emblematic photo of the ferocious interstate rivalry. That’s Laurie Daley’s then receding hairline in the background, now miraculously restored.
And so it has come to this. New South Wales and Queensland with one win each in the 2008 State of Origin campaign. ANZ Stadium in Sydney is the host for Origin III, the decider. It is a ground for which Queensland has little love. But after blowing New South Wales off the park in Origin 2, the Cane Toads are deserved favourites (though they will still try and claim underdog status).
Thurston, Inglis, Prince, Folau. A dream combination which could be a nightmare for New South Wales. Thurston enjoys the extra room at five-eight and so does Inglis. He was sent on many a raid down the left side of the field by Thurston in game 2. An obvious tactic for New South Wales is to keep Inglis quiet. And that means shutting Thurston down.
The structure of elite-level cricket competition is virtually unique. Soccer, rugby, the various American codes - you name it, they’re all based around clubs which are free to recruit players from where they choose, rather than representation from the country or state where one was born - though at the sub-elite level, England’s county teams have been full of Australian players for decades.
The recent Indian Premier League Twenty20 competition was strikingly different, with many of the world’s elite players distributed around the various teams like a schoolyard pick-up game. And, according to cricketer-turned-businessman Neil Maxwell, it’s the way of the future, and the cricket establishment must deal with it or miss out:
WORLD cricket is on an irreversible path towards a franchise club system in which players will be free to participate in three Twenty20 competitions and earn millions from contracts alone…Maxwell also believes that if Test cricket and player development are to feature in the revolution, governing bodies such as Cricket Australia must act fast.
Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more,
Or close the wall up with our Queensland dead!
In peace there’s nothing so becomes a man
As modest stillness and humility;
But when the blast of war blows in our ears,
Then imitate the action of the tiger:
Stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood.
Apologies to The Bard!
Yes, it’s time for State of Origin 2 in the year of our Lord 2008.
The time has come, the walrus said… Oops! I’ll start again.
The time has come to begin the the greatest contest, the longest stoush, in the greatest game of all. Well that’s the view of the 0.0000000001% of the world population that follow rugby league. Tonight we have the first State of Origin match, where the cane toads take on the cockeroaches from south of the Tweed in the opening stoush in enemy territory where the reviled Blues have won 10 out of the 12 matches played. This on one of the most unsuitable venues for the game in the country, a round field for a rectangular game, for Chrissake, and a slippery surface unsuitable for grazing cows, or anything useful really.
It’s part of the dark plot by the game’s governing body, where NSW always has the numbers, to tip the odds their way. As is the adoption of the 10 replacement rule, specifically requested by the NSW coach, as against the 12 replacement rule used in international competition, when any donkey knows that SOO is faster and more furious than any international game we are likely to play.
Andrew Bartlett dissects for us the official goals of the “Olympic movement”:
* “Olympism seeks to create a way of life based on the joy of effort, the educational value of good example and respect for universal fundamental ethical principles.”
* “The goal of Olympism is to place sport at the service of the harmonious development of man, with a view to promoting a peaceful society concerned with the preservation of human dignity.”
* “The practice of sport is a human right. Every individual must have the possibility of practising sport, without discrimination of any kind and in the Olympic spirit, which requires mutual understanding with a spirit of friendship, solidarity and fair play.”
* “Any form of discrimination with regard to a country or a person on grounds of race, religion, politics, gender or otherwise is incompatible with belonging to the Olympic Movement.”
But sport has nothing to do with politics, does it? Thorpey said so. And a gaggle of superannuated IOC bureaucrats/marketing men. (They all appear to be men. What’s with that?)
Andrew goes on to detail the fact that human rights abuses in China go far beyond Tibet. It’s a great post. Go read!
The dense booklet, which was overseen by former prime minister John Howard, describes the uses of the stump-jump plough, the emergence of the Heidelberg school of art, the location of Phar Lap’s heart and depicts Australia’s first governor, Captain Arthur Phillip, as “firm but humane”.
It’d be nice if the Rudd government grasped the bit between its teeth and just scrapped the citizenship test. Do we really need a Rudd-era one to supplant the Howard-era farce? Would anyone care except Planet Janet?
I’m fairly sure Chris Evans - the Immigration Minister - doesn’t believe it has any value. What will be gained by setting up a review panel? And, incidentally, why is there a “former Olympian” on the panel anyway? To put a word in for teh sport? To carry the torch for that warm and fuzzy feeling of the unity of humankind we get when we think about sporting contests? If there’s any political pain in getting rid of such a nonsense, surely taking it now rather than stretching out the debate would be good politics. After all, when you’re riding so high in the polls, you can afford to take a few decisions which might be right but not universally acclaimed.
China’s Foreign Ministry have warned against protests in Canberra because the torch “belongs to the whole world”. That the corrupt thugs who run China (latest effort – dispatching a boatload of weapons to fellow despot Bob Mugabe) object to expressions of dissent even in other countries is no surprise. But let’s get over this fetishisation of the Olympics.
Year after year the same faces, the Kevin Gospers and John Coateses who are apparently on the Olympics gravy train for life, stand up to declare that it’s all about the sport, or world peace, or the youth of the world. In fact it’s a giant media event designed to generate massive revenue which, this time around, is being employed to promote one of the world’s most brutal regimes.
