KEY POINTS:
China was on the receiving end of some well-merited criticism when it was revealed that the little girl who starred in the Beijing Olympics opening ceremony was lip-syncing and was on stage only because the real singer had a chubby face and uneven teeth.
An obsession with the perfect image is never attractive. When this moves beyond stage management into falsification, utter vacuity has taken over.
Most people felt uncomfortable for Yang Peiyi, the 7-year-old deemed by a member of China's Politburo to be too unattractive.
Rejection is never a recipe for healthy self-esteem. But Lin Miaoke, the girl who appeared on stage, has also been tainted. Being exposed as a fake will not help her fledgling career.
In reality, however, this episode differed only in degree of empty-headedness from those occurring every day in a world in which style too often triumphs over substance.
People heaping criticism on the Chinese would do well to, for example, ponder the likes of fashion shows, reality television programmes and advertising where those who appear are vetted for their appearance. Only the attractive need apply.
Every day people are rejected because of their ordinariness or because they are flawed. Talent is not enough. Their rejection is simply less public than Yang Peiyi's
The ceremony's music designer excused Yang's removal as being "what was best for the nation". That observation came as no surprise. The absence of contrition when things go wrong often runs hand in hand with such vacuousness. There is no sense of having offended what most consider acceptable values.
Yang's rejection occasioned much talk about shallowness and stupidity. It was not what the Chinese intended, but with people focusing on the emptiness of their thinking, some wider purpose may have been served.
