Perhaps irony is the true universal language. After her upset victory in the 10-meter air rifle event over China’s Yi Siling and Du Li, 19-year-old American Ginny Thrasher accepted her gold medal sandwiched between two erroneous flags. It takes careful scrutiny to spot the discrepancy: the four stars on the official Chinese flag are slightly tilted, each pointing back to the larger star in the corner. The flags raised during the ceremony, themselves constructed in China, feature stars angled in the same direction–an oversight Olympic officials apologized for after Chinese Central Television noticed the knock-offs.
“We do understand that there is a problem with the flag,” said Mario Andrada, Rio 2016 Olympic Games executive communications director. “It’s very small. You have to be very familiar with the Chinese flag to understand it. However, we need to correct it.”
This somewhat timid apology will likely fail to assuage the frustrations many Chinese are expressing over what they perceive as carelessness on the part of the Olympic committee. China Central Television is particularly peeved, saying, “The national flag is the symbol of a nation! No problems are permissible!” via the state broadcaster’s Weibo microblog.
These are the type of mistakes that only highlight the difficulty in maintaining an event that caters to many nations with many different views.
(Via Deadspin)
