I know my effort of raising awareness about this issue may go in vein again this time but I feel the obligation to try again and again. As a proud TAIWANESE AMERICAN, I get a sore feeling every two years during the Olympic Games. Once again, I will not see our actual TAIWANESE flag fly in London 2012 and our actual NATIONAL ANTHEM playing when our athletes win gold. It was a bittersweet feeling when Taiwanese athletes, Chen Shih-Hsin and Chu Mu-Yen, won gold in taekwondo in Athens 2004. We are very proud of their accomplishments but we can’t help but feel discriminated against when the flag of CHINESE TAIPEI and our FLAG SALUTE SONG were used instead of our TAIWANESE flag and NATIONAL ANTHEM.
Beijing has suppressed our Chinese Taipei Olympic Committee for years and the IOC has never addressed this issue. The IOC does not want to deal with this issue and so allowed this form of discrimination to go on for years. What happened to the Olympic Spirit? What happened to the international peace and harmony? Why are Taiwanese treated as second-class country banned from using our actual flag and national anthem? Why is Beijing influencing the Olympic Games? Voula Papachristou was kicked out of Greece’s Olympic Team for her discriminatory comment. I submit to you that the IOC is doing exactly the same discriminatory action by not dealing with this suppressed issue and allow Taiwanese flags to be flown in all Olympic Games. It is time that the IOC deal with this and uphold IOC’s Olympism of FRIENDSHIP:
“Friendship Men and women are at the centre of the Olympic Movement, which encourages links and mutual understanding between people. This value refers to building a peaceful and better world through solidarity, team spirit, joy and optimism in sport. The Olympic Games inspire people to overcome political, economic, gender, racial or religious differences and forge friendships in spite of those differences. For athletes, this means forming life-long bonds with their team-mates, as well as their opponents.”Sincerely,
Chang-Yu Lin
