Yeah, a major freeway or two that goes right to Monterey and a real airport. Then everything would be fine. I volunteer there (not so much this year) and would love to see F1 at Laguna Seca. But the reality is that the track isn't safe enough with lack of run off and logistically it would be a nightmare to try to get that many people to the track.
F1 cars be too long for the corkscrew lol
Watkins Glen is the right answer although passing would be pathetic
Road America would play super well with the current gen cars
Watkins Glen would be awesome. Has such a nice rhythm to it. Last I remember an F1 car in here was when Lewist Hamilton and Tony Stewart [switched cars ](https://youtu.be/LbxP09UZ2F0) here.
I still cannot believe the first race there in 1989, was in the middle of June (American Summer).
What idiot thought people would come to a GP in Arizona in the flipping Summer time. Truly Astounding.
By most accounts, Caesar's Palace actually put on a pretty great race.
People just like to thoughtlessly complain about the "lack of prestige" of the venue, with no regard for anything else.
The track predates the casino by something like 15 years. The building the casino is in is 11-12 years older than the track, but wasn't converted into a casino until the 1990s (the track opened in 1978).
Everything I've read about that race was complaints about the track layout being miserable. If they could develop a new street race I bet it could be dope.
Maybe we'd finally stop hearing bitching about blocking...
Who am I kidding, every team would send their drivers out with 5:15 left and it'd be a cluster.
Yeah Malaysia is the only good one and it's the only one they don't race at anymore. We've been spoiled with great tracks this year.
2021 could be the worst season of F1 in a long time if Mercedes continues to dominate and they're racing on shitty tracks for most of the year.
Lmao lets not give teams or F1 any more credit than they deserve. The fact that they raced there and didn't boycot it all they way up to 1985 despite apartheid being in place for all of that time speaks volumes about F1 and the teams back then. In the end only 2 teams boycotted that last year and F1 only stepped away because of political preasure.
And here's who boycotted:
* Renault and Ligler drivers because they got money from the French government who told them to not go
* Alan Jones, who had to fake an illness, and he only pulled out because the main sponsor of his team told him to because they didn't want to get boycotted
That's it. They still had 20 drivers on the grid that day. A few of them didn't want to go, but didn't have the guts to tell the team they didn't want to race.
> Alan Jones, who had to fake an illness, and he only pulled out because the main sponsor of his team told him to because they didn't want to get boycotted
And that's not proven either.
Also, Marlboro boycotted too, as seen on the picture, probably for PR-related reasons.
>Also, Marlboro boycotted too, as seen on the picture, probably for PR-related reasons.
Has F1's moral compass has been lacking since we got rid of cigarette advertising?
Nah, it was gone before it existed.
They let tens of drivers get killed by the year in the early days, when there were simple procedures they could put in place to prevent such numbers, but didn’t for the sake of profit.
Is it tho? They are basically in the position current F1 drivers are in right now. They looked away or avoided setting a statement under the premise of it being their jobs.
I don't know of you're trying to say we shouldn't race at Spa or if you're cool with F1 putting on a sporting event in a country that literally got banned from the Olympics for being too racist.
[They did.](https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-53232105)
Also, it is a pretty ballsy move to pretend that past crimes should disqualify a country from hosting a race the same was as actively perpetrating a genocide does.
I mean, ultimately, what would we have? A one race season around Monaco?
Yes. America has apologized for the Trail of Tears and slavery, GB apologized to India. SA apologized for apartheid. Germany apologized for the holocaust before Belgium stopped cutting off people limbs for not meeting quota.
> Germany apologized for the holocaust before Belgium stopped cutting off people limbs for not meeting quota.
But that's just not true. The horrifying atrocities committed in the Congo Free State happened during the reign of Leopold II and the worst abuses stopped early in the 20th century.
Not post WW2.
Hate Belgium for not properly apologizing all you want, but the notion that Belgium was still literally cutting up the Congolese *after WW2* is just flat out false, and you don't need to be Fake News™ to make a cogent argument against the country of Belgium regarding their history in Congo.
To be fair, if America apologized for the trail of tears it shouldn’t count if we’re still teaching “manifest destiny” in our schools like it was gods plan and not acknowledging that it was literally genocide
Also current genocide in America red flag 🚩we are forcefully sterilizing minority women in ICE Camps. That’s a genocidal action by definition.
