The Beijing Olympics (1 Viewer)

[Slidey]

Re: Boycott of Olympics

I will probably get shit thrown at me from all corners for saying this, but human rights is not a negotiable thing. You cannot use cultural difference as justification for human rights abuses. Some things are just not up for discussion in that sense. Human rights are human rights. Universal. "We do it differently here" is not an excuse.

Spot on!

 

[-WaxingLyrical-]

Re: Boycott of Olympics

Excuse me, but why should everyone follow the west?! Why can't we all be ourselves?! If we don't rely on relativism, then you're certainly suggesting that the west has the absolute sense of human rights, so who's self-indulgent then?! Some aspects of human rights rely on culture, thus cannot be universal and consequently cause much grief in understanding for the west.

Differences in countries and their cultures would determine what sort of human rights are most important to them, some would probably need collective rights more than individual rights to ensure unity. What's "OMG that's violating human rights" there might be "really patriotic/we're one" here. People can't have too much say.

Besides, China's not that extreme now in her thinking that the doors have opened anyway, e.g. following one leader and doing whatever he says, yet she refuses to immerse herself entirely in the western culture. Besides, some forms of requests cannot be tolerated, NOT ONLY THERE BUT EVERYWHERE AS WELL. We've probably have too much freedom here so that any form of national "for the greater good" thoughts cannot be understood. Australia is pretty diluted.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_rights
with particular reference to this section http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_rights#Universalism_vs_cultural_relativism

When talking about human rights, I believe we are focusing on the UDHR (let's leave out the toothless tiger and non-binding arguments). China, despite being a permanent member of the United Nations and a state party to UN treaties on human rights, fails to uphold the basic principles set forth in the UDHR.
Cosmic Doris is right - human rights are universal, not culturally relative.

 

[banco55]

Re: Boycott of Olympics

Excuse me, but why should everyone follow the west?! Why can't we all be ourselves?! If we don't rely on relativism, then you're certainly suggesting that the west has the absolute sense of human rights, so who's self-indulgent then?! Some aspects of human rights rely on culture, thus cannot be universal and consequently cause much grief in understanding for the west.

Differences in countries and their cultures would determine what sort of human rights are most important to them, some would probably need collective rights more than individual rights to ensure unity. What's "OMG that's violating human rights" there might be "really patriotic/we're one" here. People can't have too much say.

Besides, China's not that extreme now in her thinking that the doors have opened anyway, e.g. following one leader and doing whatever he says, yet she refuses to immerse herself entirely in the western culture. Besides, some forms of requests cannot be tolerated, NOT ONLY THERE BUT EVERYWHERE AS WELL. We've probably have too much freedom here so that any form of national "for the greater good" thoughts cannot be understood. Australia is pretty diluted.

How well do people really know about China anyway, to make such determined comments to bag her government out?!

I for one hope China can be itself. How dare any smug westerners question China's right to run over peaceful protestors with tanks.

 

[kony]

Re: Boycott of Olympics

P.p.s. I'm 6'4'', almost 6'5'', Asian chick.

you're 1.95m?

 

[Gay Captain]

Re: Boycott of Olympics

you're 1.95m?

She is Yao Ming and I claim my 5 Yuan

 

[Slidey]

Re: Boycott of Olympics

I for one hope China can be itself. How dare any smug westerners question China's right to run over peaceful protestors with tanks.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/d/d8/Tianasquare.jpg

 

[Slidey]

Re: Boycott of Olympics

As I said on another forum, it's hopeless trying to defend Tibet. It's a well-known phenomenon that authoritarian regimes use wars to unite the people and shift focus away from their tyranny and corruption. The government has managed to leverage the people against Tibet through their state-run media such that any Western media that is contradictory only serves to inspire the Chinese into blind nationalism.

It's gotten to the point where anybody who speaks out against the government, in favour of Tibet, is a traitor to 'the cause'. It's gotten to a point where it's a 'war' of China vs Tibet & the West. A perfect tool to shift blame and focus away from the Chinese government in the eyes of the Chinese people.

"We have always been at war with Eurasia!"

 

[Iron]

Re: Boycott of Olympics

I'm saying that the whole notion of cultural relativity is absolutely self-indulgent piffle that allows ivory-tower academics to wank on about subjectivism and the evils of objective pragmatism and thus not put their necks on the line with an actual moral position.

What makes you think that any moral position is valid? Surely it's the stronger who recognise that there is no truth, no black and white. It's shades of grey, circumstantial, complex, ambiguous - this is the nature of reality: constant flux.

Any absolutist argument is the weaks' attempt to comprehend the world in stable/consistent ways, because they cannot face the terrifying reality of the abyss, of meaningless, isolation, of the need to take total responsibility for yourself.

