Sadly, despite writing this piece last week, the racist, xenophobic crap has continued.
Today during the “women’s” competition for the balance beam, Catalin Ponor (of ROMANIA, yes I get it!) originally came in third and everyone thought she won the bronze medal. Then the Americans appealed (as is their right) and the judges changed the score based on perfectly legitimate reasons and an American (Aly Raisman) was bumped up to third, won the bronze, and Catalin Ponor went down to fourth place, and thus no medal.
Immediately the racist comments flooded Twitter and Facebook in all directions, saying things I won’t repeat here but just out of control on every level. Outrage? Of course. Disappointment? Obviously. Catalina Ponor is a tremendous athlete and did a great job. But the Olympics are the Olympics and the rules are the rules. I salute Ponor for her performance today as well as all of her performances throughout the last eight years. She has won a handful of medals through hard work and good effort.
Mno… ardem și noi un drapel american ceva? Să fim români până la capăt!—
Radu Ceucă (@RaduCeuca) August 07, 2012
But shit like this continued, the tweet above saying “Hey let’s burn an American flag” and much more like it.
Quite frankly, I’m sick of it. I’m sorry for the disappointment and obviously nobody likes to lose. But sports are about winning sometimes and sometimes about losing. Everyone seems to forget the gold and silver medals for balance beam went to two Chinese athletes, who had scores far above everyone else’s. Instead of fighting over crumbs, both the United States and Romania could’ve done a lot better and skipped all this nonsense.
To say I am disgusted is an understatement. And I REALLY do not want to hear a bunch of excuses as to why Romanians are behaving this way. It’s disgusting and shameful and that’s all there is to say about it.
UPDATE – I completely forgot that Raisman (the American who ended up taking the bronze) has a Romanian coach and it was he who made the appeal to the judges. Turns out EVZ had an interview with this guy (in Romanian) about a lot of things, including this appeal that cost Ponor the bronze:
Sunteţi, probabil, cel mai hulit român la ora actuală de la Olimpiadă. Cum comentaţi incredibila situaţie care s-a iscat, ca un român să conteste medalia altui român?
Se mai întâmplă!
Bam! If you don’t speak Romanian it says “What do you have to say about the incredible situation where a Romanian challenged the winning of a medal of another Romanian? Answer: So it goes!”
I am sure that the tweet above was an irony or a mere joke. Where’s your sense of humor?
indeed it is, but that’s Balkania for you.. if it “helps”, we hate each other just as much.
The “burning flag” post was clearly sarcastic…
I think that tweet was a joke, as a reaction to other mean tweets that you describe in you article. But furthermore, if I remember correctly, that tweet came after the second performance, the women\’s floor exercise, when everybody thought that Ponor did a better job than Raisman. I\’m not saying you don\’t have a point, I too was often disappointed by ridiculous reactions, but I don\’t think you choose the best tweet to ilustrate that.
I find it sarcastic, too.
It happened to others, too! Romanians like to take things personally…
In prima faza, Marea Britanie a fost anuntata oficial pe locul 2, dar Japonia a contestat ultima nota primita, la cal cu manere (Uchimura-13.466), care a fost acceptata, nota fiind modificata in 14.166, astfel ca Marea Britanie, care s-a bucurat pentru argintul olimpic, s-a trezit cu medalia de bronz. In sala au inceput huiduielile, dar marea perdanta nu a fost Marea Britanie, ci Ucraina, care a coborat de pe podium, pe 4.
http://sport.hotnews.ro/stiri-jo2012_london-12919127-2012-china-medalie-aur-concursul-masculin-gimnastica-echipe-decizie-incredibila-arbitrilor-japonie-adusa-podiumin-urma-unei-contestatii-huiduieli-prelungite-pentru-arbitri.htm
it’s a mere sarcastic comment, directed to effervescent souls. really. no need to make a big deal out of it because of a cultural misinterpretations.
IMHO, that tweet was a sarcastic one and he didn’t really intend to burn the flag.
I guess the people above didn’t “get” the part about the bunch of excuses.
There’s no excuse for the “language” used in the matter, especially considering the spirit of the Olimpycs. Hopefully, in a hundred years or so, Romanians won’t be such big a-holes anymore.
it’s not excuses, just pointing out the obvious.
I started to write a long reply to this, but as far as I like reading your articles, I ended up to the conclusion you have your own flaws Mr. Sam. You are not always seeing the whole picture. And as someone above mentioned… you are not a person from the Balkans.
A bit of thought about why our sarcasm doesn’t reach you and why people feel we got robbed and might help on the long run to actually understand more of the country you say you love.
PS: that tweet was/is poorly chosen!
