China Wins Propaganda Gold; NBC Medals in Self-Censorship

I am in transit today between Bristol, Stonehenge and London, so today, courtesy of Blogger's email blogging facility, we have a "guest blog": New Yorker staff writer George Packer's "Interesting Times." Please read:

Because no Americans made it to the men's 1500-meter final, I had to stay up till 2:30 last night to see it on NBC. The premier event in track and field (always thrilling because it's 1200 meters of tactics giving way to 300 meters of all-out sprinting) was relegated to the late-late-show, after beach volleyball and BMX dirt bicycling. What else is new? James Fallows, who writes from China for the Atlantic, already warned us to expect highly nationalistic coverage of the Games, no matter whose broadcast; American television isn't even the worst.That's not the subject of today's complaint. Here's my complaint: the Beijing Games have not gone a-flop. They've been a huge success. I certainly don't begrudge the Chinese people their richly deserved kudos. What rankles me is that the Chinese government's extremely effective full-court press against any negative moment marring the coming-out party has hardly been remarked upon. Has NBC mentioned the blanket denial of citizens' petitions to protest? The old women sentenced to re-education camps for daring to complain about poor compensation for their destroyed houses? The arrests of activists, or even those seeking permission to protest, before and during the Games? While Mary Carrillo is checking out panda bears and kite-flying, and Bob Costas is coaxing Michael Phelps to share victim stories from his big-eared childhood, couldn't the network send a reporter to Beijing's designated protest zones, which remain completely empty by government fiat? My viewing has been less than complete, but I doubt I've missed any rigorous journalistic probing. The media's self-censorship runs too deep. I'm not asking NBC to spoil the fun. I'm pointing out how hugely successful the Chinese government's propaganda campaign has been. Again, no surprise. But do we have to be so helpful?

Wed, 20 Aug 2008 14:54:03 -0500


Source: http://www.newyorker.com/online/blogs/georgepacker/2008/08/china-wins-prop.html

Update: Human Rights Watch concludes that allowing China to host the Olympics set human rights in that country back rather than forward.

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