The weak cannot survive without making quick decisions about good and evil, without herd cooperation, or without the simple psychological need for constancy and certainty. Therefore only the weak and sick shun change by creating 'traditions', they cast doubt and scepticism as 'false' or 'sinful', and they lie to themselves and others by insisting that pure reason actually exists (either here on earth, or in the afterlife), when there is zero basis for this claim.

Our sensory organs have only evolved to the extent that they've needed to in order to ensure our survival. 'Truth' is just another tool we've invented in order to survive.

Love the rest of the post btw

 

[Iron]

Re: Boycott of Olympics

*Insert basic retort of the understanding of human rights and finding human suffering abhorrent due to biological development here*

O THAT WONT DO A'TALL

 

[Enteebee]

Re: Boycott of Olympics

I disagree with positions taken by cultural relativists but still hold relativism to be true. What's wrong with acknowledging that they have a different culture and what's "wrong" to us may be "right to them" but still saying "I want to enforce my 'relative' morals on to them"?

 

[Iron]

Re: Boycott of Olympics

still hold relativism to be true

SHUTUPSHUTUPSHUTUP

.

The only "truth" in your post is entirely located in the question mark

 

[Iron]

Re: Boycott of Olympics

Ok, that's my stop.
Toorah lads!

Edit, Schro, I think youll find that your view is intellectual cowardice, if you believe in the inherent superiority of certain morals, without solid basis

 

[studymyassoff]

Re: Boycott of Olympics

I'm with you on this one. Boycotting the Olympics will do nothing. In fact, it might do the exact opposite of what it was intended to do. I know it sounds romaticised, but the Olympics are designed to promote international harmony. Pulling out to make a political statement would be coutner-productive to that.

agreed
people should really get a better understanding about the situation
boycotting beijing olympics will do nothing, why is the olympics related with a tibet disruption anyway?
i think the tibet people is just taking the Beijing olympics for attention, cos every1's eyes is on the olympics in 2008

well, olympics is olympics
political matter is political matter
two shouldnt be put in one sentence

 

[studymyassoff]

Re: Boycott of Olympics

http://www.multiculturalaustralia.edu.au/img/05IMAGE5.gif

y give us a 1800 proparganda poster?

ari person, you really know so much about china?
o ye where is Tibet located?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=twHzXN3kNTs

 

[Iron]

Re: Boycott of Olympics

I am laying claim that the notions of individual rights and individual agency trump those of perverse nationalism. .

I knew it! A relativist!
Zombie guards! SEIZE HIM

edit: on genetics: how is utility truth? I'm saying that what we call 'truth' is often shorthand for survival, but that doesnt make it true in any pure way.
I like your utilitarianism, but stuggle to see what you think makes it a truely worthy goal - a better goal than, say, your individual struggle for power

 

[ari89]

Re: Boycott of Olympics

http://www.multiculturalaustralia.edu.au/img/05IMAGE5.gif

y give us a 1800 proparganda poster?

ari person, you really know so much about china?
o ye where is Tibet located?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=twHzXN3kNTs

Ariala or Ari89?

 

[studymyassoff]

Re: Boycott of Olympics

Ariala or Ari89?

lol obviously the person that i posted reply too
the person who dont see that must have some sort of mental disease

 

[Iron]

Re: Boycott of Olympics

What!? Here I was gearing up to stride in on a religious white horse to save you (God is truth, truth is divine, there is no other way etc)

But you do me a great honour in the sig, dear sir.

Edit: joke to all

 

[Slidey]

Re: Boycott of Olympics

lol obviously the person that i posted reply too
the person who dont see that must have some sort of mental disease

*cough*

Speaking of mental diseases, you do realises you didn't reply to anybody with 'ari' in their name?

 

[melanieeeee.]

Re: Boycott of Olympics

Actually the amount of people suffering from metal illness in China is pretty high.

Experts claim that as many as 100 million people out of China's 1.3 billion population may be suffering from mental illness. The estimates are based on surveys carried out in several parts of the country, said Zhang Mingyuan, an expert with the mental illness branch of the Chinese Medical Association, at the seventh annual meeting of the association's psychiatry branch.

http://www.terradaily.com/reports/100_Million_Chinese_Suffer_From_Mental_Illness_999.html

Citing the Beijing Suicide Research & Prevention Center, the official China Daily newspaper reported on Nov. 1 that China had 22 suicides for every 100,000 people. The global average is 15 per 100,000. When it comes to Chinese women, it's even worse. In the countryside, where the majority of China's 1.3 billion people live, 30 suicides occur for every 100,000 women, according to Teh-wei Hu, a professor of health economics at the University of California Berkeley, who recently co-wrote a report on the economic costs of depression in China.

http://www.businessweek.com/bwdaily/dnflash/nov2004/nf2004112_8277_db065.htm