I believe this topic of a proper venue for protest has been spoken to by many of our most passionate and heroic leaders of our time and from our past. On the walls of The Holocaust Museum in Washington D.C., it states: "Thou shalt not be a victim. Thou shalt not be a perpetrator. Above all, thou shalt not be a bystander."
Author Dennis Wholey wrote in "Courage to Change" that, "Expecting the world to treat you fairly because you are a good person is a little like expecting the bull not to attack you because you are a vegetarian." Edmund Burke, a British leader who supported the American colonies and stood against King George III in our efforts for independence, stated, "the only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing". Bottom line, yes it is appropriate to protest mankind’s injustice at these Olympic Games.
"An injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere." A tip of the hat to John Carlos and Tommie Smith!
Patrick Sullivan
Computer technician/Rank-and-file Community Organizer
CVPH Medical Center
Plattsburgh, NY
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If the host country's government treats the Olympics as a political event (as China is doing by jailing and killing Tibetan human rights protesters and monitoring all incoming and outcoming emails from Beijing hotels during the Olympics), then I think the rest of the participating countries have every right to behave politically in regards to the Olympics as well.
Jean Weille
Montefiore Medical Center
The Bronx, NY
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