Abe, IOC agree to delay Tokyo Olympics by one year | Hacker News Reader

Abe, IOC agree to delay Tokyo Olympics by one year

straitstimes.com

206 pointsdoppp128 comments

More so than the games themselves in July, you have to consider all of the training and qualifiers that the athletes must participate in leading up to the games. All of that has been put on hold, making it impossible to properly prepare for the games even if the virus were to somehow be totally eliminated by July.

There was no other possible outcome.

also a ton of investments for events, tourism that may or may not be doable months later.

Japan’s preferred date in October would be much more pleasant for athletes, spectators, and tourists, but there was a lot of pressure from US broadcasters to schedule it for July.

Why is July for them so important? Football season?

July is after the NBA and NHL finals. It is before the NFL preseason. MLB is at the midpoint of their long season when it is late enough that the excitement of the new year has warn off and it is too early for the playoff race to reinvigorate fans. July is generally the slowest sports month in the US.

Meanwhile in October, the NBA and NHL both start their seasons. The NFL and college football are both going strong. MLB is in the middle of their playoffs. It is one of the busier sports months.

This is also just the sports calendar. Other aspects like the school schedule and traditional TV calendars also point to July as an ideal month.

Not only are Olympics no longer the festival of human achievement but lets have commercial interest dictate when they should take place, even if it makes no sense for the host country. Perfect.

(Anyone who visited Japan at that time of year will tell you the weatjer is pretty brutal, with very high temperateure and high 90%+ humidity.)

The Olympics these days are mainly a moneymaker for the IOC so it makes sense that the highest paying parties will have a say.

Why the negativity? Would you prefer to ignore entertainment context and only think of the weather in the host country?

Commercial interest has a direct correlation to the number of people who tune in. Even if money wasn't a factor, the number of people watching should be a core metric.

I work for a major broadcaster, we have a lot of equipment to ship in 2 weeks weeks time, equipment that still hasn't been configured, and indeed that's spread around multiple buildings across the country. We were expecting this, but we also had to be sort-of preparing to ship kit on time

Very glad they've made the decision now

Had to happen: If they tried to have it, there would have been no crowd and all the athletes would get it like wildfire (The Olympic Village has a lot of Tinder activity, at least).

That doesn't even account for the sad reality that some athletes can't go due to the virus (already). At least three of the South Korean Fencing team (Very likely medal contenders) are confirmed positive, for example.

> If they tried to have it, there would have been no crowd

I'd be more concerned that there would be a crowd and that it would greatly affect Japan's population given how a significant proportion are elderly.

not to mention that Canada and Australia have already said they wouldn't attend anyway. It basically forced their hand. Same thing happened with NCAA March Madness. They kept trying to figure out how they could still hold the tournament and then Duke and Kansas said they were dropping out. And that was the end of that.

The NBA was moving towards crowdless games and as soon as single player got sick they shut it down. Which was later followed by NCAA and a bunch of other major sports leagues.

Technically the first major sports player in a similar league was a soccer player in Europe, but it took a (European) player in America for it to really take hold.

Wouldn't the fencing team have recovered fully by this summer?

There was at least another olympian who tested positive that said he has had extreme fatigue even weeks later and he has lost a lot of strength.

A lot of constant training required to be an olympian.

Not really sure. There seems to be evidence that symptomatic cases have long term effects on lung capacity.

They all train every day, so I think even a month out would fuck up their preparation. Especially if they give their coach COVID.

At the Olympic level, missing multiple weeks of training in the ~year before competition probably eliminates you from medal contention.

And they can't even train in their country

Call it greed. They should have canceled a month ago. Same for any other sporting events.

Others cancelled what was supposed to be happening now. The Olympics were still in the future. It seemed reasonable to wait until there is sufficient evidence that things won't be back to normal by then.

They were playing chicken with insurance. Whichever side cancelled would have not get insurance coverage for their costs.

For an event that is not happening until July and cost more than ALL the other sporting event combined, I say it is not greed but sensible.

Stupid question: Couldn't they still have held it, but athletes/coaches/refs only, no spectators present, and no competitions involving physical contact?

One of the major reasons for hosting the Olympics is tourism, so without an audience, it's just a very expensive show to put on.

