2022 Beijing Winter Olympics
 

I don't think we have a thread yet. Curling starts tomorrow!

So, I'm already confused about what's going to be broadcast.

Tomorrow morning, I could wake up and watching USA vs Australia curling... but on what platform? Do I have to pay for Peacock? Can I watch it on NBC's website?

SI

I read somewhere that Peacock is the one to get for Olympics.

Gotta love curling season every 4 years. Them Canadians can curl.

If you have cable then you can use NBC Sports app. If not then I think Peacock for streaming.

For the Curling tomorrow, it looks like it is tape delay tomorrow night at 6, but their next match is live at 8 PM tomorrow.

I think the first USA game is at 6am tomorrow if I can figure out how to watch it (NBC website, hopefully)

SI

Dola,

Looks like you have to pay to watch on Peacock. $5 per month.

Double dola,

Curling starts at 0705 this morning on Peacock.

I was able to just pull up the website on my computer today and am currently watching curling on nbcolympics.com (not a Peacock subscriber)

SI

US might have just screwed themselves with that shot

SI

Huge shot to make up for the bad shot last end

SI

Had to go drop off the kid at school so I missed the end. Will have to catch on replay tonight at 5

SI

USA absolutely gifted the win against Australia. I'm sure the Australian skip (is there a skip in mixed doubles?) has hit a similar shot hundreds of times but just missed it today.

Unfortunately, USA just gave up 4 in the 2nd end to Italy in their 2nd game. Yikes.

SI

what a bizarre, anticlimactic ending to that end

Caught some curling. Seems like the best chance for me to ever qualify for the Olympics.

Not a lot of fans in the stands from what I can see.

It's kindof like trying to qualify for bowling, if it were an Olympic sport. You don't have to be Usain Bolt or Michael Phelps fit but it takes a lot of skill and there's a ton of random so to make it through qualifying takes a ton of luck to get past similarly qualified players who have been doing this for 20+ years.

SI

So we've started watching the DVR'd Opening Ceremonies. Inherently, there's Jingoism with every Olympics - cheer for your flag, etc. But, man, the USA broadcast is laying the animosity on thick in the intro. I mean, it's somewhat understandable, considering the geopolitics of the time - the only really contentious ones in my lifetime were when I was a little kid (1980/1984). I don't know what those were like.

SI

2018 Winter Olympics: Breaking down Elizabeth Swaney's ski halfpipe run | NBC Sports - YouTube

Just be like her and show up enough to the qualifying events and you can be an Olympian too.

Which brings up the question why anyone should care about these games especially with the atrocities China is committing.

Because its sports and we all grew up watching the Olympics.

I'm okay with boycotting the Olympics in China. But we made a half hearted political boycott, not many joined, no momentum and ultimately, it was meaningless. It showed how weak we are.

Ultimately, the answer is to come up with a strategy (economic, political, military, technological etc.), play the long game. Until then, let me enjoy my curling guilt free ...

Peacock interface could be better. Give me a menu to get all live games going.

They have that menu but more often than not, the live game is done. Something is out of whack there

File under "we're all old".

Shaun white just announced that he is retiring after the Olympics.

That's not quite the we're old part. He's 35 years old. Where have the years gone?

We just finished watching the Opening Ceremonies - I guess we now know what the Chinese equivalent of "I have black friends" looks like. Especially since the Uyghur skier was a co-torchbearer, the only time there's two torchbearers and not just one.

SI

I get how you get started skiing or skating or hockey or curling. Even living in Houston, I've done all of those and there are easy beginner on-ramps.

How does one get started with, say, luge or ski jump? Are there like "bunny tracks" for sports like that so you don't die the first time out?

SI

I remember 1980/84 quite well. Dueling boycotts, not sure any point was made other than screwing up the competition. And it led to violence in 1984 in Ann Arbor (perhaps in other places as well).

I was working for McDonald's that summer. It was my first job. They had spent millions on a promotional campaign surrounding the Olympics. The centerpiece was this elaborate set of scratch-off cards with names of US athletes in a gold, silver and bronze position.

