I saw a few pictures of the flame lighting ceremony. The one thing it reminisced was fascists rituals. Pseudo-ancient costumes, actresses with very regular looks, love for the torch and fire concepts... Only thing missing was the pseudo-medieval music.
Exactly !!!
Independent - Aryan ideals, not ancient Greece, were the inspiration behind flame tradition
There is a two-word answer to those who think the Olympic torch is a symbol of harmony between nations that should be kept apart from politics - Adolf Hitler. The ceremony played out on the streets of Paris yesterday did not originate in ancient Greece, nor even in the 19th century, when the Olympic movement was revived. The entire ritual, with its pagan overtones, was devised by a German named Dr Carl Diem, who ran the 1936 Olympics in Berlin........... It was his idea that the flame should be lit under the supervision of a High Priestess, using mirrors to concentrate the sun's rays, and passed from torch to torch along the way, so that when it arrived in the Berlin stadium it would have a quasi-sacred purity. The concept could hardly fail to appeal to the Nazis, who loved pagan mythology, and saw ancient Greece as an Aryan forerunner of the Third Reich.
The ceremony played out on the streets of Paris yesterday did not originate in ancient Greece, nor even in the 19th century, when the Olympic movement was revived. The entire ritual, with its pagan overtones, was devised by a German named Dr Carl Diem, who ran the 1936 Olympics in Berlin...........
It was his idea that the flame should be lit under the supervision of a High Priestess, using mirrors to concentrate the sun's rays, and passed from torch to torch along the way, so that when it arrived in the Berlin stadium it would have a quasi-sacred purity.
The concept could hardly fail to appeal to the Nazis, who loved pagan mythology, and saw ancient Greece as an Aryan forerunner of the Third Reich.
Olympic Flame - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
...fire was also present at many of the sanctuaries in Olympia, Greece. A fire permanently burned on the altar of Hestia in Olympia, Greece. During the Olympic Games, which honored Zeus, additional fires were lit at his temple and that of his wife, Hera. The modern Olympic flame is ignited at the site where the temple of Hera used to stand. ...The Olympic Flame from the ancient games was reintroduced during the 1928 Olympic Games when an employee of the Electric Utility of Amsterdam called Gerhard Herlitz lit for the first time the flame of the Olympic Games in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. In 1928, the flame burnt in the Marathon Tower of the Olympic Stadium in Amsterdam. The modern convention of moving the Olympic Flame via a relay system from Olympia to the Olympic venue began with the 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin, Germany. The relay, captured in Leni Riefenstahl's film, "Olympia", was part of the Nazi propaganda machine's attempt to add myth and mystique to Adolf Hitler's regime. Hitler saw the link with the ancient Games as the perfect way to illustrate his belief that classical Greece was an Aryan forerunner of the modern German Reich.[2]
...The Olympic Flame from the ancient games was reintroduced during the 1928 Olympic Games when an employee of the Electric Utility of Amsterdam called Gerhard Herlitz lit for the first time the flame of the Olympic Games in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. In 1928, the flame burnt in the Marathon Tower of the Olympic Stadium in Amsterdam.
The modern convention of moving the Olympic Flame via a relay system from Olympia to the Olympic venue began with the 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin, Germany.
The relay, captured in Leni Riefenstahl's film, "Olympia", was part of the Nazi propaganda machine's attempt to add myth and mystique to Adolf Hitler's regime. Hitler saw the link with the ancient Games as the perfect way to illustrate his belief that classical Greece was an Aryan forerunner of the modern German Reich.[2]
Plus, this has nothing to do with the site's editorial line. I remind you of the frontpager duties:
So frontpagers rarely step in as moderators in their function as frontpagers (frontpagers are also normal community members, with the same rights to comment and rate and have opinions). Generally, when a frontpager intervenes with the authority of a frontpager, s/he will indicate so by posting a comment in which s/he will use the moderation tag, which looks like this: [ET Moderation Technology™] .
That is also a subtext of my disgust with these Tibet puff pieces as well. "C'est un scandale !"
Activists are looking for a symbolic, but highly visible, way to protest for Tibet and press freedom in China, and they found a perfect one.
What struck me most in all the images was the close protection to the flame, visibly imposed by the Chinese authorities, who have themselves decided that touching the flame would be an attack on them, and are overreacting. And what it shows is an authoritarian regime looking cornered, which is a good thing.
The Games have not been disrupted.
If anything, this also shows that the Chinese have soemthing to learn from our own leaders: they still seem able to be shamed, which makes them less effective at wielding power against the masses... In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes
