Rant about Olympic Gymnastics
Aug. 19th, 2008 07:38 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
paige_kateI don't wish to offend anyone on my flist who is either Chinese, of Chinese descent or has Chinese friends but: Why is the Chinese Women's Gymnastics team winning medals they don't deserve?!
First the Chinese are allowed to have female gymnasts that are underage and then they make glaring mistakes and are winning medals when gymnasts who didn't make as many mistakes get screwed. Alicia Sacramone didn't medal even though her vaults were great and a Chinese gymnast who FELL on one of her vaults medaled. Nastia Liukin stuck her landing in the uneven bar finals, a Chinese girl didn't and she got the same score as Nastia and yet Nastia, who did much better, took silver?!
Am I the only one thinking that something is wrong here?! Why are deserving gymnasts being gipped out of their medals when girls who shouldn't be competing in the first place because they don't meet the age limit and are making big mistakes are taking gold medals? Just because we are in their home country doesn't mean that they shouldn't be judged fairly like everyone else. Nastia has to be happy with a silver medal when anyone with eyes saw that she was clearly better than the Chinese girl who took gold.
Now, this rant isn't against all Chinese athletes. China has great athletes that I enjoy watching; Guo JingJing was my favorite to watch during Diving (and I'm sad that she's retiring) and I love Yao Ming. It's just that I think that in Women's Gymnastics, China is being given an unfair advantage over teams that follow the rules and are performing better.
First the Chinese are allowed to have female gymnasts that are underage and then they make glaring mistakes and are winning medals when gymnasts who didn't make as many mistakes get screwed. Alicia Sacramone didn't medal even though her vaults were great and a Chinese gymnast who FELL on one of her vaults medaled. Nastia Liukin stuck her landing in the uneven bar finals, a Chinese girl didn't and she got the same score as Nastia and yet Nastia, who did much better, took silver?!
Am I the only one thinking that something is wrong here?! Why are deserving gymnasts being gipped out of their medals when girls who shouldn't be competing in the first place because they don't meet the age limit and are making big mistakes are taking gold medals? Just because we are in their home country doesn't mean that they shouldn't be judged fairly like everyone else. Nastia has to be happy with a silver medal when anyone with eyes saw that she was clearly better than the Chinese girl who took gold.
Now, this rant isn't against all Chinese athletes. China has great athletes that I enjoy watching; Guo JingJing was my favorite to watch during Diving (and I'm sad that she's retiring) and I love Yao Ming. It's just that I think that in Women's Gymnastics, China is being given an unfair advantage over teams that follow the rules and are performing better.
