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So, I need to find an example of a band that lip synced songs it didn’t sing and consisted of members who replaced the real singers because of looks. How about Milli Vanilli?
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</p>
<p>Never heard of the band. :] (Which somewhat supports my point.) Faking singing isn't "evil" (don't go all Kissinger on me!) it's just somewhat ridiculous.</p>
<p>It's not about the lip sync, but rather replacing the girl with someone "cuter." That decision was a huge mistake by those elite politburo members, but at least they went out and admitted the fact! That's a huge step in this authoritarian government.</p>
<p>Oh, to the SPANISH Men's Basketball Team:
You idiots. I wish you guys don't even get to the medal round and gets booed from the olympic village to the indoor stadium, cuz that picture with you doing the slanted eyes is ridiculous. No respect, no morals, no brain.</p>
<p>I'm not saying the Chinese girls were or weren't 16 years old (or 15 as the case may be), and they are really, really good. And the US girls screwed up and certainly did not deserve the gold medal.</p>
<p>However, if the girls are underage, that's cheating. Is that acceptable? Sports have rules, they need to be followed. There's a rule prohibiting underage girls in international gymnastics competition because it possibly confers an unfair advantage, as well as has the potential to harm the girls' future health and prospects. Cheating is unacceptable. Is there something about that that's difficult to understand?</p>
<p>I honestly do not think that the little girls chose a lifestyle of training 5 hours a day and being hammered with lessons on how to fake smile. From what I've read, Chinese officials actually go into villages, schools and cities, measure each kid's proportions, and forcibly (offering pressure and benefits to the families) remove the kid to train at a "special" olympic school. I'm not saying all the kids are unhappy, but I would bet that a great majority is unhappy. More than 10,000 kids are in these schools. How many do you see in the actual Olympics? I wonder what happens to the kids that don't make the Olympic cut.</p>
<p>o_0....</p>
<p>People ENROLL their kids into these schools. It's considered an HONOR to be selected.</p>
<p>Jesus christ, ***?</p>
<p>Did you choose to brush your teeth or eat vegetables when you were young? Because it is analogous to what happens here in Chinese culture.</p>
<p>^^Why are you so angry?</p>
<p>Even if my mom enrolled me into a school for gymnastics, doesn't mean I'm the one who's going to be happy. But really, this argument is getting tiring.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Oh, to the SPANISH Men's Basketball Team:
You idiots. I wish you guys don't even get to the medal round and gets booed from the olympic village to the indoor stadium, cuz that picture with you doing the slanted eyes is ridiculous. No respect, no morals, no brain.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>I did not hear about this. That sounds horrible, anybody have an article for this?</p>
<p>I'm very excited, it turns out my friend broke the world record for the Russian 200 IM and made the semi finals for it. :D Yay!</p>
<p>Gasol</a>, Calderon question fuss over photo - Olympics - Yahoo! Sports</p>
<p>this is the response from Spain about the photo</p>
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From what I've read, Chinese officials actually go into villages, schools and cities, measure each kid's proportions, and forcibly (offering pressure and benefits to the families) remove the kid to train at a "special" olympic school.
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</p>
<p>LOL! Since when Chinese officials are experts to pick talents?? Can you tell me which sport is about "proportions"? You mean this is a beauty contest? Please think critically about what you read. There's propapanda everywhere, including the West and welcome to the REAL world.</p>
<p>"^^Why are you so angry?"</p>
<p>I'm not angry. More of shocked that even in an educated environment, people can be so ignorant and gullible.</p>
<p>Hmmm to be honest, I don't know much about the process about Chinese sports schools. I went to one once for a swim meet (it's the place where the Chinese divers train), and all the gals were really nice and excited to meet us (an American team). According to the TIME Magazine, though, the concept of officials going into villages is legit: China's</a> Sports School: Crazy for Gold - TIME</p>
<p>I do know that the system for sports school in the USSR could be sketchy. My mom was invited to one for x-country skiing but wasn't allowed to go by her mother, who didn't want her to be pumped with steroids and other crap.</p>
<p>From what I've gathered over the years, the Chinese system of recruiting/intense training is not so different from the eastern bloc system that gave us Nadia Comenci and other incredible young gymnasts of the past. Girls are handpicked at the ages of three and four because coaches see potential for that 1-in-million chance at Olympic Gold that will bring glory to the state. They are sent off to sports schools to train, and see their parents once a year, maybe. However, like someone said earlier, it really is an honor, especially in a country where over half of the country's population lives in poverty. Thus, I'm not surprised to hear about the girl who wanted to quit and her parents wouldn't let her. Plus, given China's attitude towards girls in general, it's possible that parents could just be worried about their daughters' futures (I'm not completely knowledgeable on this subject, so forgive me if I'm totally off-base). To be more specific, girls in America today are taught to believe that they can "do anything," and with enough hard work can grow up to be a doctor or a lawyer and be successful in many different ways. Contrast that with the problem of female infanticide in China: in what other ways can a girl bring honor and glory to her family besides Olympic Gold? I'd be curious to hear other peoples' opinions.</p>
<p>If this exact situation had happened in the Atlanta games (the last games, I believe, before the gymnastics age limit was put in place), no one would have put up a fuss. The Chinese gymnasts are young, cute, incredible gymnasts, and based on skill alone, completely deserved to win gold. Unfortunately, like jaf1991 said earlier, there is an age limit now. The possibility that the host nation falsified official documents in pursuit of Olympic gold colors the Chinese victory for me.</p>
<p>:-( catsushi found the article that I was referring to. I spent 20 minutes looking for it too.<br>
@Sam Lee & Rutiene: I'm sorry. I choose to believe TIME magazine propaganda. You know how some people seem to be "built" for certain sports? Short and stocky people generally don't make good endurance runners. Lithe and tall people generally don't make good shot putters. So yes, I also believe in the fact that many sports are more oriented to athletes with certain proportions. Much like beauty pageants, albeit on a smaller but no less important scale.
