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Yesterday, the U.S. Olympic cycling team arrived at Beijing's airport and their masked visages caused a frenzy. The cyclists wore the U.S. Olympic Committee-designed and issued masks to protect them from Beijing's polluted air. One team member told the NY Times, “They told us that the Chinese were mad and that this is a politically charged issue, but we didn’t mean to offend anybody. When [the USOC] handed us these masks, they never said, ‘Here they are, but don’t wear them.’" Now the team has apologized, saying, "The wearing of protective masks upon our arrival into Beijing was strictly a precautionary measure we as athletes chose to take, and was in no way meant to serve as an environmental or political statement."
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Let me say this much about Beijing air, circa December 2007: My eyes were stinging from the pollution and when I blew my nose, my snot was black. And while it's a dramatic photo to see the cyclists enter Beijing in masks, if you go to Asia (or Chinatown), you'll see people wearing masks because of bird flu fears.
Good ol Beijing pollution...At least the American Athletes didint arrive in their bubble....oh wait, they did.
Obviously the Olympic committee is run by idiots for this situation to have ever come to be (the Olympics in china). Next maybe we should have the Olympics in North Korea.
Chechnya would be better, imo.
If I trained as hard as those athletes do to make it into the Olympics, I would take every precaution to stay healthy until after the competition is over. This is one of those situations where being polite often gets you nowhere.
It can only go downhill from here kids!
China should apologize to the rest of the world for their pollution (and all their other BS)- not the other way around.
The chinese themselves use masks, so what's the big deal?!? Now, what happens if you go to a bank using one of those?
air smair, asthma smasthma
we've given them MacDonald's now we're even.
awaiting "ChiCom" remarks. Norinco 1911
All future olympics should be held in the U.S. Why should they take place in the capital of the next world super power?
As for polluting, China should learn from us Americans with our ultra clean lifestyle. Its not like a good part of the pollution in China occurs while making goods that are eventually shipped here?!?
We didint pollute during our industrial revolution did we?
Where do you get cool black masks like that?
It was politically tone-deaf to show up wearing a mask.
I doubt the air was SO bad that it would have harmed them to arrive without masks. Granted, it wasn't Beijing, but I was in Guangzhou (aka Canton) recently, and it wasn't any different than any other metropolitan area.
I can certainly see how showing up in a mask would be perceived as an insult to the host country.
China should apologize to the rest of the world for their pollution
Yes, China should apologize to US for polluting their environment in manufacturing inexpensive goods for our consumption. If you think that the pressures applied by US and other nations to keep costs down don't have an impact on China's environment, you are sadly mistaken. If China became green and raised prices accordingly, we would take our business to India, or anyplace else we could get the job done for less. Don't be naive.
correction: If you think that the pressures applied by US companies and the companies of other nations to keep costs down don't have an impact on China's environment, you are sadly mistaken.
Dear China,
I, on behalf of every American citizen, wish to apologize for your noxious cloud of dust and fiberglass that you call air.
Cheers!
I've lived in Beijing and used to go jogging, and my lungs would literally hurt afterward (you would think I would stop jogging).
That said, they should have known that people would make a fuss about wearing masks in the airport. At least wait until you're outside and can assess the quality of the air yourself.
Everybody on both sides knew this was going to problem.
Seconded, Rocknrope. I want one.
I don't think it matters if it was politically tone-deaf; these are athletes and the Olympics are supposed to be apolitical. If I spent years training for an event, I'd wear anything to protect myself and keep myself in optimal shape.
Yeah, these people don't have day jobs, their bodies are their livelihood. The political atmosphere surrounding this shouldn't even factor into it - regardless of WHY China's air sucks and whose 'fault' it is, it still sucks. If I were one of those cyclists I'd never take the thing off.
I was in China last October-November and the air must have been better. The sun shone and we had a great time. We had been in Lhasa the week before the sun shone there as well but the altitude (12,000 ft) could make you crazy trying to catch your breath.
I finally realized that there was a problem in China when I downloaded my pictures and saw the dull grey sheen on the ones from Beijing, The Great Wall and others. I must say that the people were gracious, many of the youngsters spoke English, were friendly to Americans and asked a lot of questions of us about our country.
Let's remember that this is a Communist country with a totalitarian government and unfortunately we owe them a lot of money. There are 1 billion 360 thousand (1,360,000,000 Chinese). As their middle class grows they will come around and things will change. We can yell all we want but their population control methods are working. I hope their grandchildren will be as well off as ours.
