I can't help thinking the decision by Steven Spielberg to drop out of his commitments to the opening ceremonies of the 2008 Olympics in Beijing is a mistake, and hypocritical as it relates to Hollywood in general.
All you have in Hollywood, for the most part, are celebrities and those in the overall industry castigating the U.S. government and military for what they perceive as "interfering" in Irag. Now you have the same industry, represented by Steven Spielberg calling for the Chinese to interfere in the Darfur issue. You can't have it both ways; that's a mental disease called schizophrenia.
The atrocities in Darfur are perpetuated by Moslems. So why does Hollywood now want China to do something in the Moslem-dominated country, while blasting the U.S. for doing the same?
Some assert the Chinese have influence over the Sudanese Muslim leaders, but I question that. The U.S. has been in Iraq now for some time, and even with the shedding of U.S. blood, don't have much influence on the various leaders of the country. So why would the Chinese be assumed to have influence over the Sudanese leaders based upon the fact they buy a lot of oil from them? It doesn't make any sense.
If the Chinese weren't buying two-thirds of the oil from Sudan, another country would step in and buy it. How does that lend itself to influence?
While the usual communist papers are attacking Spielberg for backing out of his promises, it has gone beyond that to the general Chinese population, who perceive it as an unjustified attack on them personally. They don't understand how the politics of Darfur relate to the Olympic games. Neither do I.
Spielberg had made the promise to the Chinese to be an artistic advisor to the opening and closing ceremonies for the games. He dropped out about a week ago, asserting the government wasn't doing enough to push the Sudanese leaders to end their attacks.
In the China Youth Daily, an editorial blasted Spielberg's decision saying, "This renowned film director is famous for his science fiction. But now it seems he lives in a world of science fiction and he can't distinguish a dream from reality."
Another article in the Guangming Daily, which is published by the Communist Party, added that Spielberg isn't "qualified to blame China because he knows nothing about the great efforts the Chinese government has made on Darfur."
To me that's a good point. What in the world does Steven Spielberg know about what the Chinese may be doing in connection to the Darfur problems?
While the problems of Darfur are real, and hopefully solutions will present themselves, the idea that China is somehow responsible or has power to change it is probably overstated. It's simply wishful thinking by activists who have too much time on their hands.
These same activists will blast the United States for being involved in politics in the Middle East, while encouraging China to get involved in the thankless task of trying to work with renegade Muslims. The U.S. and Europe hasn't been able to do it after decades, so how will China be able to do it in such a short period of time?
You can't have it both ways. Either nations shouldn't be involved or they should. You can't pick and choose how and why. Once a nation engages another nation, the inevitable unintended consequences emerge which usually makes the situation worse than originally intended.
Now I don't personally care whether Steven Spielberg works on the opening ceremonies of the Olympics or not, but the obvious pressure of special interest groups caused him to break his word with the Chinese. It's hard to respect someone willing to back out on his word based on pressure from the endless number of activists groups.
There's nothing done by Spielberg here that will do any good for Darfur. It only satiates the activists trying to encourage interference in a nation by another nation. The schizophrenic, contradiction these groups represent show they're not only intellectually dishonest, but don't have the slightest idea what they're doing.
Steven Spielberg should have had the courage to stick by his word to the Chinese. If your word can't be trusted, than what is left for you but to be tossed to and fro by every cause perpetuated by the masses. To me Steven Spielberg has lost something of his soul by giving in to these pressure groups.
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