No: Athletes can't effectively train right now, and the coaches/refs/athletes would all spread the virus among themselves. Japan may or may not be able to deal with that, but who wants to go traveling abroad in the aftermath of a major global pandemic? Athletes also have family, grandparents etc that may be experiencing the virus themselves or the cause of a funeral. How psyched would those athletes be to participate in the games when their granny is being buried back home? Would you enjoy watching half-hearted competition among athletes not at the top of their game?

The fact it took this long to cancel in the face of an obvious global situation is a bit shameful.

It would be novel to see a bunch of flabby athletes trying to catch their breath during different events. Could add events like doing a cannonball into the pool, seeing who can jiggle their flab the longest, or anything else for which Homer Simpson would be a medal contender. Truth be told, they probably look more amazing as sedentary couch potatoes than I would in peak physical condition.

Unlike other postponement announcements, many of which are cynical attempts to prevent people from demanding refunds, this feels legitimate.

I can see it being well-contained in Japan in a year, with strict restrictions on entering Japan. I think the advice is gonna be for people who want to watch or participate in the olympics to go there about a month early so they can isolate first, and longer if they're in a country that doesn't have it under control. It's through strict border control that Japan has been able to keep it from spreading as much as other places, and I'm sure it's going to be less convenient for people going to the Olympics. I'm just guessing at what it will look like from the perspective of people going. If they go very early, athletes will need to do a lot of training in Japan, but I assume it must have been common for olympic athletes to arrive early and train in the host country in past olympics. Some may even want to travel from a high-risk country to a moderate-risk country first and spend at least two weeks there first before going to Japan. There will probably be people who won't endure the inconvenience and won't go to the olympics, but it will be much better attended than if they tried to hold the olympics in Japan late this summer.

Pretty much expected and no surprise there due to the seriousness of the COVID-19 outbreak made this completely impractical to carry on the Olympics. Postponement was the right decision.

Are they even still drug testing right now? If I’m an elite athlete, I’m hammering those PEDs every day in this quarantine.

PED? Only three letters and you spelled TUE wrong.

I meant Performance-Enhancing Drug. Yours is funnier though.

I need SARMs, SERMS, and I'm mainlining test e. Don't worry guys it's for therapeutic use.

Off-topic, but is anyone aware of many English-language news publications respecting the switch to family given name ordering? The only one I know of is the Economist.

It’s pretty common to see for Chinese and Korean names. I never read about “Jinping Xi” or “Jong-un Kim”.

historically, Japan officially used Western name order when communicating in Western languages. but this year it was switched, with requests going out to media organizations to update their style guides.

Just this week I saw a good article about this[0].

[0] https://www.cnn.com/2020/03/20/media/japan-abe-shinzo-name-i...

Thanks, that was interesting and illuminating.

Glad to see the safety of athletes and the public is being protected.

I wonder why Japan seems to have such low numbers even though they had coronavirus very early as well as many cases from the cruise ship.

I conjecture that since there is a cultural norm of wearing masks when sick, everyone had masks at home. Because of this, they put the masks on when apparently-healthy to avoid getting sick. Because of this, the asymptomatic people didn't spread the virus nearly as much.

I think that more than masks, Japanese are more fastidious about handwashing. For example, Japanese restaurants routinely supply a wet Handi-Wipe with your meal -- even McDonald's.

And they don't shake hands. That's a very easy way to transfer germs, and endemic to Western culture.

Masks also help you avoid getting the virus if you’re not infected. It’s a complete myth that they don’t; literally all research points in the same direction.

Of course; we just can't say that part out loud otherwise there would be a run on masks and the healthcare workers would be in such a shortage it would further exacerbate the strain on the healthcare system.

Is there not already a run on masks? More like the truth is not being said because then people would be more inclined to ask questions like why the "greatest country on earth" is unable to procure basic necessities for a crisis, especially with two months to prepare.

Yes, if we somehow manage to get a massive supply of masks, I expect all officials to do a 180 turn and ask everyone to wear them.

The problem now is that we don't have enough, so we downplay their effectiveness, to limit panic buying and to make sure that people who need them the most get them. It is a perfectly understandable, though a little dishonest strategy. Also, we don't to give people a false sense of security, being close to someone with a mask is still worse than being far from someone without a mask.

It runs the risk, though, of murdering the credibility of those officials. Who will trust anything they say, when they're right there on the record intentionally telling ridiculous lies?