The idea was if your card matched a gold-medal winner, you'd get a premium sandwich, maybe fries for silver, a coke for bronze. And then the Russians boycotted.

All of a sudden, a promotion with maybe one winner in dozens of cards... nearly every card won something. And the rules were you give one card with every purchase and people could ask for one free card per day.

The downtown Ann Arbor McDonald's was a strange scene. It was summer, so very few students around. And it was a very large restaurant - two floors of seating. So that's where all the teens in the area spent their days and evenings for a couple of weeks.

There was no way to cook enough food to meet the demand from the cards. Lines of kids demanding more cards. A couple of fights when employees declined to hand out free cards to kids who had already asked the same employee for a card earlier. Employees quitting. The police a constant presence.

I didn't normally work in that McDonald's, but the call went out after a few days that if you were a reasonably-sized male and wanted to remain employed where you were, you'd have to take night shifts downtown for the duration of the promotion.

Since jobs were impossible to find then (even at the minimum $3.35 per hour, don't even think about a raise), I did a handful of night shifts there. Talk about tension. Fortunately, by then they had pretty much worked out how to get enough Big Macs made to satisfy the crush and we were instructed never to say no. So we had incident-free shifts amid the tension and life eventually returned to normal.

Sports is supposed to be this refuge from politics. I don't know what we can or should do about the Uyghur camps in China. I doubt boycotting the games would have any effect. The "political" boycott was greeted with laughter over there, which should have been an obvious result to those making the statement in the first place.

You hold these games to try and bring people together. There's always going to be tension between Communist governments and Democracies. One can't become powerful without threatening the other in some critical way, and China, like the USSR before the Cold War ended, is becoming extremely powerful. But the games should be an opportunity to get people to see the other side as human rather than an opportunity to make ineffective and divisive political statements.

However, it does illustrate that there are places in the world where people are suffering far worse fates than we can even imagine over here. Hopefully, that strengthens our resolve to treat each other better and stop hating so much over relatively trivial issues.

Ok, I found out how to learn to luge! While my back may protest, I'm going to add this to my bucket list:
Muskegon Winter Luge Track - Muskegon Luge Adventure Sports Park

Can combine it with the CCC toboggan track in northern Indiana
DNR: State Parks: Toboggan Run at Pokagon State Park

Now I want to make a little winter trip out of these two events. I know weather can do awful things to travel in the Midwest in winter and I will probably feel it afterwards and there's still a pandemic so it's not happening right now. But it's on the list for the future

SI

What a great ending for the biathlon relay

SI

The US mixed doubles curling team dosen't seem like a top 4 team. Vicky is a good player. Hopefully Chris plays better in the team competition.

I've been watching some events in Peacock without commentary. Also watched some NBC (under Peacock) with commentary.

Commentary is definitely much better.

Anyone else think that wreath-panda bear thing looks a little scary?

(see middle of page)

https://nypost.com/2022/02/05/usas-j...in-slopestyle/

So I am watching the mens 1000M speed skating where it is the two brothers from Hungary. Odd sport where the race ends, they look at the tape, and literally rearrange everything so the host nation wins gold and silver but I am sure its just a coincidence.

All sorts of shady stuff in short track today. There was this gem, too

"Sportsmanship" shown by the Chinese skater in the Beijing Olympics : gifs

Watch the Chinese skater toss the marker at the Canadian skater but make it look like the Canadian was who threw it. The Canadian behind was DQ'd for causing the crash.

Apparently, the Chinese skater has a history of this:
ISU releases images of infringements by China and Canada in the Ladies 3000m Team relay final : olympics

SI

The way the Chinese were advanced into the final of the mixed relay was also shady AF.

I would like to see someone do a figure skating routine to "What would Brian Boitano do?"

SI

This wins the thread. Gold medal.

Chen is godlike!

C'mon, guys. No need for Chinese conspiracy theories here. The Hungarian short track skater Liu Shaolin Sandor deserved his disqualification in the 1000m. I thought he deserved to get disqualified twice, but that's technically impossible.

