The Olympics

[2bias 3]

Going well in the boxing just seen degale beat the irish lad, very good result. And another GOLD woooo in conoeing.....(they all count)

[Jimbo 175]

DeGale boxed brilliantly.

[Guest alex]

DeGale boxed brilliantly.

Was just going to say the same thing. He's looked classy so far but that was superb.

I also got excited by a canoeing race for the first time in my life.

[sweetleftpeg 0]

BMX lass went shit or bust last corner. Shit won.

[ewerk 31236]

This table tennis isn't what I was expecting at all. And I know they're wearing shorts 'n' all but can it really be considered a proper sport?

Edited August 22, 2008 by ewerk

[ewerk 31236]

Great bit of Partridgesque commentary there in the Taekwondo about how they score points, 'They're a bit like political lobbyists outside Westminster. Political lobbyists who can kick you in the face'.

[Ketsbaia 0]

Great bit of Partridgesque commentary there in the Taekwondo about how they score points, 'They're a bit like political lobbyists outside Westminster. Political lobbyists who can kick you in the face'.

 

[ChezGiven 0]

[Guest alex]

I could get into Taekwondo like. Watching it, obviously.

[luckyluke 2]

I think my mum met that chap who won the canoing gold when he was a medical student.

[ewerk 31236]

Irish fella embarassing himself after the light flyweight semis. He wasn't given a couple of blatently obvious points but overall was comfortably beaten.

[Besty 4]

New WR in mens relay there from the Jamaicans.

[ewerk 31236]

Jamaicans just taken 0.3s off the WR in the 4x100m men's relay.

[2bias 3]

Russia are catching up now!! Got that canoeing guy again 2morrow i think it is in the 500m

[Fop 1]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7576446.stm

[Kid Dynamite 7190]

Whens the Mackem boxer on? I chekced at 2pm and he wasnt on? Is he on at 2am or have I missed it?

[Guest alex]

Whens the Mackem boxer on? I chekced at 2pm and he wasnt on? Is he on at 2am or have I missed it?

He got stuffed.

[Fop 1]

But Jacques Rogge, president of the International Olympic Committee, said London still had to deliver as well as China with regard to the quality of the Olympic village, venues and transport.

 

"The Games are for the athletes, the Games are not for London, the Games are not for Great Britain," he added.

 

That's probably more IOC criticism aimed at the UK already than China has ever had.

[Guest alex]

But Jacques Rogge, president of the International Olympic Committee, said London still had to deliver as well as China with regard to the quality of the Olympic village, venues and transport.

 

"The Games are for the athletes, the Games are not for London, the Games are not for Great Britain," he added.

 

That's probably more IOC criticism aimed at the UK already than China has ever had.

I know. Fucking ridiculous isn't it? And as though London could just build stadiums and facilities that they didn't have to justify to the public in the way Beijing was able to.

[Guest alex]

I see they're cheating to favour the Chinese in the Taekwondo. Again.

[Fop 1]

But Jacques Rogge, president of the International Olympic Committee, said London still had to deliver as well as China with regard to the quality of the Olympic village, venues and transport.

 

"The Games are for the athletes, the Games are not for London, the Games are not for Great Britain," he added.

 

That's probably more IOC criticism aimed at the UK already than China has ever had.

I know. Fucking ridiculous isn't it? And as though London could just build stadiums and facilities that they didn't have to justify to the public in the way Beijing was able to.

Maybe we can take it a step further than China and just computer generate the whole thing.

 

I suppose really for the IOC a regiem like China is perfect for the Olympic Games, as it doesn't really matter what happens around the games so long as the games appear perfect.

 

But it's doubly pathetic when these Olympic Games have basically been used as the biggest propaganda exercise since 1936 (only this time they knew who'd be in charge).

[Guest alex]

Fucking hell. The British appeal has been upheld. Justice was done though.

[Guest alex]

But Jacques Rogge, president of the International Olympic Committee, said London still had to deliver as well as China with regard to the quality of the Olympic village, venues and transport.

 

"The Games are for the athletes, the Games are not for London, the Games are not for Great Britain," he added.

 

That's probably more IOC criticism aimed at the UK already than China has ever had.

I know. Fucking ridiculous isn't it? And as though London could just build stadiums and facilities that they didn't have to justify to the public in the way Beijing was able to.

Maybe we can take it a step further than China and just computer generate the whole thing.

 

I suppose really for the IOC a regiem like China is perfect for the Olympic Games, as it doesn't really matter what happens around the games so long as the games appear perfect.

 

But it's doubly pathetic when these Olympic Games have basically been used as the biggest propaganda exercise since 1936 (only this time they knew who'd be in charge).

I think they've put on a great show, in terms of the facilities and so on. I know you're making a different point though. To hint the same is expected of London is frankly madness though. Also, it is for London. The much discussed 'legacy' is one of the reasons it got the games.

[Howay 12496]

That Rogge is the same twat that's had a go at Bolt saying he was disrespectful to other athletes in the 100m and 200m, Crawford came out and said Bolt disrespected no one and he obviously meant no disrespect.