It is an honor to go to one of these schools? An honor for whom? China, who uses its children's lives on churning out Olympic Gold Medals? The children, whose families get benefits until they prove no more use to the government? At the risk of being called gullible and ignorant again, even China Sports Daily "estimates that 80% of the country's retired athletes are plagued by poverty, unemployment or chronic health problems resulting from overtraining"
BTW are you two trolls? You've hurt my feelings. </p>
<p>Oh, and this may be a figment of my imagination, but the high tens and fives the Chinese teams give each other seem manufactured? They seem to be like a "Hi" greeting instead of "OMG W T F BBQ, THAT WAS AMAZING" kind of statement.</p>
<p>@woami: It's an honor to the child and the family. Can you please for a second try and imagine that Chinese culture is different from US culture. The circumstances and expectations are different. Be a little accepting.</p>
<p>But yeah, this entire thing is getting a little ridiculous considering the fact that I don't even really care. heh.</p>
<p>
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Oh, and this may be a figment of my imagination, but the high tens and fives the Chinese teams give each other seem manufactured?
[/quote]
i'm sure they are all pre-planned</p>
<p>woami,</p>
<p>Even if children were plucked for the schools, you need to look at the context, the circumstances surrounding the familes, and the culture..etc. I am not defending for the chinese government but I have a feeling everything you read is through English media and therefore you are getting distorted picture of what "really" goes on in China.</p>
<p>From what I've seen, the media in the West loves to dramatize the negatives in China. For example, they'd like to paint that Beijing is like a "sauna" with very polluted air. I can stay in sauna for 20 mins at most in my gym but I'd have no problem staying in Beijing for the whole summer, which I did a while ago. The weather is probably less humid than Houston. Granted, the air pollution is a lot worse than Houston but so far, there's no reported collapse of any athletes like you'd probably imagined based on what the media in the West painted before the Games (probably a huge disappointment to a lot of people who like knocking China)!</p>
<p>Also regarding the recent conflict of Georgia vs Russia, the UK/US have tried to paint Russia as the aggressor. While facts are difficult to gather, South Ossetia sounds a lot like Kosovo to me. Apparently, it was okay for the UK/US to help Kosovo but it's evil when Russia did the same for South Ossetia. Again, beware of what you read.</p>
<p>
[quote]
Oh, and this may be a figment of my imagination, but the high tens and fives the Chinese teams give each other seem manufactured? They seem to be like a "Hi" greeting instead of "OMG W T F BBQ, THAT WAS AMAZING" kind of statement.
[/quote]
</p>
<p>Please tell me you’re joking. Do you think Chinese are so inhuman that they can’t even express camaraderie?</p>
<p>It doesn't matter what the chinese do, as long as they win, the gymnasts don't complain. They actually enjoy winning. So what if they trained from 3 years old? It doesn't matter how much you prepare, what matters is what you perform and what you get. So if we go to an exam studied for 5 minutes and get a B and someone studied since they start the class and get an A, you can't really say that's unfair.</p>
<p>it's unfair having gymnasts under 16 though</p>
<p>I give up. If you don't understand why it's important to follow the rules of your chosen sport, nothing is going to convince you now.</p>
<p>If they are truly underage, they would be banned since the beginning because that's against the rule. I don't see that many people complaining BEFORE the final about that problem. You can't just look at people and say they're too young. Shawn Johnson looks the same size and has a young face just like those Chinese girls.</p>