Commenting: The Solypsisyphisticate #2

Chinese People Are Robots

Every four years, something in my body goes horribly awry, and I start to care about things like how fast people can swim and the fairness of tie-breaking procedures in women’s gymnastics. Now that the Olympics are over, I can at last take a step back and reflect objectively on what they meant. Of course, we learned a lot about individual determination and the power of sport to bring people together, but I think the most important lesson to draw from these Olympics is that Chinese people are robots.

On what do I base this conclusion? We’re all aware that China strictly regulates reproduction by limiting each family to only one child, yet they have over 1 billion people. This is mathematically impossible unless a portion of that population has been produced synthetically by the Chinese government. What do you think they were doing during those 20 years they were completely isolated from the outside world? Perfecting their ping-pong strokes? Well, yes, but they were also perfecting their plan for world robot domination! By 2006, they had developed a beauty droid and a robot chimp. Put those two together and you’ve got a pretty good chance of winning gold on the uneven bars.

So how did China’s robot athletes perform in the Olympics? First of all, they’re horrible at swimming, but fantastic at diving. This can only mean that the Chinese have created a synthetic skin that seems human in look and feel, but that cannot withstand submersion in water for extended periods of time. The superhuman precision of body movements devoid of of any recognizable warmth distinguishes both Chinese divers and gymnasts. Also, note how the Chinese “women’s” gymnastics team appeared to have a sense of solidarity difficult for any human female gymnast to fake. One particularly striking instance of China’s technological superiority was Fei Cheng’s bizarre scream before her second vault attempt in individual competition. At first glance it would have appeared that this was a systems malfunction, especially since she fell flat on her ass on the dismount. But the inexplicably high score she was awarded can only lead me to conclude that Chinese robots have some sort of mind-control device that operates through the emission of a high-pitched frequency. If only Alicia Sacramone were wired for telepathic score enhancement, we might have won team gold. Hey, NASA, let’s get workin’ on that!

Of course, it’s not only Chinese athletes who are robots. Outside of the games, we have seen that your everyday Chinese “person” lacks the desire for personal autonomy that our Founding Fathers recognized as an integral part of human nature. All three “protest zones” in Beijing remained entirely empty throughout the games, despite the fact that the government was considerate enough to place them where there was no chance of protestors being inconvenienced by spectators. At least when we build barbed-wire enclosures in vacant lots miles away from public events, people have the decency to show up. Now that’s good old American tenacity. I was definitively convinced, though, when I learned that two septuagenarian women would be sentenced to one year of “reeducation-through-labor” for having actually applied for a protest. Whoops! Looks like somebody’s wires got crossed! It’s a good thing they’re robots, otherwise we might have to start feeling guilty about our collection of Happy Meal toys. Obviously, no government would be so heartless as to sentence spinsters to hard labor without a trial unless they were certain that, as machines, they are impervious to pain and slow, lingering death.

Why would anyone want to criticize a government that decides to host the Olympics anyway? The games promote a feeling of international solidarity and remind us of our common humanity. I mean, those of us who are still human. In any case, we’ve certainly seen in the past that repressive regimes that host the games become more accepting of ethnic, religious, and sexual minorities.* Besides, who are we to judge? We had the Olympics twelve years ago, and we torture people daily. And that’s real people, not robots, androids, or cyborgs. Big deal! As long as we get the opportunity to beat up on Brazil in beach volleyball, I say leave the robots to themselves.


* Except for that one time.