A Practical Plan to Implement a Citzens' Boycott of the Chinese Olympics

It can be done! It could make a difference! I don’t know that the tech specs would be or how to set it up, but first things first.

Consider this proposal my friend, the writer David Samuels, sent me in response to my call to boycott the Chinese Olympics in order to refuse to enable their murderous crackdown on dissidents and on Tibetan demonstrators, not to mention the regime’s long history of shameless repression of human rights:

Dear Ron,

I can’t help but feel that watching the Beijing Olympics on NBC this summer has clear parallels with buying a ticket to the 1936 Munich Olympic games that helped Adolph Hitler cement his murderous rule.

While a campaign for an American GOVERNMENT
boycott of the Olympics is clearly futile at this point, we should
start a public campaign for a widespread CITIZEN boycott of
Olympics.

We could launch a global internet petition which would bind
signatories to not watch the Olympics and to put pressure on NBC to
give equal time to the Dalai Lama, the student leaders who fled China
after the Tienamen Square killings, and other victims of rampant Chinese government abuses.

While holding the Olympics in Beijing is obscene, there is no contractual reason why NBC has to acquiesce in producing a month-long television commercial for the biggest tyranny on the planet. NBC should stand up and do what’s right or risk being labeled an accessory to murder. The writers and actors who produce shows on NBC should stand up in public for the people that their network is condemning to death in forced labor camps and in Tibet.

We could also appeal to US athletes not to go and push for companies with some moral sense to offer endorsement deals for “clean” athletes — the ones who are willing to put their personal honor and the purity of their skill above the lure of receiving applause from the handpicked elite of the Chinese communist party.

I think it’s a brilliant plan. Forget governments. Use the net to mobilize the citizens of the world against these torturers and murderers–and their media enablers.

I’m curious, are there those reading this who would sign such a petition? Perhaps there would be a way for Pajamas Media to host it or to scope out the tech possibilities. Possibly you techies have some advice for how best it could be done.

It’s not too late to show the Chinese government there’s a price to be paid for its contempt for human rights.