And you can see where these sports administrators come from. Just about every athlete or sports person parrots the same lines about sport having nothing to do with politics or, for that matter, morality, as if sports – professional, international sport, in all its cash-generating glory – is somehow a priori disconnected from basic ethics and standards of civilized behaviour.
For those planning to have a crack at disrupting the relay, or who just want to marvel at some wonderful security overkill, the event kicks off at 8.30am tomorrow morning.
The location? Reconciliation Place. That’s Olympian-level irony.
While we (or most of us at any rate) were asleep, the Guardian’s Eleanor Schor was liveblogging the progress of the Olympic torch relay/rally through San Francisco. Or rather, on a boat circumnavigating San Francisco.
Watching from Kiwiland, No Right Turn asks a pertinent question:
Is it a relay if no-one can see it?
According to the Guardian’s liveblog, the torch has since returned to land, a significant distance from its original route, and it may not even finish at the original location. So, they have no protestors - but no spectators either. So much for taking the torch to the people…
Update: According to the Students for a free Tibet liveblog, one of the torchbearers pulled a Tibetan flag, and had the torch taken away.
Meanwhile, Kevin Rudd has got up the goat of the leader of the Tibet Autonomous Region, Qiangba Puncog:
Asked about previous criticisms by Mr Rudd, Mr Qiangba, a Tibetan Chinese, said: “Australia and other countries should have a better appreciation and understanding that people in Tibet are now enjoying democracy and wonderful human rights protection and those remarks are totally unfounded.”
Whatever. They can’t expect anyone outside China to take that seriously. Obviously it’s part of their typical Maoist-era information control tactics, and to warn Rudd not to press them too hard on human rights. It’s to his credit that he’s undaunted.
The Liberal Party is demanding that Kevin Rudd and federal ministers boycott the Olympics opening ceremony.
However, federal Small Business Minister Craig Emerson said a political boycott would damage the spirit of the Olympics.
Why?
What’s interesting about the current conjuncture, according to Henry Farrell of Crooked Timber is the shift from inter-state politics to the politics of protest:
The current debacle though seems to mark an important change in the politics of the Olympics. As best I understand it (I am open to corrections if wrong), in the past, Olympics politics have concerned inter-state rivalry, and have been driven by decisions on the part of traditional political elites. The US boycott of the Soviet games in protest against the invasion of Afghanistan in 1980 resulted from a decision by Jimmy Carter, and the tit-for-tat boycott by the Soviets and their allies of the LA games in 1984 resulted from a top level decision too. The dynamic driving the Beijing Olympics seems to me to be rather different; what we are seeing is that the politics of boycott is being driven by mass-publics, and most recently by protestors, rather than by political leaders. In the absence of the public unrest that has culminated in the recent protests in Paris, I doubt very much that Western political leaders would be muttering about not showing at the opening ceremonies – the geopolitical stakes of market access etc are likely more important to them than the fate of Tibetans. But given the widespread public reaction in the West, even leaders like Gordon Brown, who obviously want very much to attend, are having to insulate themselves from public pressures by taking other actions liable to annoy China (such as meeting with the Dalai Lama). In short, I think we are seeing how public opinion and organized cross-national opposition can create significant constraints on the ability of leaders to respond to what they see as the geostrategic necessity of keeping China happy. This is, as best as I am aware, a new phase in the development of the Olympics.
Who came up with the bright idea that holding the Olympics in China would improve its human rights performance? Worked a treat in 1936 and 1980, didn’t it?
It’s doubtful what the protests against the torch relay will achieve, but props to the protesters. The only way these things ever get sorted is through the courage and will never to give up, and to make your point at the point of maximum impact and leverage. Meanwhile, the “sport separate from politics” narrative is fracturing before our eyes. And it seems to be doggingthe steps of our Dear Leader as he travels across the world (next stop - China…)
One suspects a comedic musical about errant ex-footballer Wayne Carey would be a very black look at the psyche of a certain kind of male (not sure what song from Hairspray the cast might break into when Carey hits his girlfriend with a glass).
A less difficult subject for funny songs is the blokey but unthreatening Shane Warne, the former spin bowler with a beer gut, and a, errr, big thing for blondes.
Eddie Perfect, who more than entertained at last year’s Melbourne International Comedy Festival (MICF) with his turn as a kinky Alexander Downer, has returned to MICF in 2008 with a sneak peek at his upcoming ShaneWarne:TheMusical.
I’m impressed that the shoulder-charge was textbook in execution for a man who only trains recreationally with the League. The streaker is most unlikely to have any permanent injury to anything more than his pride. Still, was Symonds’ response appropriate to the trespassing nuisance, or was it indefensible thuggery?
Larvatus Prodeo is an Australian group blog which discusses politics, sociology, culture, life, religion and science from a left of centre perspective. more»
In contrast to the media coverage earlier in the year when the People’s Republic of China suffered such an overwhelming public relations disaster in the context of protests from human rights and Tibetan activists against the Olympic torch, very little has been heard of Tibet in the mainstream media of late. All that we’ve seen lately in the Australian press is the solemn warnings from the Australian Olympics Committee that any athletes wearing an innocuous t-shirt with a generic human rights message offered to those interested by the Australia Tibet Council would be immediately sent home. Lest they annoy the Chinese government, and violate the “spirit of the Olympics” presumably. The corporate sponsored Olympiad brooks no petty “mixing” of politics and sport, of course.
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