The hint for sarcasm in that tweet is “Mno…” Sam, how come you missed it, being in Cluj you know “ca_cand” (get it?) un ardelean are ceva “adinc” de zis baga un “Mno..”
So instead of using :) or ;) or JJ (jost joking?) ardelenii zic “Mno..”…i guess.
Hope it helps. And don’t worry, I hate US too….LOL did u get this last one?
US=USA, or US=NOI…TOTALLY involuntary !
Sometimes I totally HATE the schnitzel out of “NOI”. Check out my personal rant on “NOI”: http://www.facebook.com/politiadefrontieraromana/posts/421029177943269
Now this was TOTALY xenophobic and rasist, the policeman was obviously thinking that there is money to be made out of a “rich american family”, ..which we totally are… I don’t even know why am I crying after 70$ since I have in my backyard 2 trees: one gives a crop of Benjamins in summer and the other one Grants in winter. All I have to do is rack’em quickly in a bag and put them in the bank, otherwise the squirrels eat them. LOL
We love you!
To add something to your point of view. The “burning of the flag” is taken VERY serious here in US of A. You don’t fuck with that shit, even in a joke, so I see your point too but relax, you didn’t use the best example. I do know that there are Romanian USA haters. But hey, fuck’em! Who’s flag is on the friggin MOON? Now Respect!
Well, if it makes you feel better, you won’t ever see a Romanian President negotiating the fate of your country with the Russian leader and the British PM. Nor would you see the Romania Ambassador to US giving sound advice to Barack Obama, although the poor man may need it in order to win the upcoming elections.
I apologize for my harsh words but these are facts that cannot be ignored by anyone who seeks to understand the Romanian psyche. To just say that such behavior is “disgusting” and “shameful” (and it may very well be, unless it’s actually sarcastic, as everyone else said) would only serve to make the matter worse, in my opinion. You cannot change anything about how the Romanians perceived the events of yesterday by just going and telling them they are behaving shamefully. You could tell that to some youngsters entertaining themselves on the social networks but would you tell the same to a couple of old people, both around 70, who, without going so far as to talk about burning flags, concluded bitterly that Ponor’s bronze medal “was stolen”. As you said, according to the rules, they were most likely wrong but would you tell them that?
Dude, the tweet was sarcastic, mocking the people who overreacted because they felt the gymnastic team got robbed (basically saying the same thing you said in this post, but in a more concise, and more humorous manner).
By the way, if you think some Romanians overreacted in this case, you should have seen the outcry when Anthony Bourdain did his food special on Romania. The response of overly patriotic idiots (mostly women, I have to be honest) was embarrassing. The comment section of Bourdain’s site made Romanians look like Borats even more than the actual episode did. And don’t get me started with the Romanian lashing out against Urs Meyer, the Swiss referee who helped Denmark narrowly qualify for Euro 2004 at the detriment of Romania. (Albeit, I saw the game, and the refereeing was visibly one-sided; but Romania missed 3 one-on-one chances which would have put the game away). However, maybe we shouldn’t feel so bad, since the Brits reacted the same way when he robbed them (I saw that game too). http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Urs_Meier
lol @ the brits & Urs Meier
stii cum e, romanii trebuie sa fie mai catolici decat Papa daca vor sa fie considerati egali cu alte natiuni :)
I have a question: are you a legal resident of Romania, Sam? Just out of curiosity….
@LOL: You forgot to add “Nu ne vindem tara” to your comment :-)
SO LET ME GET THIS : you left America you came here. You want Romanian citizeneship when/if possible (you mentioned it). AND NOW you write this piece of shit without knowing the facts? what are u actually trying to do here?
non sequitur… what does citizenEship [sic] have to do with one’s opinion about the Olympics????
It was about the romanain reaction at what happened at the Olypics not THE Olypics monsieur “down_with_the_censorship”.
So you think that the duty of every Romanian citizenship is to support Romanian athletes in sports nobody even cares about, and to claim referee bias every time a Romanian athlete loses? Do you realize this spoiled brat reaction makes Romania (and its citizens) look WORSE, not BETTER, to civilized outsiders? Aren’t you tired of being labeled a Borat?
As everyone pointed out, it’s about sarcasm directed at those who overreacted. On the other hand, when I stumbled earlier this year on a bunch of commentaries over an article about an “innocent” who got into a fight in a bar somewhere in Ardeal, all I could read was “NUKE THEM!”, “SEND THE DRONES!” and other sweet things about Romania. How would you react? Would you say “racism” again? Should Romanians feel good about that?
I only asked out of pure curiosity what’s Sam’s legal status in Romania. We have to jump through hoops to get a visa for US, whereas US citizens like Sam can settle anywhere they want. After living for so many years in Romania he must have some sort of status…and if he doesn’t, why is that?