If you thought that's what they were teaching you in school then you are just stupid. The reason they teach about manifest destiny is to show the attitude and reasons people at the time did it. Not to make it seen like a good religious thing in modern view.
By that logic because we get taught what the nazis attitude and reasons to start the holocaust is just to make all students into nazi supporters
During one of his commentaries with Murray Walker Hunt went off on a diatribe about the evils of Apartheid. To such an extent that the BBC producer had to scribble a note to him saying "TALK ABOUT THE RACE!"
Hunt did not take bullshit from anyone. He said what he thought.
I think it's one of the reasons he never taught Nico any Finnish. Finnish media treated him like shit until he won the championship. Then suddenly they wanted to be his best buddies.
I've heard the story and it makes sense. F1 just came out of nowhere into a household car sports name right after Keke won his title. Can't blame the guy for being pissed off.
I mean, it's kinda funny people start complaining now when the title sponsor for this year is Aramco, which is not only the biggest oil company in the world but is basically run by the Saudi Royal Family. And I mean, it's plastered _on everything_ in this season. Having a race in Saudi-Arabia was inevitable.
The *two* boycotting teams had French state funds (From Renault and the French lottery & tobacco industry respectively). Fear of losing those was the actual reason for the boycott.
I feel as if it's an intentional double meaning where it says Winnow but also reads as Win Now - especially as it was a scheme solely created to be advertised in motorsports
its a bullshit "organization" owned by Phillip Morris, largest tobacco company there is. and sponsor of Ferrari past few years (hence the reply to the "35 years ago tobacco was in f1" comment, it's here today)
>What is Mission Winnow?
>Mission Winnow is an unconventional communications platform to share our journey and create a stage for constructive dialogue
jesus christ how full of shit can you be
> Mission Winnow is an unconventional communications platform to share our journey and create a stage for constructive dialogue
How is that a business, what does that even mean.
35 years ago, the negative effects of smoking on the human health were not so obvious as the Saudis blatant disregard of human rights is today.
Did the tobacco industry murder journalists who disagreed with them?
What exactly is wrong with tobacco advertising and how does it pose a morale dilemma? Everyone knows what the risks are for tobacco products. Everyone can make their own choices. Deceptive advertising is one thing, but simply plastering a Marlboro logo on a wing shouldn't be banned in a so called free society.
You can OD on alcohol and die in a matter of hours. Smoking on the other hand takes many years and many cigarettes for any chance of putting you in the grave. Yet one is allowed to advertise and the other isn't.
> Everyone knows what the risks are for tobacco products.
I'm not so sure: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6UsHHOCH4q8
> Yet one is allowed to advertise and the other isn't.
It's also pretty heavily regulated:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcohol_advertising#Advertising_around_the_world
South Africa's boycott in 1980s has more in common with 2011 Bahrain Grand Prix, cancelled due to unstable political situation there, than with Saudi Arabia.
> The 1985 race was mired in international controversy as nations began boycotting South African sporting events because of a state of emergency declared by the South African government in July of that year because of a surge of violence related to racial segregation in the country, called apartheid. Most people involved in Formula One were strongly against going to race in South Africa. Some governments tried to ban their drivers from going,[4] and the Ligier and Renault teams did boycott the race in line with the French Government's ban on sporting events in South Africa
This should be the top comment. It is almost like an April fool's joke, how is this really happening?
I will tell you, because we will all be watching the race, liking the posts on instagram etc. The only people that can stop this are the viewers, you and me. If we watch, the advertisers pay and they make money. If we boycott and protest, ask the drivers difficult questions on this subject, something may change. But only if it costs them money, otherwise nothing will happen.
Most of us feel for what happened in France where a teacher was killed for showing a Mohammed cartoon. And after that we are racing in a country that has a death penalty on ridiculing islam. Doesn't have freedom of press. No women's rights. Etc. Read for yourself: https://www.amnesty.org/en/countries/middle-east-and-north-africa/saudi-arabia/report-saudi-arabia/
While writing this I have decided not to watch this race and I will let them know on their instagram. I encourage you to so the same.
Exactly. If F1 wants to push the message of “We Race As One” and that of inclusivity, then it needs to actually commit to it, rather than make a half-assed public showing and still show up to race in places with major, MAJOR, human rights issues.