If masks should be diverted to hospitals, then the correct action would be to divert them to hospitals, not to lie to people.

You don't even need to wear a N95 mask, or wear it according to the book. Anything that can reduce the number of virus particles you are exposed to when someone nearby sneezes, or when you touch a surface that was recently sneezed on and then touch your face, can be helpful when millions of people do the same.

A T-shirt over your mouth or a handkerchief tied around your head might not protect you personally. But if enough people wear them, even a small reduction of viral load in the community will compound over time and result in a meaningful difference in the total number of cases and the load it puts on a nation's health system. That's what ultimately matters, and that's what the Japanese and Koreans understand.

Any country that has the guts to order their citizens to stay home should also have the sense to order them to cover their faces with something substantial whenever they have a valid reason to be outside, e.g. going to work.

I don't know if that's true. Surgical masks are pretty good at stopping droplets but they only stop 80% of virus sized particles and that's really not good enough for most medical use cases. It's a lot easier to teach new doctors and nurses "surgical masks don't protect you" than go into details. I expect health officials are just repeating the received wisdom which is close enough to true in their circumstances rather than deliberately being deceptive.

People round off quantitative information to qualitative judgements all the time. Nate Silver still has people being angry at him for "Predicting Hillary would win" when he said at there was a 2/3 chance of that happening. It's such a pervasive phenomenon I don't see any reason to think it couldn't be happening here.

This is repeated a lot, however just like most things - there's more nuance to it than just "wear masks".

In most places, there's simply not enough masks to protect those most at risk (eg: healthcare workers who are constantly in contact with infected patients) AND to have everyone in the community using them.

Improper use of masks is at best pointless, at worst can actually make things worse. The vast majority of people are not used to wearing PPE or dealing with contaminated items. It requires some level of training to fit and wear a mask correctly, and how to properly dispose of them.

You see this with a number of people touching the outside of their mask, and then scratching their face/nose/eyes. or pulling their mask down below their nose, or where it's not even properly sealed around their mouth.

They didn't say just wear masks. You're beating on a strawman.

Masks protect the wearer. This is blatantly obvious and scientific reality. Messages to the contrary are absolute propaganda (for instance a common line is "there is no evidence to show protection for civilians"[1] --- because there has never been a study for that case. Yet it's a specious, absurd claim because we know the masks are protective).

Yes, masks are in short supply. This doesn't make misinformation acceptable (including the absurd, anti-reality claim that unless you're perfectly trained and certified perfectly fitted it is "pointless", which is just ridiculous noise). People already touch their face hundreds to thousands of times a day, so the other fear mongering "you'll adjust it" is another bit of nonsensical noise.

As supplies ramp up and we have to return to some semblance of normal society, masks will not only be seen prevalently, they'll be encouraged as one mechanism of controlling spread. And at the time it'll be interesting how all of the propagandists change their tune.

[1] Excluding the evidence in front of our eyes where countries where mask use is prevalent are seeing little spread.

Can you explain how improper use of masks can make things worse?

false sense of security - gives the person the impression they are protected and allows them to lower their guard in other area's that they might now if they weren't wearing it.

edit

To put it in tech terms ... someone poorly implementing a security / encryption method may be more dangerous than someone who didn't because the person who didn't may take additional steps that the person who falsely thinks they are protected wouldn't.

Couldn't you say the same thing about every non-100%-certain method of protection?

The conversation was about using the protection incorrectly - and yes you could likely say the same thing about any method of protection that is being used incorrectly.

Airbags are great - shouldn't put one in front a baby. Sunscreen is fantastic - assuming it's not expired. etc etc.

> false sense of security - gives the person the impression they are protected and allows them to lower their guard in other area's that they might now if they weren't wearing it.

Using this argument bullet poof vests and helmets "make things worse".

In my experience a mask is a conspicuous reminder of an unusual/dangerous situation - that I would definitely forget about at certain times if I was not wearing a mask - and to be constantly on my guard.

I've seen and heard from people who think social distancing doesn't apply to them if they are wearing a mask... hell there are people who don't think social distancing applies if they are indoors.

edit

Also people who are using bullet proof vests / helmets are generally TRAINED on how to use them, thus know the limits.

It's a poor example.