I'm split on Eileen Gu. I'm glad she was able to fulfil her childhood dream.

On one hand, it doesn't sit well with me that a US born Asian American has decided to represent China (if she gave up her citizenship, that would be a different matter). On the other hand, there are examples of other athletes, born in one country but representing another (either as naturalized or dual citizen).

I'm sure the US has benefited from such arrangements also. The question in my mind is ... did Eileen Gu give up her US Citizenship to represent China? China does not recognize dual citizenships. Apparently in a news conference, she hedged and did not answer. And the Olympics has long stopped being just for amateurs and guns for hire are not unusual.

Don't know. I think I lean towards being okay. Won't root for her but happy for her (we can only hope to be that talented), sad for the US, let it play out in future sponsorships, endorsements, court of public opinion etc.

Short Track is the "Whose Line is it Anyway?" Quadrennial event where everything is made up and the points don't matter.

This happens seemingly all the time for the Olympics. If you watch the parade of nations, a lot of the smaller countries that only have a couple of athletes - the announcers will talk about one of them and often they're from larger countries but compete for a smaller country where their parents are from or where they have dual citizenship with. I mean, cynically, it's probably something like "athlete X is in the top 20 in the world but not top 2 in the US/Russia/Germany/whatever so they can't make that local team in the sport but if they compete for another country, they can easily qualify for the Olympics". That seems fine to me, especially if it's a country where their parents are from. We want the best people in sports at the Olympics and they probably shouldn't miss out due to limits from top-heavy teams.

That doesn't mean there isn't some manipulation like the whole Elizabeth Swaney thing, but, generally, it seems fine.
Elizabeth Swaney - Wikipedia

SI

Plus, it's just the fucking olympics not war.

It's partially, maybe completely, a business decision for Gu. She was going to make money in sponsorships even before she won gold, but now she's poised to be the face of winter sport in China. She'll make millions and most of that wouldn't e available to her in the U.S.

Is it really fair to judge an 18-year old for picking a side (when she was 16) between the country she lives in and the country of her heritage? Aside from randomly being born into that situation, her additional bad luck is that there are political issues between the USA and China. Would the backlash be the same had her heritage been from another country?

At the same time, although she had to pick an NOC, it doesn't mean she turned her back on the USA as a country or as her home, she just made a decision of NOC, that to her felt to be the best for her ability to ski. And apparently it was the right decision for her.

Or that, in which case she made an even smarter decision to be able to make a living out of her sport. She created the chance to live the American dream while milking Chinese businesses. Donald Trump should be proud of her. :D

The Olympics this year seem like a complete and total shit show. Perhaps they should have passed on this one.

I blame Tanya Harding.

Not directly, more a butterfly effect of, well, shit show. That was the moment when the networks realized that they could be telling stories (which they do very well) rather than doing the legwork necessary to make pageantry out of sometimes difficult-to-understand sports in difficult places.

On nights when Tanya and Nancy skated, there were 38 commercial minutes per hour. Ratings were astronomical and CBS made a fortune.

There were 24 skaters in the final. How many of them did CBS viewers see perform? Maybe half, maybe less. The figure-skating long programs are one of the crown jewels of Winter Olympics. And how much did we see from other events?

Now, all you get is profile pieces for the telegenic US athletes, a handful of foreign competitors, the pageantry of the opening ceremony (interspersed with more profile pieces), incredible numbers of commercials. Sometimes you get to see a tiny piece of a sporting event that happened half a day earlier, but not enough of it to really follow it.

And curling and hockey on the side channels. Since those are team competitions with two teams, at least the networks know they have to televise them in full. But curling is never going to be more than ordinary people playing shuffleboard with brooms and granite slabs on ice. OK once every four years. And hockey still has to compete with odd start times.

It's not just skip this one. It's figuring out how to get back to what made the Olympics interesting in the first place.

