This year the Olympics will be held in Beijing, China. There have been talks of boycotting this year’s Olympics due to the human rights violations in Northern China. The Uyghurs are a Muslim minority in Northern China who are being persecuted by the Chinese government. There are mass detention centers created to forcefully change the religion of the Uyghur people. Little information is known about these detention camps due to the fact that no journalists are allowed inside them. However, survivors have escaped from these camps and were able to tell their stories. The US State Department has officially declared the Uyghurs population as, “undergoing a genocide.”

President Biden declared a diplomatic boycott against this year’s games. Some people believe that stopping diplomats from going to the games won’t be enough. A diplomatic boycott only stops US officials from going to the games, not the athletes. Other countries soon followed the United States’ example, Australia, Canada, and Britain all decided that they are not sending political diplomats to the Olympics. 

All athletes are still attending this year’s Olympics. No athletes have spoken out about China’s actions against the Uyghur people. The US team warned athletes to not speak out against the games or any Chinese government officials because they would be eliminated from the games. So far, no US athletes or sponsors are boycotting the Beijing Olympics. 

The current human right atrocities that are occurring in China is a tragedy. No person should be subjected to the treatment that the Chinese government is enforcing on the Uyghur community. To force an entire community to change religions should never happen in any country. A boycott is necessary to show China that abusing human rights is never okay. The few countries that are simply doing a political boycott will never be enough to make a statement. America, Britain, and Canada all need to fully boycott the games to show that no country will support China’s genocide. 

Corporations also need to boycott the games. China has threatened major companies like Intel and Coca-Cola to not pull advertising from the Olympics. Unfortunately, most large companies like Intel have their factories in China. The government has full control over these factories and can stop production at any time. This forces many companies to not speak on China’s recent human rights violations.

China has a long history of abusing its citizens and taking away vital human rights but there has to be a limit to what a country can do with its citizens. Genocide is one of the worst atrocities that any country can commit. Not a single corporation has taken out their advertisement and not one country has fully boycotted the games. This gives China a pass to do whatever they want.