If Olympic officials are going to make a huge fuss over athletes taking reasonable precautions, they should've held the Olympics in a less polluted environment. The idea that anyone is taking umbrage at this is, though predictable, insultingly stupid.
If they had REALLY wanted to make an environmental statement they should have all worn clothspins over their noses.
And they should never wear those masks in Tiananmen Square. Remember how those bicyclists were treated there?
I would just like to use this space to remind people to buy apples grown in Washington...yay American apples!
Bridezilla China two days before the bitch's wedding day.
rdsizzle, your post is so full of fail that I think you must be a troll. But you are riding that stupidity fence on which one sets and it is difficult to determine whether one is a sub ponte troll creature, or just mentally deficient. Now, I'm taking you to task because I think you are mentally deficient. If, however, you are a troll, good on you!
First off, America didn't do half the crap they are doing to the environment during our industrial revolution. You obviously have never been to China if you think anything we have EVER done rivals that level of nasty. Remember a lot of Beijing's pollution comes from the number of cars with terrible emission standards (correct me if I'm wrong) but they still use leaded gasoline as well.
Secondly, China isn't destined to be the next superpower and a quick look over the literature will show you that people who say this constantly are fear mongering. It would take China pulling a full reversal of state policy immediately to ensure that the state doesn't collapse in thirty years due to demographic issues.
Thirdly, nobody said they wanted the Olympics in the U.S. I would have liked to have seen Toronto or Paris, but the corrupt and sad IOC picks this crapper of a country for god knows what reason.
First off, America didn't do half the crap they are doing to the environment during our industrial revolution.
that was because America industrialized 150 years ago. China was late to the game. Heck, one might even claim that China was "green" at that point, while the US wasn't.
Since the U.S. has largely transitioned to a service economy, it's pretty smug to condemn the countries that produce most of our goods for us. There are certainly places where one might decide to wear a mask here. Ever crossed into New Jersey? How about conditions in our coal mines? Gowanus Canal?
China curtailed production in Beijing to attempt to improve air quality and if you read ANY business magazine, you would know that our companies have been impacted and complaining about the effect of that on their supply chain. If China somehow magically went green, the resulting increase in costs would have one result-- American and other manufacturers would flee to some other country where they could exploit the poor and take advantage of a corrupt government. India, or Africa, or wherever.
Pollution in these countries is to some extent our fault; we simply moved our factories from Detroit to China, India, Mexico, whereever.
China is a country with a billion people, mostly very poor, living under a bad government that has spent a lot of money to host the Olympics. Government aside, the people of China have invested a lot of time, energy and hope in this event, and I hope for their sake it is a success. Most of them don't have much; I'm hoping they get to feel proud of at least this effort.
My comment is not in defense of the air quality of Beijing, but about understanding how some might find it an insult for us to arrive wearing masks.
Looking on the bright side of the smog, for those who care about the environment, the air conditions there will certainly highlight the issue for a lot of people and maybe will even force Beijing to realize the problem and start taking the issue seriously.
There was a time when travel agents in Europe and elsewhere warned their clients that NYC was dangerous, polluted and filthy. They weren't that far wrong but things do change.
Henricus - you are a poor debater. To have half of your response calling me a troll and/or mentally deficient is useless and does nothing.
Then you go on to say that America has never done half the crap that china did - yet you fail to elaborate except for talking about cars using leaded gasoline. Point well taken; they should learn from us as in America (land of the hummer) we have always drove hybrid cars and we rely heavily on common transportation and car pooling right?
Do you realize that we have 1/5th of their population and we pollute just as much; or much much more per capita.
As for China becoming a new super power; I am not saying this in a fearful way. I think it is great that in my lifetime I will witness many other countries rise to power (India, Russia, China, Brazil) Yes, they are still way behind the U.S.; especially in military spending, but their business infrastructures are growing extremely fast. As for Demographics; one can argue that this will be a great asset to them rather then a problem.
I have been to China only 3 times but what i witnessed was unbelievable - especially from an ambition point of view. Yes they will have many issues to fix from environmental causes to human rights issues - matters that America wasn’t worried about while it built the Hoover dam and the empire state building...
In the past few years; we have seen plenty of Olympics in North America and Europe. The IOC did the right decision by displaying on a world stage the fastest rising country today. They built beautiful installations and had them ready way ahead of time.
So get your head out of your ass, perhaps layoff fox news for a while and go fuck yourself for your insults towards me...bitchass
Fuck the communists
how spineless do you have to be to apologize for wearing a mask?