Comments on: Women’s Chinese Gymnasts team underage: is it true?

By: Jennie

Jennie — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 05:41:43 +0000

In addition, I would like to comment on the lip synching controversy. Can we please be a bit more introspective about this? American advertising is based on the concept of beauty, whether the products are for adults or for kids (do you see ugly kids advertising for Gap?). Granted, it’s not supported by the government, but since this advertising works in a capitalist society, one can only assume that most American people support it either directly or indirectly, unless we think the American system doesn’t work, and the capitalist society continually produces products and images that do not sell. Beauty is one of the great contributing factors to success is further reinforced by other aspects of society. Frankly speaking, is that really better than a politically incorrect government making a choice to pick a pretty girl over an “ugly” girl? One is overt. The other is covert. Both are equally damaging. Just look at all the girls with extremely low self esteem in elementary school, middle school, high school, college, and beyond.

By: Jennie

Jennie — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 05:24:53 +0000

As an Asian American female, I do have a problem with people making comments such as “Shawn Johnson…is small, but she obviously was developed like a 16 year old…” People have different builds, and Asian females on average are built differently from Caucasian females. I have tons of Asian friends who are 23 or above and who look like “12 year olds,” by typical US standards. By making such statements, people are basically judging these girls using American standards, and that’s unfair. I’m not posting this to support the Chinese gymnastics team, since I do believe that there is enough evidence from various documents and reports to look into this matter. I am speaking from a perspective that by comparing one demographic to another and not recognizing inherent statistically differences, one is setting one standard as “normal” and another as not, and I think that can be quite unhealthy for the demographic that is considered abnormal. It’s not just this post, but other posts which comments on, say, the “curves” of the girls on the American team, etc. How is a 16 year old Asian girl who doesn’t have “curves” supposed to feel?

By: collin

collin — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 08:53:11 +0000

There is a difference between simply being smaller and obviously looking pre-pubescent. Shawn Johnson is 4 foot 9 inches.. that is small, but she obviously was developed like a 16 year old….

By: Abe

Abe — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 19:23:13 +0000

In Response to Eric:

The issue is not when you start training. The issue is that younger bodies can do things in gymnastics that older bodies can not. This creates an unfair advantage. See Nadia Comaneci who (when it used to be legal) got many perfect 10s when she was 14 but failed to get any when she came back at 18.

By: Eric

Eric — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 15:38:17 +0000

Why all of the whining over the age of the chinese gymnasts? Yes, if they are truly underage, the Chinese are breaking the rules, clearly. Yes, they should be strippped of medals for breaking the rules.

Are they cheating though? No, they are not. They simply are not improving their chances of winning by having younger women/girls compete in the olympics. I love the righteous slant Americans (and Bela Karolyi) take when they slam them for sending them off to training camps at early ages. What exactly do you think is taking place in the US in gymnastics and similar sports??? Why is the American approach to these things always so right and just? Why is ok for the Americans to have defecting citizens of other countries compete and nobody has anything to say, as long as they wave the American flag?? Does anyone realize that the history of success of Americans in the Olympics is based almost solely in our free market economy that incentivizes athletes to participate full time in their sport because they are guaranteed financial success if they win??

This idea of American righteousness when it comes to sports and the Olympics as a whole seems to be as much as an attempt to maintain some level of world superiority, in light of an awful foreign policy and a joke of a government. It’s so typical for Americans to turn around and criticize as many components of these games as possible. It’s probably rooted in the fact that people aren’t happy with the gold medal count.

Folks – lay off of the statistics and stop your whining.