Ballistic vests and helmets don't collect gunfire that can be transferred to you if you take them off incorrectly, or if you scratch an itch under the vest with a hand that hasn't been decontaminated.

Imagine you have a mask, you take it off for some reason (say to eat or drink) and put it in your pocket, it gathers tons of bacteria, you then put it back on your face. The warm and moist environment lets that bacteria spread, and you sit there breathing in through that colony of bacteria for the next two hours.

The vast majority of people don't know how to handle contaminated items correctly, and default to how they normally do things. You can't see contamination like that, so it's difficult to control your subconcious behaviours.

Touching the outside of their mask (more likely to have any virus droplets), then touch their face/eyes/etc.

Lifting the mask with their contaminated hands to scratch their nose or mouth. Touching the mask and transferring contaminants from your hands onto the inside of the mask, or from the outside of the mask onto your hands then to the inside of the mask.

Taking off/disposing of the contaminated masks improperly.

Using a mask beyond when it's safe to do so - most masks are not supposed to be used if they become moist, as they can retransmit and help spread droplets.

Literally all of these are strictly worse if you don't have a mask; instead of touching your mask - touching your mouth then touching your eyes; instead of disposing contaminated mask improperly - not being able to dispose contaminated skin on your face; etc.

As long as everyone in public wears a mask, it's not really important how good it is as long as it covers the mounth and the nose. This is because you basically switch from protecting the wearer to protecting other from infected asymptomatic wearer.

In such a case even a simple home made mask does wonders in preventing infected droplets contaminating a wide area around the wearer, not to mention the benefit of reducing hand based contamination due to not being able to touch your mouth and nose.

Due to this the Czech government introduced mandatory mask wearing (including self made) in public - if you don't wear one, the police will first warn you and then you get a hefty fine if you still don't comply. Also Slovakia (a neighboring country) just introduced the same.

As for protecting medical personel - yep they definitely need the best protective equipment tjey can get, to prevent even more of them getting infected (there have already been cases for medical personel, police & firefighters). For that reason an "air bridge" has been established that regularly airlifts PPE from china, even including one of the NATO leased gigantic AN-124s.

That way both regular people are protected (from infecting each other) and first line responders as well (by proper air lifted PPE).

Foe this reason ot feels worrying or almost sad to see the reaction in te UK and USA slowly waking up to the seriousness of the whole situation.

- we have no PPE for first line workers, but rest assured it has been ordered (unless its in plane and in the air now, it's too late, should have been done weeks ago)

- not enough beds/ventilators (should have cleared hospitals of elective surgeries and non acute cases)

- cant tell people to wear masks as there are none (tell them to make some or face a fine)

- people still congregating in bars and restaurants (you should have closed those long ago)

- with schools and day care closed first line responders have nowhere to put their children (keep some vare centers open to care of children of critical workers)

- people are not respecting our guidance (well, then it should not be a guidance but punishable emergency state ordnance)

Hopefully others can get up to speed quickly before it is too late. The local emergency measures in Czech Republichave been pretty strict, but so far (and I really hope not to jinx it) seem to be working. Arround 1200 infected so far with smaller Neighboring Austria havig 5 thousand. Still two people died... But at lest the people on ventilators are still in the tens.

An overall high level of urban hygiene and general cleanliness, some social distancing already being the norm (generally not touching each other, though there are severe exceptions like the overcrowded trains at rush hour) and a respect for public order.

What is your source for this?

Generally when people tell anecdotal stories/things they remember, there's no source. It's kind of silly to ask him for something like hand washing statistics for Japan vs the world, that's clearly not what he's providing.

Sorry I guess my question wasn't clear. I meant to ask, what is the source that those hygiene practices he mentioned are factors in the lower rates of spread of the virus given that other countries such as Italy and Spain have enacted stricter measures and yet show higher rates of spread? I am not asking for sources to show the difference in cultural practices.

I have no source for that, and it was a guess/suggestion for your original question, that maybe because preventive measures were already in place in the culture, they may have slowed the spread before proactive measures were taken.

Visiting, watching and talking. You can get some sense of it just from watching any of the street walks/tours on YouTube and other unscripted videos of daily life there.

Fairly early government measures for containment and mitigation: selective border closure or preventative quarantine for people from affected regions (much easier to implement as an island nation), closing of schools.

What's interesting is that none of the answers seem definitive.

