2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing

[Goldenboko]

Man, imagine being told you're not cute enough at like 7 or whatever years old, to sing your national anthem at the olympics. ;;

If you're brainwashed properly you'll just consider it a great honor that your voice was good enough Dx

[Big D]

I think you guys are misinterpreting the fireworks thing. All the fireworks were set off. But filming explosives like fireworks would have been dangerous and logistically challenging for the filmcrew in the helicopters. So while the fireworks were being displayed, instead of having the helicopter fly around and try and capture the footprints, they chose to show a cgi of it instead.

Ah, that's good to know - it's consistent with thee other footage that's come up (like the YouTube video linked earlier). It highlights the uselessness of most of the 'western' news outlets, too, who would have us believe the entire thing was a hoax.

Any links to credible sources confirming that those fireworks were actually set off?

Man, imagine being told you're not cute enough at like 7 or whatever years old, to sing your national anthem at the olympics. ;;

Chances are it wasn't explained in those terms - more like, "we'll use your singing because it's good, and we've got an actress who looks like the 'ideal Chinese girl' who'll play the part of the singer."

If you're brainwashed properly you'll just consider it a great honor that your voice was good enough Dx

I really wonder if many of you people have ever actually met someone from China... they're not all as stupid, foreign and sheeptastic as you seem to believe, nor is the entire nation mired in indoctrination. Yes, it's an oppressive and totalitarian government that manipulates its populace on a grand scale - but it's not a population of brainless zombies whose only goal in life is to serve the Evil League of Communist Evil.

[Goldenboko]

I love watching Phelps swim, he makes it look effortless. :O

[Bunny]

WHY DID MY SATELLITE SIGNAL HAVE TO GO OUT THIS WEEK

argghaghfdapoighfdigifshg;osda

[Kirobaito]

I think you guys are misinterpreting the fireworks thing. All the fireworks were set off. But filming explosives like fireworks would have been dangerous and logistically challenging for the filmcrew in the helicopters. So while the fireworks were being displayed, instead of having the helicopter fly around and try and capture the footprints, they chose to show a cgi of it instead.

Ah, that's good to know - it's consistent with thee other footage that's come up (like the YouTube video linked earlier). It highlights the uselessness of most of the 'western' news outlets, too, who would have us believe the entire thing was a hoax.

Any links to credible sources confirming that those fireworks were actually set off?

Man, imagine being told you're not cute enough at like 7 or whatever years old, to sing your national anthem at the olympics. ;;

Chances are it wasn't explained in those terms - more like, "we'll use your singing because it's good, and we've got an actress who looks like the 'ideal Chinese girl' who'll play the part of the singer."

If you're brainwashed properly you'll just consider it a great honor that your voice was good enough Dx

I really wonder if many of you people have ever actually met someone from China... they're not all as stupid, foreign and sheeptastic as you seem to believe, nor is the entire nation mired in indoctrination. Yes, it's an oppressive and totalitarian government that manipulates its populace on a grand scale - but it's not a population of brainless zombies whose only goal in life is to serve the Evil League of Communist Evil.

Seems like a Communist sympathizer to me. BURN THE PINKO!

[PuPu]

I love watching Phelps swim, he makes it look effortless. :O

*cough* steroids

Yes. I said it.

I really wonder if many of you people have ever actually met someone from China... they're not all as stupid, foreign and sheeptastic as you seem to believe, nor is the entire nation mired in indoctrination.

QFT, not to mention that some of the critics here seem just as brainwashed as the people they are describing.

[Goldenboko]

I love watching Phelps swim, he makes it look effortless. :O

*cough* steroids

Yes. I said it.

HA! Now thats funny. "Oh, god! He's successful at a sport in the Modern Era! HE MUST BE USING STEROIDS!" No. If he comes up positive in a steriod test then you can say something, until then you can't say jack. After all, Jeremy Giambi was a huge failure in baseball and he took steriods didn't get him anyway. People can be great at a sport without steriods.

[Yar]

That's only because everyone else is taking performance hindering substances! Come on, Winter Olympian Bode Miller skis drunk. Who's to say that some of these other swimmers aren't also hitting the bottle.