I don't know about making things interesting, but my wife said something I took note of the other night. It boiled down to all the "new" events, which mostly seem to have a lot of judging in them, vs "old" events where there is something measurable (time, distance). There's probably a fuddy-duddy instinct there (where I am probably with her; "shouldn't this be in the X-Games?") but I think there's also a bit of, "what the hell is going on?"

I mean, it's very simple to understand that bobsled A went down the track .015 seconds faster than bobsled B. It's not quite as easy to watch someone shoot off a ramp, flip and spin and twirl a bunch of times, and then have a score thrown at you. Like, I don't know what the hell they just did or why it was good or bad. It looks cool, but I am completely at the mercy of the broadcast saying why it was what it was and taking their word for it. It's not a race, there's no "go go go!"

(At the same time though, she likes watching skating. *shurg*)

Regarding what nations athletes compete for, I've never been a real fan of mercenary athletes. "Oh, they are competing for Andorra because their great-grandfather..." Yeah, that's a bunch of crap. Compete where you come from.

With Gu, I'm trying to not feel irrational jingoistic anger. At the same time, part of me still whispers if you like it there so much....

I don't whisper.

They're all welcome to do as they see fit. But I don't want them coming back to the U.S. under anything other than the same rules that apply to any other foreign national either.

I found the USA coverage to be pretty good in terms of showing everything. I'm pretty sure, if I wanted I could see every luge run, men's skating, slopestyle, big air and Mens super G skiing run (at least the top 25 contenders) over the past few days.

Isn't the big problem that there just aren't very many American stars this year? There's the female skier, the male skater, and then the husk of Shaun White. Not much to interest an average American viewer.

I wonder if the extremely aggressive copyright enforcement plays a role today. It's nearly impossible to build up buzz online when no one can post clips of what happened.

Then on TV, no other network is allowed to show video highlights. So unless you're watching a bunch of NBC, you're probably not seeing much of what's taking place.

Media coverage has been hampered by some pretty draconian rules. Seems a lot of outlets said fuck it and didn't send anyone to cover it.

20 years ago this works because you don't have a ton of options. But now, I'll just watch a few episodes of Reacher instead of trying to decipher what's going on in the Olympics. It's fine background noise but I don't have time for the secret club when so much other media out there just wants me to watch it.

Eh, they tend to manufacture those when there's a shortage though.

More than a third of the people in the entire world live in India or China. And until recently (and this only with China), Olympic sports wasn't a thing. The Chinese have developed figure skaters (often not in China) and the Indians for some truly bizarre reason really love cricket. Some people think cricket will soon become bigger than baseball, world-wide, and that's all about India, Bangladesh, Pakistan, etc. It won't catch on here - we're still struggling with soccer.

If you're training to be in the Olympics, there aren't that many places or coaches out there. It would be interesting to see how many top Olympic athletes (and tennis players) who really are native to other countries, pretty much live in the United States (or for skiing, the northern European countries).

I don't care that Gu wants to represent China. The China she sees and experiences is not the same China most of her new countrymen and women experience. The sacrifices she makes for the sake of enjoying that privilege aren't ones she'll ever know enough to understand, unless she's unlucky enough to go the Peng Shuai route.

Figure skating at one point was literally skating a figure. Judges got up close, noted your edge, and you skated repeatedly around a circle or an "8" on the ice. You lost points if your skate touched outside the figure or if you lost your edge. At some point they added the long program. If you jumped well or were graceful enough, you hoped to make up for a mediocre score on the figures. Gradually, the figures counted for less and less until they were dropped from competition. All except the name itself.

The judging more or less makes sense, though every once in a while you get someone who can rotate more than anyone else, somewhat land it, but looks like an elephant out there. I guess with the newer sports, we just have to get to a point where the elephants look like elephants. I don't think the kids doing it right now know, either. The judging seems far more about reputation than reality than the other judged sports - and they sure complain about it. But until the X takes (and it may never take), that's all they get.