1) 'Mask wearing' - we know even cloth masks will help reduce spread, but not by what factor overall. We don't know the real vectors here.

2) Someone mentioned 'hygiene' - do the Japanese really wash their hands every time they enter the house? Or do they 'rinse their food' i.e. maybe package handling is a big vector.

3) 'Early border closing' - it only takes a handful of cases to cause the spread. Nobody has been able to 'keep it out' this way.

4) Some cynical commenters indicated it's due to low testing and governments wanton to 'keep the numbers down' which is hard to buy because the truth would hit hard when hospitals start to fill up.

5) Timing. Taking strong measures early may have made all the difference. If you can truly keep the numbers small, it becomes more manageable on a case by case basis.

Or all of the above.

I hope we are able to isolate the real transmission vectors that affect R0, but we may never really know.

There are too many things that may or may not have some kind of effect. Adding to the brainstorming list: taking your shoes off at home, showering in the evening vs. in the morning. BTW I don't think people wash their hands more in Japan, but who knows.

There definitely are places within Japan that have more cases despite having a lower population density. Okinawa (south) has very few cases, while Hokkaido (north) has a lot of cases. That seems to support the hypothesis that climate plays a major role.

Yes, literally showing at night might make a difference.

So many things: maybe they regularly clean the handles on doors. Maybe the restaurants always use a disinfectant wipe. Maybe people 'stay at home' more regularly if they are sick.

There's a really powerful EpiCurve calculator someone at OpenAI published - and the most interesting thing is how sensitive everything is to R0. R0 1.8 v. 2.2 is just a huge difference.

If 'social distancing' brings it down some, but then 'showing at night' nudges it a little bit lower, voila, noticeably less spread.

It's going to take a very keen measure of variables, in fact, it's going to take a keen observation of culture to even figure out what those variables are.

Sadly, I don't have faith we'll ever get there.

Some other possible factors I have considered beyond the above are:

Effective local government response (contact tracing and closures) when a case is detected. Japan does seem to do a good job at disaster preparation and response generally.

Possibly some climate-related advantage. Japan has a fairly humid climate and the Tokyo area is starting to see some warmer weather now.

In addition to the other points they aren't testing as much.

I read yesterday that Japan had administered something like 16,000 COVID-19 tests in total. So I think they're basically not testing and hoping that it goes away.

I would be interested to read if you could share the source for the above. It’s true that Japan only seems to be testing people with serious symptoms at the moment. But we would expect hospitalizations and deaths to be higher if the number were really that high.

Doesn't Japan already have a pretty high number of death for the supposed amount of cases? Sweden for example has 36 deaths for 2286 cases whereas Japan has 42 deaths for 1140 cases. And South Korea has 9037 cases and 120 deaths, so about three times as many deaths but nine times as many cases.

Japan actively avoids testing if those deaths are due to COVID-19. If someone recently dies with pneumonia, it's worth to test if this is the COVID-19 case. Japan doesn't and it claims that the public fear will overload and collapse their medical infrastructure. I don't really understand why this can even be the case, but this is a broadly accepted sentiment around Japan. And its annual death toll from typical pneumonia is around 100k, so Japan can easily hide it even if they had hundreds of the COVID-19 death cases by not testing it.

https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2020/03/24/national/tokyo-...

Meanwhile, Tokyo's governor is actively considering lock-down due to a potential explosive rise. Lock-down for a city like Tokyo (which has roughly one third of their entire GDP) is clearly a nuclear option. If you really have only hundreds of the cases, this can (and should) be handled by comprehensive testing and tracing like S. Korea. Or perhaps their confidential COVID-19 projection doesn't agree with Japan's official stats...

From that article they state that Tokyo had 154 infections, with 101 hospitalized. That hospitalization rate is roughly 5x higher than seen elsewhere; implying that their actual infection count is closer to 750. I think there's something amiss...

What they didn't write, is that there will be no Olympic village next year then. They already sold all the new apartments. And now they have add contracts to all those buyers to let the private appartment for 3 weeks to the athletes. Or something like this. Hotels? In Tokyo during the high Olympic season? Tents?

Is anything insured? A lot of companies bet their farm and then some, on this happening. Not to mention the countries, including the host.

We need to let Japan know that this is not their fault.