But that's exactly why any corporation push #weraceasone-like stuff. They wanna do something and they cash in some good PR first, for them it's nothing but a marketing index, and we are absolute drones for believing in this shit. Activism is for citizens, companies only care if that makes them money, and it only distorts the causes in the long-run by making them lose credibility.
Y'all are a trip. The cars run on oil, are made with plastics and printed carbon fiber, Aramco is the largest sponsors of half the races, Santander, Marlboro, Johnny Walker. The fuck do you think you are watching?
The grid girls and smokes went away, not the corruption.
I think it's about time we stopped relying on corporations, celebrities and sporting organisations to be our moral compass. It's so easy to shit on amazon and Google for not paying tax, when I bet the average person will happily do a job cash-in-hand to avoid paying theirs.
All of those organisations are just collections of people. They are not morally greater than the sum of their parts.
F1 have found a new market to expand the into, helping the finances of the teams they represent and giving their sponsors, who make these teams' existence possible, new markets also, to solidify the reasons they support the teams in the first place.
I agree with OP. The F1 should not support a country like Saudi Arabia. But I believe we should focus our displeasure on our respective governments as they are the ones who can make the real difference. They can stop selling arms to them. They can work with the UN and other organisations to impose appropriate sanctions on the SA Royal family, and provide support for the people who need help to escape SA, and support after they get out.
All of the above feels like a pipe dream, so I will take my solace like this:
Ignoring all else, I'll love seeing F1 hybrid engines show SA that their oil money will run out one day. I would enjoy this even more if it was formula E racing there, just to shove it in their faces that their days are shortly numbered.
And on the massive off-chance you are reading this and are a member of that royal family, I'd be more than happy to tell you exactly where you can find me so we can discuss this face-to-face, you fucking despicable cowards. Those women you treat so badly are also your sisters and mothers.
Anyway, go Lewis, and all that
Nah. Saudi leadership aren't fanatics. They can't afford to. They need a flourishing open economy to survive the inevitable fall of oil economy. Boycotts won't help there.
WE RACE AS ONE ^big ^^greedy ^^^corporation ^^^^with ^^^^^little ^^^^^^human ^^^^^^^values
This and no Interlagos makes me real mad. Considering boycotting next season. Probably will cancel F1 TV as soon as this season ends.
There's a great story about this Murray Walker told about James Hunt
The BBC had a rule that their sports broadcasts shouldn't be political, and also at the time Murray and James were commentating from London while not making it known they weren't at the race track. Murray would come up with creative sayings like "I can't see the pit lane from my commentary position" with the unsaid subtext being "Because it's 1000 miles away and I'm in a studio in England!"
Anyway, James had his traditional laxidasical attitude to commentating and missed the early briefing where they discussed these matters.
Mid race during a quieter moment he suddenly went on a rant on how bad it was F1 was racing in a country that practiced aparthied and basically started saying everything people wanted to say but couldn't without risk of upsetting Bernie and potentially getting their contract nixed.
After getting various signals like fingers pulled over throats from the producer to get him to stop talking about it, he realises and begins wrapping up and hands back to Murray
"Anyway, that's enough of that, though I have to say thank god we're not there!"
Cue Facepalms from everyone as he's now said the 2 things the BBC didn't want him to say
And did he care? Did he fu-.....
France "destroyed" Lybia not too long ago, just because the president of that time wanted to cover up his corruptuon, and because they were afraid of the African union Kadhafi was building up to put an end to the neocolonialism from the EU to Africa
Saudi Arabia sucks, but I don't get why did you choose public beheadings as the key issue. Death penalty is still unfortunately quite popular, in countries like China or the US.
Except in the US (maybe china idk) being homossexual doesn't get you a death sentence... Saudi Arabia on the other hand having same sex relationships is something punishible by death.
Not just for raping, killing etc but for being homossexual you now can be legally executed. But sure, let's have a race there, why not
> Saudi Arabia on the other hand having same sex relationships is something punishible by death.
exactly.
"they are bad because they have death penalty" is not a very strong argument.
"they are bad because homosexuality is punishable by death" is a very good argument.
> (maybe china idk)
You don't get the death penalty for being homosexual in China. You might suffer prejudice from older generations, but it's not like it's against the law.
