by Lizzy Hermosilla ‘23

With less than a month until the 2022 Winter Olympics Games all eyes are on Beijing, the host city of the games. With the prying eyes of the media now of the country of China, grave animosity towards the country has arisen worldwide due to its involvement in the extermination of the Uyghur Muslims, a religious minority in China. They are currently interned in the Xinjiang province which is about 1720 miles away from Beijing. The strategic hosting of massive sporting events like the Olympics is viewed by critics as a way to distract from the bad publicity that various human rights violations attract to a countries global image, commonly known as “Sportswashing.”

The Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) internment of the Uyghurs has now been classified by many human rights activists and nations as genocide which is the deliberate killing of a large number of people from a particular nation or ethnic group with the aim of destroying that nation or group.

China also is now faced with the Women’s Tennis Organization’s decision to suspend all tournaments in China. This comes after the disappearance of Peng Shuai, former No. 1 female doubles tennis player in the world, after her allegations of sexual assault allegations by former CCP leader Zhan Gaoli went public.

Many activists have now dubbed this Olympics as the “Genocide Games” and despite the new nickname, the games only grow closer, and the International Olympic Committee (IOC) remains firm in their stance not to relocate the games. Many countries have called diplomatic boycotts of the games in response to the IOC’s unwillingness to postpone and relocate the games. This will not stop athletes of that nation from competing, but it does mean that no diplomats from that country will be in attendance during the games.

The United States was the first country to announce its diplomatic boycott and many countries have followed such as Great Britain, Canada, and Australia. However, many countries as well as the European Union are fearful of Chinese trade retaliation if they were to join the diplomatic boycott.

The fear brought on by boycotting China is a common occurrence when “Sportswashing” is present. Other culprits of Sportswashing like Saudi Arabia and Qatar face little push back from other countries, including the United States, due to their important role in the global oil market and various alliances.

Despite Sportswashing recently being recognized by international news outlets, it has been around for years going back to the 1936 Olympic Games in Nazi Germany.

The IOC has found itself in similar predicaments with the 2018 Winter Olympics where North and South Korea were allowed to compete as one team which inadvertently pushed positive headlines about North Korea to the forefront of their global image.

In addition, Team Russia, now known as the Russian Olympic Committee (ROC) since their doping scandal in the 2008 Olympic Games, have been able to compete in all the Olympic games since under the name ROC while simultaneously committing various human right violations against independent media outlets.

The IOC’s consistent blind eye towards human rights violations continues as the 2022 Beijing Olympic Games are a go in less than a few weeks.