[PuPu]

I love watching Phelps swim, he makes it look effortless. :O

*cough* steroids

Yes. I said it.

HA! Now thats funny. "Oh, god! He's successful at a sport in the Modern Era! HE MUST BE USING STEROIDS!" No. If he comes up positive in a steriod test then you can say something, until then you can't say jack. After all, Jeremy Giambi was a huge failure in baseball and he took steriods didn't get him anyway. People can be great at a sport without steriods.

Not as funny as the fact that you think people jump to extremes as easily as you described. I'll say it in a similar way that you said it: "Oh god! Someone is being skeptical of the fact that someone is unusually better than others! I must now mock that person!" Yes, people can be good at a sport without steroids, but probably not so good that breaking world records becomes "effortless" like you said. That's why I kind of said the steroids thing as joke, sorry if it didn't seem that way to all Phelps fans. I'm just saying that I'm slightly skeptical of Phelps' ability; it's not like I'm outright accusing him of being a fraud.

Again, I wasn't trying to accuse Phelps of using steroids and only meant it as a joke.

(By the way, aren't there certain non-steroid drugs a person can take that makes certain substances (such as steroids) in urine untraceable?)

[Yar]

Wow, Canada must really hate summer. 0 Medals. :/ I thought they were doing better than that.

[Slothy]

I haven't been keeping up much with a lack of a TV, but I seem to be hearing that there's been a lot of gymnastics and swimming going on. I don't know if many other events have taken place, but Canada doesn't tend to do well in those. We tend to do better in some of the later events.

Now if we had to swim in frozen water, or run with snow on the ground, we'd be cleaning up right now.

[Breine]

Just watched some gymnastics today. China has already won three out of four gold medals in that sport.. Gonna be interesting to see if they can take the last one as well tomorrow.

Also, I'm kinda sad that Caroline Wozniacki (Denmark) didn't make it further in the women tennis tournament (she made it to round three, before losing to Elena Dementieva). Too bad, 'cause she's really good and it would be nice to see her get into the top 20 (she's currently no 22 in the world).

[Madame Adequate]

I don't even get the big deal about steroids. It'd be better to allow and regulate them than keep up the pretense that their use isn't widespread. Besides which, A) Why are natural massive advantages fair? B) Why is being born in a country with massively superior training capacity fair? C) Why is having a different diet from other athletes fair? But as soon as you use something else specifically designed to make you good at this, it's an awful problem and you should be banned from sports forever?

[Big D]

I don't even get the big deal about steroids. It'd be better to allow and regulate them than keep up the pretense that their use isn't widespread. Besides which, A) Why are natural massive advantages fair? B) Why is being born in a country with massively superior training capacity fair? C) Why is having a different diet from other athletes fair? But as soon as you use something else specifically designed to make you good at this, it's an awful problem and you should be banned from sports forever?

I guess it's about maximising a person's natural potential as best you can. Sure there's a disparity in training and economy and such, but steroids take away from the genuine hard slog and mental commitment of doing the work for oneself. It's cheap, anti-competitive and - since those things are presumably quite sophisticated and expensive - giving an added, incomparable edge to wealthy athletes.
With conventional training, you can the same results almost anywhere in the world. Weights are just as heavy whether they're part of a sophisticated machine, or simply heavy rocks found in the wilderness. Either way, an athlete's only going to get results by trying to be the best they're capable of, rather than going beyond their capabilities through synthetic means that are intended to give them an unassailable advantage.

I'd compare it to allowing cheating in other sports - low blows in boxing, for instance. It happens anyway so it's 'normal', but that hardly means it should be fine for cheap and unsporting dropnuts fighters to use it as a way of overcoming more honourable, decent opposition. The games are supposed to be about who's the best at what they do, not who's the best at cheating.

[Flying Mullet]

Ouch, this story isn't for the faint of heart:
Pictured: The horrific moment Olympic weightlifter turns his elbow back to front | Mail Online

This is the moment Hungarian weightlifter Janos Baranyai's first Olympics ended in agony when he dislocated his right elbow in the ugliest moment yet of the Olympic weightlifting competition.

I sure hope he's okay. It's one thing to not place in your first Olympics, but to have to withdraw due to a serious injury like this?