This. The USA coverage on the weekend was so much better. At worst, for recorded stuff, you'd get all of the runs of the Americans and the medal contenders. For the live stuff, it's just live so they just roll it on out there for you to see. I found it to be so much more palatable than the NBC coverage. But it's not as "neatly" packaged as Prime Time where they pick the three to five biggest stories of the day and condense them for you so you know exactly which couple of hours to watch for max drama.

Also, I'm a DVR fiend for the Olympics. I just set it up to tape and then start at, say, 8:30 PM. That way, I can roll through the human interest stories, the commercials, and all the other fluff and just see the sports and be done about the time the broadcast ends.* Should I have to do this? No. But I'm also the guy who was watching Olympics all weekend so if I want to see it, this is what I have to do. It's only a couple of weeks every couple of years so I deal with it. I know others won't.

*I also have to keep reminding my wife that if she's manning the remote that you fast forward into things until you're sure it's something you want to see and then rewind if need be - if you just stop at everything that might be Olympics, you'll be there all day. She tends to stop at Olympic ads or all the incessant coverage of figure skaters warming up because she might miss the routine. The number of times they would come back from break, Tirico would say something, they'd go to some skaters warming up on the ice for two minutes, Tirico would say something else, and they'd go back to commercial is just maddening. Just give me my damn sports. You could have given me 5 more runs of slopestyle or luge or moguls or whatever in that time but, hey, some pairs figure skating team is skating across the ice warming up, not even doing tricks. That'll draw the eyeballs!

SI

I kindof wonder when India will start becoming an Olympic power. It seems to follow about a generation after rising economic power so maybe we're 20 years away?

Also, for decades, the US has had one heck of a cheat code in the university system. How many times are you watching a broadcast of a sport and they're talking about how all of the athletes go to school in the US, even though it's 8 different people representing 5 different countries? That's not to say there isn't a Russian gymnastics program here or Chinese diving program there, but so many of these athletes train at American universities and the NCAA championships aren't that different than the world ones.

SI

Or Jack Ma, or Fan BingBing, or Sun Dawu, or Zhao Wei...

If she is doing this because she thinks there's a better market for her in China (modeling, endorsements) to get rich/famous, she might want to be careful. China doesn't seem to appreciate anyone getting too much of either.

olympics IS war!

I’d also point out that I’m not sure the message was exactly the same when the US mens soccer team was digging up anybody they could find who was European but had an American parent for the better part of half a decade, but hey ho.

Now would be the perfect timing for the media in the USA to finally adopt the medals tabulating method the rest of the world is used to, just to get the Russian OC pushed from the top.

Team figure skating medal ceremony at Beijing Olympics delayed over legal issue

wait, legal consultation? The only thing I can think of is citizenship or age (I think if it was Drug related, there wouldn't be that legal consultation), and the fact that four members of the Russian team didn't show up for practice... the only other thing I can think of is that they knew they had a COVID positive and still let them participate..

All of the articles I've read say "drug test", so I'm guessing the legal matter is either how it was collected or contaminated product.

I think more accurately "it used to be". That's when the Olympics were interesting and fun.

Now?

"Our" athletes are often more unlikable than "their" athletes. I have no real interest in it because there's hardly anybody to root for at all at this point*.

Kills my interest same way I haven't watched NASCAR in years (after a couple decades of being able to name every driver/sponsor combination across three levels of racing)

edit to elaborate: And that lack of rooting interest matters a lot when you're talking about events I really have no interest in, as opposed to being able to at least have something like Oregon State vs Pacific college football on as background noise at 2am

legal = "give them the medal or I invade Ukraine!"

So one thing I don’t understand is how the Women snowboarders go so much smaller than the men in the half pipe… I get that men have an advantage in pure strength or speed but feels like this is an event as much about technique and maybe core. And it also doesn’t seem like as noticeable in the disciplines like big air for example.

DOLA - also the failed drug test being the 15 year old star skater is just nuts on all levels. The backdrop of Russian state doping, her age and skill, the medication that nobody has ever actually used to cheat (but also doesn’t seem to make any sense for a 15 year old to take)… it’s going to get super ugly

Maybe they should just ban the country doping 15 year olds instead of placating them over and over?

