Superhuman
In the build up to these 2008 Olympics, the tele viewer was left in no doubt whatsoever that China was a very naughty country. Worse than battering monks (God alone knows how they managed that when everyone knows you never fuck with a bald guy (have these people not SEEN Westworld?)), worse even than rolling tanks over shoppers, China has stopped journalists accessing the entire internet!
That’s right, journalists can’t download porn where a girl sits on a cake (have you seen that?) so the most sophisticated criticism of China was of the county being the equivalent of a moustache-twirling villain tying a girl to some railway tracks. That’s not the outrage, the outrage is that the oncoming steam train, yea, burns fossil fuel yea? Yea? Will nobody think of the penguins?
The opening ceremony was, to be fair, a terrifying endorsement of all we had feared. Note to all superpowers: if you want to make yourself look non-threatening and cuddly, don’t have thousands of your citizens doing the same thing simultaneously, flawlessly. The last time westerners saw footage like those drummers all beating together in time was of soldiers goose-stepping in B&W newsreels. However, if the message is: ‘even our percussionists are terrifying’, then job done.
The build-up and the opening ceremony were all about making regimes look good. This did not work. Politicians never look good, not standing next to normal people and never, ever, standing next to fit people. Politicians have suits that don’t quite fit them and have shiny arses to their trousers and shiny elbows to their jackets – that’s because they spend all day sat at their desk with their head in their hands thinking ‘what the is going on with the economy?’ or ‘why the fuck did I pay that hooker with my visa?’.
Then the games started.
The Olympics is sport broadcasting for people who hate sport – no, correction, the Olympics is when sports other than football make it onto television and the world is reminded that sport can be thrilling and athletes can defy belief.
Russia’s territorial ambitions are as nothing compared to BBC sport, which has annexed just about every digital channel it owns to provide saturation coverage the way that Bomber Harris arranged for saturation coverage of many German cities at the end of the War. You’re never more than a click away from watching somebody do something incredibly dangerous at high speed. Have you seen the canoeing? The only way they could make that sport more exciting is to let lose sharks and crocodiles into the stream and have the canoeists beat them to death with their paddles.
The athletes are amazing. All those mornings of getting up in the dark to go training. All those evenings of going to bed early when all you want to do is get off your tits and party. It all pays off, because suddenly you’re having the time of your life. Win a medal? Great! Get knocked out in the first round? Great – you can now spend two weeks getting pissed, eating chips and cheering on your team-mates!
What’s really cheering is how all the team GB athletes are such ambassadors for their sport and their country. And the teens – bloody hell. First of all you have to check your perving credentials at the door when you remember that the girls doing synchronised diving are in their teens – and also because their Dad has probably spent the last few years of his life really getting into shape to beat the hell out of perverts.
Most of the teens you see on telly are hoodie rat-children, carrying knives, talking jive and looking like there are well on their way to evolving into morlocks. These people are anti-chavs. Bright and enthusiastic. No wonder we never see them though – they do their training before it gets light and they are in bed by eight.
Best of all are the BBC commentators. Just as you sit at home, thinking ‘how can she do a somersault and land on that beam?’, the commentator screams ‘that’s AMAZING, how does she do that? Magic leotard?’ Possibly, or steroids if it’s a foreigner.
That’s right, journalists can’t download porn where a girl sits on a cake (have you seen that?) so the most sophisticated criticism of China was of the county being the equivalent of a moustache-twirling villain tying a girl to some railway tracks. That’s not the outrage, the outrage is that the oncoming steam train, yea, burns fossil fuel yea? Yea? Will nobody think of the penguins?
The opening ceremony was, to be fair, a terrifying endorsement of all we had feared. Note to all superpowers: if you want to make yourself look non-threatening and cuddly, don’t have thousands of your citizens doing the same thing simultaneously, flawlessly. The last time westerners saw footage like those drummers all beating together in time was of soldiers goose-stepping in B&W newsreels. However, if the message is: ‘even our percussionists are terrifying’, then job done.
The build-up and the opening ceremony were all about making regimes look good. This did not work. Politicians never look good, not standing next to normal people and never, ever, standing next to fit people. Politicians have suits that don’t quite fit them and have shiny arses to their trousers and shiny elbows to their jackets – that’s because they spend all day sat at their desk with their head in their hands thinking ‘what the is going on with the economy?’ or ‘why the fuck did I pay that hooker with my visa?’.
Then the games started.
The Olympics is sport broadcasting for people who hate sport – no, correction, the Olympics is when sports other than football make it onto television and the world is reminded that sport can be thrilling and athletes can defy belief.
Russia’s territorial ambitions are as nothing compared to BBC sport, which has annexed just about every digital channel it owns to provide saturation coverage the way that Bomber Harris arranged for saturation coverage of many German cities at the end of the War. You’re never more than a click away from watching somebody do something incredibly dangerous at high speed. Have you seen the canoeing? The only way they could make that sport more exciting is to let lose sharks and crocodiles into the stream and have the canoeists beat them to death with their paddles.
The athletes are amazing. All those mornings of getting up in the dark to go training. All those evenings of going to bed early when all you want to do is get off your tits and party. It all pays off, because suddenly you’re having the time of your life. Win a medal? Great! Get knocked out in the first round? Great – you can now spend two weeks getting pissed, eating chips and cheering on your team-mates!
What’s really cheering is how all the team GB athletes are such ambassadors for their sport and their country. And the teens – bloody hell. First of all you have to check your perving credentials at the door when you remember that the girls doing synchronised diving are in their teens – and also because their Dad has probably spent the last few years of his life really getting into shape to beat the hell out of perverts.
Most of the teens you see on telly are hoodie rat-children, carrying knives, talking jive and looking like there are well on their way to evolving into morlocks. These people are anti-chavs. Bright and enthusiastic. No wonder we never see them though – they do their training before it gets light and they are in bed by eight.
Best of all are the BBC commentators. Just as you sit at home, thinking ‘how can she do a somersault and land on that beam?’, the commentator screams ‘that’s AMAZING, how does she do that? Magic leotard?’ Possibly, or steroids if it’s a foreigner.
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