It's ingrained in Japanese culture that they often put too much pressure on themselves. They might think if they had put extra 120% effort, the Olympics would have gone as scheduled. But this is not on them.

Although it's only speculation, we wouldn't want another case of heartbreaking suicide[0] because of a Japanese blaming himself/herself too much.

[0] https://www.straitstimes.com/asia/east-asia/japan-confirms-t...

That's sad but what does "let Japan know that this is not their fault" even mean?

As a global community we should come to and express the (IMO) correct conclusion that Japan did an amazing (perhaps the best) job of containing this, and it was still the right thing for them to postpone the 2020 olympics.

My understanding is that Japan didn't do the best job, although definitely better than the US. Taiwan probably has had the best Coronavirus response.

Doesn't Japan have a much higher case fatality rate than the US?

They also have a much older population. Maybe saying that they had a "much better" response than the US is too generous, certainly compared to their neighbors of similar means, Japan has been incredibly slow to act and test.

> ... Japan has been incredibly slow to act and test.

and it seems the Japanese public is quite angry over Abe's willful neglect to save the Olympics. Now that the Olympics is off the table (ie, postponed), Japan can stop pretending that everything is all sunshine and sunflower.

Not sure if Taiwan, Singapore, Vietnam had to do much to prevent it in the first place. Their warmer climate seems to have slowed the spread.

South Korea's initial response was actually slow -- didn't restrict travel from China like many others did. The president declared a premature victory ("it would be over soon") and donated 2M face masks to China -- only to find the country in masks shortage the very following week. But their innovative testing efficiency (eg, drive-through, booth) and containment strategy set a good example for the world.

They're adults, they can see that the world is dealing with something significantly more important than the Olympics.

Yeah sorry I think we have more important things to do right now.

The short answer is, we don't know. There just isn't data to tell.

That being said, not that much testing has been made. The culture doesn't promote not downplaying or hiding your symptoms. Past couple of weeks, people have been relaxing. Cherry trees are in full bloom and so are the park gatherings. At the airport there are fingerprint scanners at the passport control - no way to sanitize your hands until after luggage unless you brought hand sanitizer. I could go on.

Tokyo's governor just mentioned the possibility of a Europe/China style lockdown: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-tokyo-...

Tokyo just picked up the rate significantly: https://www.mhlw.go.jp/content/10900000/000612031.pdf

CDC just raised Japan's alert rate: https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/travel/notices/warning/coronavirus-jap...

Internally, there are recommendations, and not much more. Bars and clubs are still going. Many offices are business as usual, apart from not demanding everyone in at 8:40 sharp to spread out commutes a bit more. Many of those expect to be able to return to that by April. (Just anecdata, my girlfriend happens to work at one such company)

Golden Week is coming up. For those who don't know, generally in Japan people only have around 10 holidays - but on the other hand there are a lot of holidays. It just so happens that in may several of those fall together and it's the one week every year where everyone goes traveling (there is also New Year's which is more focused on family).

I am not optimistic.

Use Twitter; Japan's PM has an account.

> @AbeShinzo, it ain't yer fault bro #tokyo2021 - @thieving_magpie

@AbeShinzoニキ、お前のせいじゃねぇぞ

>We need to let Japan know that this is not their fault. It's ingrained in Japanese culture that they often put too much pressure on themselves.

I can't help but think this is such a bizarre take.

"Japan" and the Japanese people aren't children. We don't need to reassure "them" of anything, as if their culture collectively precludes them of realizing that the Coronavirus isn't "their fault". As if they're too naive and caught up in same bushido notion of honor and dignity. A quick few moments on Japanese Twitter around news of the virus will show the intense xenophobia[0][1], with highly liked/retweeted posts directed almost entirely at Koreans and Chinese people, and praising Trump calling it the "Chinese virus".

I know Twitter isn't representative of the Japanese population, but I'm highly skeptical of the idea that "Japan" is down in the dumps, thinking they only could have done better for the olympics. From what I can gather, a large chunk of the Japanese population didn't want the olympics anyway.

[0] From Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_incidents_of_xenophobi...

