Why Did Spielberg Exit Olympics?
Maybe it was Mia Farrow‘s guilt-trip last March. Maybe he kept looking at the worsening statistics and realized he could no longer merely speak, not act. Whatever the reason, I salute the decision of director Steven Spielberg (pictured) to withdraw his participation from the Summer Olympics in Beijing. Do I think that his withdrawal will cause the Chinese government to exert more pressure on the government of Sudan to stop the genocide in Darfur? Probably not. (It’s not as if all the years-long protests over China’s human-rights abuses in Tibet have changed many things.) But it is a black eye for Chinese officials. I’m wondering now if two of the other “artistic consultants” to the Games, Ang Lee and Quincy Jones, will follow Spielberg’s example.