By: Michael

Michael — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 19:10:01 +0000

Asian girls are generally leaner and shorter than Americans

Japanese Gymnastics Women’s Team
Avg height in cm: 146.67
Avg weight in kg: 37.33
Avg age: 19

Chinese Gymnastics Women’s Team
Avg height in cm: 144.33
Avg weight in kg: 35
Avg age: 16.8

USA Gymnastics Women’s Team
Avg height in cm: 153.67
Avg weight in kg: 48.33
Avg age: 18.17

Data from http://results.beijing2008.cn/WRM/ENG/BIO/Team/9990373.shtml

http://results.beijing2008.cn/WRM/ENG/BIO/Team/9990717.shtml

http://results.beijing2008.cn/WRM/ENG/BIO/Team/9990657.shtml

By: Kris

Kris — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 19:42:51 +0000

I agree with Adam. If they admitted to substituting a girl to lip-synch for the opening ceremony because the actual singer wasn’t “cute enough”, what do you think they’ll do in a competitive situation? I don’t blame the gymnasts, they’re basically forced to do it, and they live in a communist country.

And I’d be blind and dumb if I didn’t admit that based on performance, they deserved the gold medal.

BUT they should not have gotten the opportunity to perform at all with underage gymnasts. There are athletes training their whole lives for this, and to be cheated by someone else is far from fair.

Yang Yun from the 2000 games admitted that she was only 14. And she actually LOOKED eligible! Imagine how old these girls are.

By: Adam

Adam — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 02:21:13 +0000

They admitted to using a substitute lip-sync girl for the opening ceremony because the girl who sang beautifully just wasn’t pretty enough.

Imagine what lenghts thy would go to if gold medals were on the line.

By: Bo Ngadi

Bo Ngadi — Thu, 14 Aug 2008 01:42:09 +0000

jason lowe wrote
[quote]
“As patriotic Americans who support our athletes I urge all readers to bomb Mr. Rogge with emails until he does something.”
[end quote]

Is this a sick attempt at satire ?

So, what should patriotic Chinese do, hack this website ?

Jaosn Lowe and his band of morons need to get back and start searching for Saddam’s WMD’s . What an idiot? Pick your arse you moron you might find your elusive WMDs.

Documentary evidence – my foot.

By: traceymarg

traceymarg — Wed, 13 Aug 2008 23:12:24 +0000

The ages of the Chinese women’s gymnastics team was brought up before the Olympics began. After watching them compete, one has to be blind not to notice how young these girls look compared to the rest of the competitors.

If an investigation proves these girls are underage, China should be stripped of their gold medal for not following Olympic rules. One cannot argue the fact they were spectacular, but lying about ages and forging documents does not uphold the integrity of the Olympic Games.

By: Jason Lowe

Jason Lowe — Wed, 13 Aug 2008 19:05:33 +0000

At the olympics Women’s gymnasts by rule need to reach the age of 16 in year that they compete in the olympics. It is clear that the Chinese team has members who are under age. One who saw the event can not deny how young the chinese gymnasts look. Further there is documentary evidence which questions there age. The Chinese government is obsessed with winning to the point where they take children as young as 3 away from their family to put them in boot camp to become olympians. This obsession with winning has led them to cheat by falsifying passports. The chinese government surely believes that the IOC will not question their falsified documents. The NY Times covered this as there have been suspicions for awhile (http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/27/sports/olympics/27gymnasts.html). As American consumers we should all be upset. I am proposing we email the IOC chairman telling him to open an investigation. I am attaching a letter I wrote. The email I have for Jacques Rogge is JaRogge@olympic.com – this email did not bounce so I am assuming it is correct. If someone else has a better email or a suggestion as to who else to contact that would be great (maybe we should urge America to file a formal complaint?). As patriotic Americans who support our athletes I urge all readers to bomb Mr. Rogge with emails until he does something.

Here is the Letter I wrote to Jacques Rogue:

Dear Mr. Rogge,

I recently witnessed the women’s team gymnastics finals. At first, I was skeptical that the Chinese would risk public ridicule by presenting gymnasts who were not of proper age however just looking at the girls one can not deny that they do not look in anyway like they are 16 years old. Further, this visual evidence is only corroboration for documentary evidence. I find it very honorable that the IOC has come down on performance enhancing drug cheating. It is not fair though if cheating happens in other ways. If these girls are not of proper age it will come out in the future. I understand not wanting to insult the host country but do not insult the rest of the world. I urge you to immediately open an investigation into the age of the Chinese women’s gymnastics girls and ensure that the Olympics games are competed in an honorable way.