China Cheating?

China is currently leading the world with 22 gold medals and a total of 35 medal. But are they cheating?...

First it was the fireworks. One billion people around the world sat back in their armchairs, oohing and ahhing at the pretty impressive fireworks display. It wasn't until about a week later that we found out that part of the display had been computer generated.

And then it was the little girl singing the Chinese Olympic Games anthem, a patriotic song entitled v "Hymn to the Motherland" - it wasn't actually her singing it, as The Telegraph sums up,

"Chinese officials have admitted deceiving the public over another highlight of the Olympic opening ceremony: the picture-perfect schoolgirl who sang as the Chinese flag entered the stadium was performing to another girl's voice."

Apparently, the show's musical director Mr. Chen decided that Yang Peiyi was too ugly, with her "buck-teeth" being one reason given for why, at the last minute Lin Miaoke (the girl in the red dress) was chosen to lip-sync the pre-recorded song. "She was not cute enough" said Mr. Chen. Rick draws an interesting parallel here.

And now, speculation is growing over allegations that some of China's athletes are underage. The age-restriction for competiting in the Olympic games has been set at 16yrs in an attempt to cut back on the high numbers of children who had been suffering from extreme training schedules that would eventuate in them being crippled or disabled. However trainers recognise that the younger gymnasts are more flexible, and have a higher strength:body-weight ratio. Check out this video which seems to present some strong evidence that several of China's gymnastic team are indeed underage. A forensic scientist who is interviewed in the video suggests that some of the athletes may even be as young as 10 years old.

Are these girls really 16?

Gateway Pundit has some screenshots on his blog, evidence that China has been removing references to it's athletes ages, and changing them to 16yrs.

These few examples just seem to exemplify China's culture of deceit.

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Hat tip: Half Done
Update (15/08/08 11pm): Children dressed in traditional Chinese costumes representing the 56 ethnic groups in China exposed as fakes: they were all of the Han Chinese ethnicity.
Related post: Chinese Govt. closes down churches for duration of Olympic Games.