And supposedly tested in Dec. Why so long?

But apparently someone can have taken it unknowingly ...
Don't know what's going to happen but this doesn't seem to be a mass scale doping scandal (or at least not yet).

Really happy for Lindsey Jacobellis. She made a dumb mistake in 2006, costing herself the gold, and she finally gets her first Olympic gold this year.

Happy to see Nathan Chen and Chloe Kim happy to represent the US.

Still happy for Eileen Gu on a personal level for achieving her dreams but frak her. Certainly won't buy any Wheaties and like endorsed by her.

Still wondering why we don't know definitively if she gave up her US citizenship to represent China (as articles have said China does not recognize dual citizenships).

Were you going to before?

Considering all the other conversations in all the other threads across the board about a wide array of topics, and this is the bridge too far for an individual?

EDIT: Really not trying to be a dick, just trying to understand. Like to me, this doesn't seem like that big of a thing - she made a very, um, capitalist decision. It seems so very American, rightly and wrongly.

SI

Not a Wheaties fan. But "and the like" include below. Unsure if these endorsements will continue but if they do, yeah forget Red Bull, forget Beats. Admittedly wasn't going to buy any VS or Cadillac.



Bridge too far is overstating it. But using the example of Chen being a spokesperson for Coke and Gu being spokes person for Pepsi, yeah I would go for Coke. If it was the other way around, I would have second thoughts about Coke (but Coke Zero will be hard to give up).


From what I've read, it was primarily to set an example for kids in China. I'm sure endorsements are also a factor but that is unsaid by her. I don't see it as a big thing all things considered just the principle.

Question for you ...

Should someone that has not changed citizenship (presumably) be able to represent another country (especially since we have tense relationships with), but yet reap the benefits of the one she has benefited from and figuratively left behind?

That's been going on in the Olympics and FIFA forever, so I don't see why not.

That's kind of how I view it. It just doesn't make my top ten things to be pissed off about today.

So, rightfully, she gets questions about China's human rights abuses and she deflects them as she's probably trained to do. She makes a fortune in China, gets to compete in a sport she loves, and we all move on.

It's not like she could say something and Xi would pause, reflect, and say, "you know, now that you mention it, maybe we shouldn't be a communist country and enslave minority people."

In the end, like with the NBA, it's kind of funny watching athletes avoid the questions. But you're right, that's how capitalism has always worked and probably should work.

Specifically for the Olympics, I don't think you can compete for China unless you are a dual citizen (not possible in China) or gave up US citizenship and became a citizen of China.

She's avoided the question about citizenship. Easy enough to answer. I infer from her hesitancy there is more to this story. If she has not renounced her US citizenship but somehow is representing China in the Olympics, then yeah, there's a principle here.

If she has renounced her citizenship and now is a Chinese citizen, great for her.

Do people choose between coke and pepsi based on who they endorse/endorses them? Maybe I'm just a normal person, but I base my food and beverage choices on whether I like them, not what person is on the cover.

I have a seriously hard time believing that you are researching who is endorsing what before you buy it, so let's cut the BS here.

I've explained this over and over and you still misrepresent this. Just like in the USA, a child of a Chinese citizen is given Chinese citizenship and there is no way to revoke that other than through petition. Gu, with both a Chinese and American parent, would be recognized as a citizen by both China and the USA. She doesn't have to do anything for that to be true and whether or not China or the USA recognize dual citizenship is irrelevant.

This is the status of my daughter, born in China to Chinese parents. She is and will always be a citizen of China. When we adopted, she was granted American citizenship, but that has no bearing on her status as a Chinese citizen. She will always be recognized as a citizen by both countries.

I am not researching per se. But if it's front page news and there is someone (or principle) I don't support is endorsing something, yeah I'll try to avoid it.

CFA is a good example. If I was LGBT, I would seriously have second thoughts eating there.

I get your daughter, she was born in China.

Eileen was born in the US to presumably parents who are naturalized US citizens (but can't find much info on dad). So you are saying a US born child of Chinese descent but naturalized US parents is considered a Chinese citizen? Can you share a source for this?

