Little girl not "cute" enough? How do you feel about this, and the fact that China tried to sensor the info?

Question

"BEIJING (AFP) - The little girl who starred at the Olympic opening ceremony was miming and only put on stage because the real singer was not considered attractive enough, the show's musical director has revealed.

Pigtailed Lin Miaoke was selected to appear because of her cute appearance and did not sing a note...Photographs of Lin in a bright red party dress were published in newspapers and websites all over the world and the official China Daily hailed her as a rising star on Tuesday.

But Chen said the girl whose voice was actually heard by the 91,000 capacity crowd at the Olympic stadium during the spectacular ceremony was in fact seven-year-old Yang Peiyi, who has a chubby face and uneven teeth.

"The reason why little Yang was not chosen to appear was because we wanted to project the right image, we were thinking about what was best for the nation," Chen said in an interview that appeared briefly on the news website Sina.com before it was apparently wiped from the Internet in China."

http://ca.news.yahoo.com/indepth/olympics/s/afp/080812/world/oly2008_china_ceremony_song_fake

Would the same thing have happened had the girl - been a boy?

Answer 1

I say that it is pure gutlessness. they want the pride of having the most memorable Olympic opening ceremony. And if the girl that has the voice and has gone through the trouble of learning to hit every note and courage to sing in front of millions she should be on stage. The main problem I see with this is that the chinese have one of the seven deadly sins on there backs... pride. Which shouldn't be taken for granted.

My personal opinion is that it is disgusting behavior from the organizers for the 2008 Beijing olympics.

Answer 2

What do you expect from a totalitarian government?

        Why the Olympics was given to china is beyond me...

Answer 3

that is so mean why would they do that, nobody cares if the little girl not that cute, i mean think ho she feels now because they told her she wasn't pretty enough to be seen  

Answer 4

I think that was terrible of China. I saw the story on the news. It just makes China look even worse in the world's eyes, or in mine at least. Telling a girl she couldn't sing at the Olympics because she wasn't cute enough! It's horrible.

China really just doesn't get it. The fact that the musical director actually said what he did just shows how out of touch with the rest of the world China, or at least the musical director, is.

I can't believe China thinks this makes them look good! It makes them look even worse!

Answer 5

Hi Tracey, Look everyone its TRACEY! and she has a new name FINALLY!  

Answer 6

It's shocking but it doesn't surprise me.

China is all about face. The face you give to the world means everything in their culture, it doesn't matter if its fair, if its just or if its right.. it just has to be like that.  

Answer 7

It's disturbing but not sexist if it were a boy they probably would have done the same thing if he wasn't deemed cute enough.

Answer 8

It's just unfair.

The Chinese government is like that, only care about the image they give to the other countries, and let the people die in the smog.

And yeah, they would have done this to pretty much anyone.

I bet the real singer cried.

Answer 9

The reason lies in the acknowledgment that women (even girls) have little value outside of the sexuality or in this case "cuteness".

Answer 10

I think China has bigger problems than this.  

Answer 11

This is very interesting, I had not heard those comments (from Chen) previously.

Initially, the report suggested that Lin was selected to present the song because she is an accomplished and experienced performer who is quite well known in China, but Yang's voice was used because she is the better singer.

That's kind of strange, but who knows ~ China is a very different culture and maybe that's how things work there.

But on top of all the other scandals, to find they have these same sexist ideas as western media is disappointing.

Well, I guess in a country where laws have to be made to prevent s*x selective abortion overbalancing the population with males, what can be expected?

The IOC didn't look into ANY of this, did they? It was just all lies and Big $.

Very disappointing. Very.

Cheers :-)

Answer 12

before anybody starts critisizing china i've got the real story

little girl #2 (the one who wasn't chosen) wasn't not chosen because of her looks it was because she had stage fright. altho she had the best voice she was too scared to sing in front of that many ppl...so they went with the little girl #1 who was extremely experienced as she had sang in front of millions b4 ...IT WAS NOT BECAUSE OF THE GIRLS TEETH!

Answer 13

I feel so BAD for her :'(

Answer 14

yes b/c asians only care about cute. they don't like s**y, wild, sultry, etc. why else would their mascots be so "adorable"? they didn't consider what the rest of the world thinks is what it is!

Answer 15

I think Peiyi was just as cute as Miaoke. I can only imagine what her parents had to tell her.

poor kid. :(