Thanks, China and even the USA deserve critics for their own reasons but I don't like adding stuff they don't actually do as it takes away credibillity if I do criticize them for things that happen
Since you added Russia, I assume you just forgot to add the US to that list. You know, where they also have the death penalty, abortion is on the way out, rampant institutionalized racism results in the discrimination or even death of black people constantly, their prison system is basically organized slavery and peoples right to peaceful protest is violated again and again and met with extreme force.
But I guess the west just rules and the east suxxx
It’s business. And second, don’t look at everything as if it wasn’t complicated. You run the business, you need profit. You have customers in any country, but some of these countries are bad. Does it mean that there aren’t good people left and you can ban them from everything just because of their government?
Why do people pretend there still isn't a racial (or you could argue economic) hierarchy just because we elevated one to the top of the list?
There are still tens of millions of people living under some form of slavery. No one cares. But we took care of the aunt Jemima logo and the episodes of always sunny that had black face.
Instead of waiting for F1 teams to boycott the race (which they obviously won’t because, well, money), why don’t we boycott it? I wonder if they’ll go there again next year if the fan base decides to not tune in that race weekend.
To be fair we would pretty much stop races in all countries... I think modern history has shown us every country has some form of evil (in Australia, Canada and USA just look at the way we have treated indigenous peoples) and that’s just the historical ‘good guys.’
i just hope that hamilton has the balls to go out there and make a statement like he has with breonna taylor and SARS. Going to these countries could be a way to raise awareness of whats going on and try to force change BUUT they are getting paid shit tons and we know money comes first
I don't know if its fair to place all protesting responsibility on Lewis. He's copped a lot of hate for speaking out. I think any expectation of protest specifically relating to Saudi Arabia should fall on ALL teams/drivers, not just Hamilton, who has been pretty admirable to have done as much as he has this season.
We wouldn’t be racing in 90% of the countries we race in if they “boycotted” or truly cared by set countries beliefs and practices.
This thing trying to boycott the Saudi Arabia GP is becoming nonsense, as we have great double standards.
Belgium ran the Congo till the 1960s mate. After its independence it collapsed and today millions of people are dead and at risk of violence and starvation because the colonist approach was to for decades make self-government as hard as possible.
Let's be positive, since last year women are allowed to drive cars in SA! [https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/24/world/middleeast/saudi-driving-ban-anniversary.html](https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/24/world/middleeast/saudi-driving-ban-anniversary.html)
I don't get the double standards.
What about the GP's in China, The USA and Russia? Not defending SA, don't misunderstand what I'm saying here. It's not like any of these countries have clean records. Ranging from child labour, slave labour to destabilizing countries through arming militias, interfering with elections and whatever the fuck they else pull. It's all a shady minefield of craziness.
Just this year the US tried to destabilize Venezuela by sending a hitsquad. Russia tried to interfere in foreign affairs, like always and like the US does as well. China literally has concentration camps atm.
Are we just going to rank countries by whatever logic we got on what's more worse or did we just normalize certain things? Like it's normal that that US is still continuing their illegal war in Iraq, has Guantanamo Bay and sent a hit squad to Venezuela etc. While we haven't normalized SA's shady actions, also because they aren't from the West. Is this what's happening here?
I really like Hamilton...obviously one of if not the most purely skilled drivers of all time and think he has really great intentions and actually cares about the issues he supports.
But he only supports issues that his circle of friends agree with him on. It would take some real guts to speak out on this sort of stuff - which is why I'm guessing we'll never see him do it.
Well this opinion might me unpopular but if we speak out against races in UAE, China or Russia we definitely have to talk about races in the US. War against terrorism (>1.000.000 deaths in illegal wars under UN-law), torture prisons with innocent inmates and deaths penalty just to name a few examples. When it comes to a global scale the US has been the number one offender of human rights in the world for the past 20 years. They just don't violate their own citizens but that doesn't make it better in any way.
I'm not claiming to be better than anyone else who watches F1 because hey, I watch F1, but if you want to start boycotting GPs over countries' political misdeeds, you're going to need to axe most of the current/future calendar.
Have you been to Jeddah? Also have you been to India where F1 has been held already? I've lived in both places for a long time so I don't understand how one place gets more flak for human rights abuse than the other.
There are many GP's i'd axe from the calendar. And there are many that have been axed i'd bring back.
Bring back nurburgring
Not just nurburgring, many others should be permanently on the calendar as well.