I kindof wondered if this was where this was going to end up. I mean there's the whole "what your permit is what you condone" so... I'm not sure how "if I was LGBT" is part of the conversation. If Gu is tacitly condoning genocide by advertising for China (these athletes are basically national and product billboards in this case) then you eating a chicken sandwich at CFA or shopping at Hobby Lobby is condoning discrimination against the LGBT community, whether you're a part of the community or not.

Of course, this ignores how it's different by degrees. I mean, if you really want to wrap your head into knots, you can go:
Well, genocide > discrimination
But, directly funding > indirectly funding through sponsorship and advertising (?)
And then try to parse out what is worse or better or if both are below your personal tolerance level

Like I don't think Gu is providing money directly for the Chinese government to commit genocide but CFA/HL have actively given money to discriminate against the LGBT community. So, we're definitely into apples vs oranges or, like apples vs school buses. I don't think it's wrong to base your buying decisions on how ethical a business is - I wish we had more regulation and buying around that idea. And, of course, there are some products with limited consumer choices where there is no right choice - if you're doing home internet access, you have, at most, 2 choices, both of pretty awful corporations. Also, I think that on the list of things that, say, Coke has done - sponsoring Gu which indirectly funnels money and eyeballs to China, which is engaging in horrific genocide - probably doesn't even crack the top 50 of least ethical things Coke has done this year. For a company that is directly responsible for dead people, basically employs wage slaves, caused societal upheaval to save money, and whose product is one of the biggest causes of type 2 diabetes, this is moral accounting dust.

I want to assume you're actually making this discussion in good faith. But I could also buy that it was just fishing for a reaction to make another political point ("America good, China bad; see all these lefty hypocrites" when, of course, it's a lot more complicated than that).

SI

Consider it in good faith. I am an immigrant and greatly appreciate what the US has provided for me. I love this country, warts and all.

If this was another country that we don't have dual citizenship status with, I'd feel the same.

(I actually don't support dual citizenship per other discussions but Olympic rules does say citizen or dual citizenship for this discussion).

Good deal - it's hard to tell on the internet sometimes. My bad.

I think a lot of us have different ideas of citizenship. For instance, I feel that it's part of my job as a citizen to challenge our country and leaders to be better and not offer blind loyalty. Others clearly disagree (not speaking about you - but it's clearly a prevalent sentiment in many countries, not just here).

I think the idea of being a citizen or having dual citizenship is an interesting one, but it's also a bit antiquated in a lot of ways. This isn't the ideal of being a Roman citizen anymore. It's also really, really difficult to get citizenship in another country - either you need to go through years of work with no guarantee you'll get it or be some special case and you jump the line over others, which also seems inherently unfair. However is it different for 20yo world class skier vs giving advantages to poaching software engineers from, say, Eastern Europe, India, or Brazil? I don't really have an answer to this one - it's not something I've really thought at length about.

SI

From the LA Times:


That's common and most countries recognize the citizenship of children born to citizens, regardless of birth location. That's how the US does it, too. If you're a citizen and give birth in China, that child is still recognized as a US citizen.

It's interesting to think about what our jobs/responsibilities are as citizens.

What's core to each of us? What are our "moral values," not necessarily thinking of that as it pertains to a religion, but religion for some offers answers to those questions.

When and why do we speak? When and why do we challenge the government (something that's a lot harder to do in China than it is here). Do corporations have moral values, or is the responsibility of those running corporations to enrich shareholders and not take those positions?

How we answer those questions, which have many shades of grey (not exactly 50, thankfully) depends on our parents, the area we grew up in, our experiences and perhaps more randomness than we'd be comfortable admitting.

I am a dual citizen (of the UK, where I was born, and the US, since my parents were born and lived here - my mother didn't find out she was pregnant until my dad's sabbatical spent teaching at a British university was already underway). I don't think of myself as British, but should the worst happen, it's an option.