[tinofbeans 91]

overall a great finals then.

 

Charlie brooker put somethig out about the british olympics coming up and the outgoing Chinese variation...

 

Thanks to China, we have a blueprint for 2012 - virtual athletes and exciting made-up CGI sports

All comments (150)

Charlie Brooker

The Guardian, Monday August 18 2008

Article history

 

Thank God for dishonesty. I can't have been the only Briton to shift awkwardly in their seat throughout the opening ceremony of the Beijing Olympic games the other week. The Chinese mounted an unprecedented spectacle. Thousands of synchronised drummers, acrobats, fireworks, impossible floating rings made of electric dust (surely alien technology, that), dancers, prancers, singers and flingers. Maybe not flingers. I just threw that in to complete the rhyme. But you get the picture. It was amazing. It cost around £50m and was probably rehearsed at the shooty end of a machine gun. Dance, beloved populace! Miss three steps and we take out your kneecaps. Miss five and we go for the head. Dance till your homeland is the envy of the world! Stop weeping and dance!

 

Yet even as my eyes took delight in the colour and magic, my spirits sank. I'm no patriot, but I feared for our national pride come the 2012 London Olympics. How the hell are we going to top a display like that? Our plans currently consist of six roman candles, Bernie Clifton riding his ostrich, and some Britain's Got Talent prick-a-ma-boob beatboxing on a trampoline. It would be less shameful if we all marched into the arena one by one, dropped our trousers, yanked our bumcheeks apart and let the entire globe gaze right up our apertures for an hour, while the Kaiser Chiefs perform their latest single in the background. If nothing else, it would give the rest of the planet something to think about. They'd never mess with us again, that's for damn sure.

 

But my defeatism, for once, was misplaced. The ceremony wasn't as spectacular as it seemed. An impressive swooping aerial shot of fireworks bursting in footprint-shaped constellations turned out to be a computer-generated lie. And the cute little girl singing the Chinese anthem was only miming to the voice of another girl, whom the authorities considered too hideous to warrant airtime.

 

Actually, they were right. The original girl was an absolute pig, with teeth so higgledy-piggledy you could be mistaken for thinking her skull was trying to chew its way out of her face. You could possibly use her head as the basis for the lead puppet in a children's programme set in Ugly Wood, provided you didn't mind your kids vomiting in fear and disgust each time she wobbled on screen.

 

Oh shut up. I'm joking.

 

Anyway, the deception didn't end with the opening carnival, but bled into the events themselves. Hordes of volunteers, known as "cheer squads", have been been planted in the stands during under-attended events, to disguise empty seats and goad the rest of the crowd into whooping on cue.

 

What's remarkable about all this trickery isn't the trickery itself - but how ineptly it's been maintained. Even a six-year-old knows that once you tell a lie, you stick to it. You never admit the truth. Never. And when confronted with irrefutable evidence of your guilt, you dig your heels in further still - loudly denying reality until your accusers die of exasperation. It's a brilliant strategy that's kept the Bush administration going for years.

 

But the Chinese? A few timid queries and they admitted it all with a shrug. Yeah, they were computer-generated image (CGI) fireworks. Yeah, the kid was miming. Yeah, we're using cheer squads. So what? We're not arsed. Stop wetting your pants. What are you going to do about it anyway? Did you know that if we all stood up and sat down at the same time, the resulting tidal wave would destroy your capital cities? Ask us again if we're arsed. Go on. Fire away.

 

They didn't even try to cover it up properly before they were rumbled. The "cheer squads", for instance, were hardly subtle - they were decked out in bright yellow shirts and huddled together in conspicuous clumps. They couldn't have been more noticeable if they'd had searchlights for faces and foghorns for hands. All of which provides an effective blueprint for us to follow circa 2012. First up, the opening ceremony, in which a volcano rises from the Thames, spewing flaming Olympic rings into the night sky while Big Ben - or rather, a genetically enhanced version of Big Ben, one with straighter teeth and bigger tits - pirouettes in the background, miming to the Kaiser Chiefs' latest single. This goes on for 15 hours or until the nearest superpower threatens to bomb us. Then the events themselves begin. None of them takes place in the Olympic stadium because there is no Olympic stadium. We've not bothered building one. Instead, we've got a host of exciting made-up CGI sports. Moon Snooker! Unicorn Wrestling! Quantum Deathball! Dissenter Beheading! Pac-Man with Guns! Naturally, none of the other countries has been allowed to practice any of these games, whereas we've had four solid years to develop and perfect them. So we're guaranteed, ooh, at least three bronze medals. We'll thrash Paraguay, that's for damn sure.

 

And as our virtual athletes (who aren't really there) take their place on the podium (which isn't really there either), thousands of specially trained spectators will loudly voice their appreciation at gunpoint. Then we'll kick the shit out of one or two overseas journalists and claim the whole thing's been a roaring success. Again and again, till we're blue in the face. Bish bash bosh. Job done. As a twat might say at the end of a column.