[1] A quick search of the trending tag "#ChineseDontComeToJapan" and the corresponding Japanese-language tag "#中国人は日本に来るな" and related posts (example of a popular anti-Chinese people post: https://twitter.com/mobirufosugang2/status/12391799224944803... - other posts in the thread emphasize the beauty of Kyoto without "Chinese and Koreans")

It’s very clearly the CCP’s fault. This is basically the CCP’s Chernobyl moment

(Note: I said CCP not China. The Chinese people are also very much victims of the CCP’s culture of suppression of information here. Wuhan never should have suffered as much as it did).

Very anectdotal, but the three Japanese persons I know have told me that people in Japan are generally negative towards holding an Olympics and think it's just a waste of resources.

This is a very common "populist" view when the Olympics are held locally... true here in the US when the Olympics were in LA and Atlanta.

In my opinion, it's rational (which surprises me that it would be "populist" since populist thinking is rarely rational).

The Olympics really are a terrible waste of effort and resources for the host nation, and the host nation rarely, if ever, gets a positive return on it. Mostly, it seems only to serve to increase the prestige of some head-of-state, nothing more. In reality, it costs an enormous amount of money to build facilities that are only used once and then go to waste. The world would be better off designating two separate, permanent Olympics facilities, one for summer and one for winter, and just reusing those every 4 years.

The final goal of ever endeavor is not always profits.

Extraordinary public funding that goes through a narrow "takings" funnel may be a high price to pay for the "not always profits" outcome of an Olympics though.

Yet funnily the IOC, broadcasters, various contractors who build the stadiums, the travel and hotel industry...all seem to profit.

Then what exactly is the goal? If you're not better off after doing something than before doing something, then why would you do it? Hosting the Olympics doesn't help a host nation in any measurable way that I've ever seen, though it does seem to increase the profits and prestige for some national leaders, the IOC, and of course other companies that stand to profit from the event as another poster here pointed out. I don't see how that helps the people of the nation at all.

To give examples, Calgary recently voted not[1] to host the Winter Olympic Games when they had been previously known for doing quite well in 1988. [2] When I was in high school we had a substitute teacher from Greece to talked about how he was unhappy with the economic effects on small towns from larger infrastructure projects after the 2004 summer games.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Calgary_bid_for_the_2026_Winte... [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1988_Winter_Olympics#Impact_on...

I wish we would quit moving it around. The Olympics could be quite profitable if countries didn't spend a fortune building for it.

If we held it in Athens (not sure if Olympia could support it?) for the summer, then have it rotate between countries that can host without massive infrastructure changes for the winter (NA - Calgary/Lake Placid, Europe - St. Moritz, Oslo Asia - Beijing, Pyeongchang).

I would guess every citizen of a hosting country has felt similarly.

Except the ones running the companies being paid to support, construct, or provide concessions and services... follow the money.

This is the same everywhere. I was in LA for the lead-up to '84 (though I was just a kid), Sydney 2000, and Vancouver(Whistler) 2010.

The people who were the most outspoken in Whistler against the Olympics became some of the biggest cheerleaders when the event came to town. When you're in the thick of it, it's difficult to not be amazed at how great the Olympics is.

Yes, every host country ends up losing money. Let's not forget, Japan just held the Olympics in '98, and had previously done so in '64, so they know what they are getting themselves into.

Infantilizing an entire country. This is an interesting take on the state of things.

That's not infantilizing.

Asian countries have a very ingrained sense of "face" and honor. Face in China and honor in Japan are very very important.

It is infantilizing when we say that the concept of saving face prevents them from seeing the results of their actions, and that they need to be "reassured" by the global community that things aren't as bad as they think - "if only they could see past saving face".

It seems to be the final degeneration in Orientalism[0] not only to say that the Japanese aren't aware of their responsibility, but to say they need to be given a pat on the back and reassured, like you would a child.

[0] Orientalist thinking is not necessarily racist; I'm saying this now before someone accuses me of accusing GP of being a racist.

> It's ingrained in Japanese culture that they often put too much pressure on themselves.

This just sounds like reverse Orientalism. Japanese culture might have a bigger emphasis on civic duties, but on a national level it's clearly a hit and miss: consider that WW2 apologists are still popular in some sector of Japan. (And I'm not trying to blame Japan here, I mean, most countries aren't much better.)

Good call!

(Obligatory joke:) So, the events of Akira are not going to happen.

Oh, they're still branded Tokyo 2020 Olympics Games. Maybe Akira is set in 2025.

So glad that Dick Pound finally got in on the action!

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