Posted on 02/16/2026 11:47:56 PM PST by KingofZion
*** Gu, arguably the most polarizing Olympian of her era, was unable to defend her gold medal in Monday’s freestyle ski big air event. But she rallied from seventh place to win the silver medal with a stellar final jump, becoming the most decorated freestyle skier in Olympic history.
*** As Gu celebrated after her final jump, the NBC commentators gushed, not even a little ironically, “Who isn’t an Eileen Gu fan?”
Gu certainly has her fans, and 2.3 million followers on Instagram. But she has plenty of critics. She created a firestorm seven years ago when, at age 15, she declared she would compete for China, her mother’s birth country, despite having been raised in San Francisco and competed for the United States as a young skier. Four years ago, as the youngest freestyle Olympic champion, she became the face of the Beijing Games.
***She’s been called a traitor for refusing to represent her birth country, the United States. Gu pledges allegiance to no country, trying to sidestep the dispute by saying, “When I’m in the U.S. I’m American, but when I’m in China, I’m Chinese.”
In truth, she’s that most American of entities: an unashamed capitalist who seems intent on making the most money she can.
*** More controversial is the recent revelation that the Chinese government has paid her, along with American born figure skater Beverly Zhu, $14 million over the past three years. The information appeared online in 2025 in a public government budget; the athletes’ names were later deleted, along with ensuing social media comments. Berkeley-based Chinese Digital Times called it a “wave of cross-platform censorship,” scrubbing comments that expressed concern over the exorbitant taxpayer expenditure for Chinese-American athletes.
(Excerpt) Read more at sfchronicle.com ...
Interesting to see that China takes it one step further than the old East Germany. Not content with spending millions on selecting and training their own athletes they buy ready made athletes of Chinese heritage from other countries.
:-)
Traitor
EFF Her along with all the scumbags on the USA teams speaking out against America.
Strip her of her US citizenship and deport her to China
She will be gone in a few weeks. Only remembered by the very few. And they will be gone also.
How is this different from college sports these days? With NIL and transfer portal the athlete gets rich and the school can buy the best.
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Message: Gu, born in the US, sold out to China for millions, declared is she competing for China, her mother’s birth country. She was raised in San Francisco and competed for the US as a young skier. Four years ago, as the youngest freestyle Olympic champion, she became the face of the Beijing Games w/ millions of fans.
At least one parent is from the PRC.
And she’s showing the value system of what city but the one where Any Twosom was Mayor, and “San Francisco Values”. She is the epitome of San Francisco Values, endorsing Any Twosom’s Presidential campaign and also helping Red Bull. Red Bull probably wants her for China.
The values of that city and the virtues of Communism are taught and we see it with that and her sponsors.
For example, in the Taiwan Pro Basketball League (East Asia Super League affiliated FIBA basketball league), they have three classes of basketball players: Domestic (players from Taiwan, but may also include naturalised citizens and players from areas designated as FIBA Asia, which includes Japan, Philippines, South Korea, and even Australia), Import (players from other parts of the world; there has been a recent crackdown on naturalisation in order to be part of the national team, some leagues still require them to be imports), and Heritage (players who may have a parent from Taiwan). Heritage has allowed Jeremy Lin (Harvard), Randall Walko (The College of New Jersey, NCAA Division III and played in The Basketball Tournament), Doug Creighton (Madonna University in metro Detroit, NAIA, now retired and coaching the Taichung Formosa Dreamers that he played for years, starting his coaching career) among others to play as “Heritage” players — primarily American players but not as imports.
Whatevs.
Maybe it is time to consider all the “sponsored” training and subsidies taxable income and have these “amateur” athletes start contributing to the national benefit. This Olympic clown show is just as bad as the NIL or whatever the acronym is in the minor-league pro football system called Division I.
Meh, let the kid live a little and make some money.
Chinese are huge capitalists with a highly respectable work ethic. She’s worked hard, let her reap the benefits.
CCP is a dictatorship. Most ppl don’t realize the Chinese people have no vote.
She’ll eventually realize this and run back to “American exceptionalism” with all her fame and fortune.
Why do we care? Like it or not, multiple citizenship is a real thing. Why begrudge the girl for being able to practice her sport and make some money along the way?
I know this will be unpopular but I understand her position. Foreign countries pay a whole lot more for medals while in the US, you get comparatively very little. We’re talking life changing money here. When I was a kid I knew a guy whose parents were from Spain though he was born and raised in the states and was an American. At that time in the 90s, Spain was paying its athletes $1 million for a gold medal while the US was paying nothing. My friend happened to be an absolutely excellent swimmer in the backstroke. Since his parents were Spanish, he qualified as Spanish so he swam for Spain, won a gold medal for them and made enough money in his early 20s to set him up for life as a result.
I can’t say I’d have chosen differently. We’re not talking about a war here. We’re just talking about sports.
its really not different from the way college sports or pro sports works nowadays. They’re just paid mercs. They’ll go to the highest bidder.
I wonder if people like her inspired the PRC’s birth tourism grift.
The left accuses Jews of having dual loyalties. It’s about time Chinese face accusations of dual loyalties as well. They’re all CCP spies anyway.
I refused to watch the Beijing Olympics. I’ve watched these Games when I can
Eh, they’re all 304s and their parents are pimps. There’s no “personal best” or achievements, it’s all about the money. They get endorsements here and overseas, foreign governments pay them bigly for the prestige or give them nice places to live. The Olympics is one gigantic racket. Next up on the bread and circuses lineup, the FIFA World Cup.
Eileen Gu’s crime is exposing the phony nationalism the Olympics korporate directors use to sell the Olympics to viewers, who are then sold to advertisers. She’s showing the Olympics as the business that it is.
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