I think of the US as the greatest country ever, not in a MAGA sense, but in a "my great-grandparents would have been killed if not for how the US welcomes immigration" sense. We are a nation of immigrants, pulling together as best we can, hopefully. The words of the Founding Fathers are words I take seriously. And the US, warts and all, as Edward said, has my loyalty.

I don't understand Gu's decisions, but it's easy to accept that her combination of variables is quite different from mine, and led her to a different path than one I'd choose.

What if you were born in Kenya?

I would appreciate a more official source because I have not been able to find an "official" source to support it.

The distinction I'm making is her parents are presumably naturalized US citizens and therefore Eileen, born in the US, is not a Chinese citizen by default.

I think you are saying even if the parents were naturalized US citizens, just as long as they are of Chinese descent, the child is a Chinese citizen. Assuming that Eileen is Gen 1, how far does this go, Eileen's children, her grandchildren etc. I don't think so.

But taking your source, I would counter with this (admittedly, no idea how accurate it is).

Are children born in China automatically Chinese citizens if one parent is Chinese and the other a US citizen with an American passport? - Quora

So I guess the question then is are Eileen's parent's US vs Chinese citizen or US vs Chinese permanent residency.

Again, simple enough question for her/parent/Olympic committee to answer. The lack of an definitive answer right now raises questions on why they are avoiding this. My cynical view is Eileen did not give up her US citizenship and has a wink-wink to represent China because the Olympics do not want to PO China.

Oh yeah baby!

FWIW. Although I don't support dual citizenship, I acknowledge that US citizens have benefited from it. I would love to have dual citizenship with an EU country so I can travel around the schengen.

Her mother was a Chinese graduate student residing in the U.S. and her father was an American citizen of European descent. Gu has family in China and has visited and lived there on and off her entire life.

That was always the dumbest part of the birther conspiracy. Even if he was born in Kenya, his mother was still a citizen and he would then be a citizen.

Oh good. Was not able to find much on the Dad.

Do you know if the mother is a US citizen or PR?

And is the below your stance?

Eileen is a U.S. citizen, so her children will be U.S. citizens. Now if they are born in China they may not ever fill out the paperwork, but if they can prove they are a child of a citizen, yes, they get US citizenship.

I don't necessarily agree with the editorializing here (tho it's a discussing we're having in this thread): Eileen Gu's citizenship status a focus after winning Olympic gold for China - Sports Illustrated

But, lol - I also didn't realize just how sketch some the circus around it was. Bach (IOC Pres) was at Gu's event and Peng Shuai (likely raped tennis star who magically recanted her accusation after she mysteriously disappeared for a couple of weeks) just happened to be there, too? Wow! What are the odds?!?

SI

I'm curious about Hungary. They have a lot of athletes that have formerly competed for other countries.

The US judge giving Hirano an 89 is sketchy as fuck

But two others gave him a 90, so it wasn't out of line.

Thanks Shaun White.

We're a couple of nights behind. I'm a big fan of Keegan Messing. He's from Alaska but skating for Canada as his mom is Canadian. First off, he doesn't look like tall, lithe figure skater - he's a bit more stocky. Second, he almost missed the Olympics due to COVID and he arrived about 24 hours before the start of the short program so he skated horribly jetlagged. Third, he was not using the traditional skating music so it was something different. Finally, his long program outfit was red and black flannel top with black pants. Flannel for figure skating. Rock on.

SI

I'm pretty sure our male snowboard racer is really Will Ferrell.

So, about that... Some incidents can only feed the conspiracies...

There was a ghost false start on the 500m at men's speed skating, that disrupted the race between the top two favorites (Japan's Tatsuya Shinhama and Canada's Laurent Dubreuil). In almost 30 years of watching speed skating events, I've never before seen such a questionable false start. Sure, it didn't lead to disqualification, but in this distance it's usually enough to put both riders just to make them fail. Beneficiary of the incident: China's winner Gao Tinyu, another one of the favorites.

The tossed marker - how was that anything but deliberate? It would be a one in a million shot for that to be an accident

SI