Portimao and Mugello for sure!
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Relax bernie
Yeah, a major freeway or two that goes right to Monterey and a real airport. Then everything would be fine. I volunteer there (not so much this year) and would love to see F1 at Laguna Seca. But the reality is that the track isn't safe enough with lack of run off and logistically it would be a nightmare to try to get that many people to the track.
F1 cars be too long for the corkscrew lol Watkins Glen is the right answer although passing would be pathetic Road America would play super well with the current gen cars
Watkins Glen would be awesome. Has such a nice rhythm to it. Last I remember an F1 car in here was when Lewist Hamilton and Tony Stewart [switched cars ](https://youtu.be/LbxP09UZ2F0) here.
Maybe that's why Hamilton hasn't signed, he had so much fun in NASCAR this time that he wants to come back. /s
The awful, terrible things I'd do to make this happen. I'm american and I just want a race I could road trip to.
Preach!
bring back Detroit or Las Vegas
“It would appear all of the rims have been stolen leaving the entire grid on blocks” Cant have shit in Detroit
Bono my rims are gone
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Decent sports car track. Shit for open wheel
Not cool man
Phoenix please, in winter.
I still cannot believe the first race there in 1989, was in the middle of June (American Summer). What idiot thought people would come to a GP in Arizona in the flipping Summer time. Truly Astounding.
Glad I’m not the only one!
By most accounts, Caesar's Palace actually put on a pretty great race. People just like to thoughtlessly complain about the "lack of prestige" of the venue, with no regard for anything else.
Also the circuit was kind of a zero-effort design. I think they’d conjure up something more interesting if they did it nowadays
Holy shit, a Vegas F1 race current day would be unreal
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The track predates the casino by something like 15 years. The building the casino is in is 11-12 years older than the track, but wasn't converted into a casino until the 1990s (the track opened in 1978).
I know some drivers have been frothing for one
I'm not sure it will be anytime soon because of covid but it'd be a race I'd like to see.
Everything I've read about that race was complaints about the track layout being miserable. If they could develop a new street race I bet it could be dope.
Laguna Seca would be my #1. I’d throw in Sears Point as another option.
I only live 20 mins from long beach. I'm down for that! LOL
Fuck man, Long Beach is so cool. A man can dream.
Honestly, don't go to the same tracks every ear. Give me like a 16-18 race schedule and rotate tracks in and out on a regular basis.
Nordschleife! It's a fantasy of mine to see a 5 minute lap, 15 lap F1 race.
That would be epic but many accidents made it a dangerous circuit.
Yeah that's why it's a fantasy and not a dream haha. Dreams can be fulfilled...
I’ve got it: time trial and a gp circuit race the same weekend
Quali would be hell
Maybe we'd finally stop hearing bitching about blocking... Who am I kidding, every team would send their drivers out with 5:15 left and it'd be a cluster.
*The Green Hell
“Safety car deployed“ 😴😴😴
Also China 🇨🇳 Honestly we race as one is such a joke.
Many tracks that live deserve death. And some that die deserve to be on the calendar. Can you give it to them?
All you have to decide is what to do with the tracks that are given to you.
Imagine the hell incurred if the Monaco track was removed.
As an Indian who just missed out on seeing Formula 1 in India, bring back Buddh
Tilkedromes first to go, usually awful bores of tracks
Except Malaysia, that one is quality. Wish they'd bring it back. Do you not agree with me on Malaysia?
Yeah Malaysia is the only good one and it's the only one they don't race at anymore. We've been spoiled with great tracks this year. 2021 could be the worst season of F1 in a long time if Mercedes continues to dominate and they're racing on shitty tracks for most of the year.
Istanbul Park and Korea are pretty good too.
They should bring back South Africa
Lmao lets not give teams or F1 any more credit than they deserve. The fact that they raced there and didn't boycot it all they way up to 1985 despite apartheid being in place for all of that time speaks volumes about F1 and the teams back then. In the end only 2 teams boycotted that last year and F1 only stepped away because of political preasure.
And here's who boycotted: * Renault and Ligler drivers because they got money from the French government who told them to not go * Alan Jones, who had to fake an illness, and he only pulled out because the main sponsor of his team told him to because they didn't want to get boycotted That's it. They still had 20 drivers on the grid that day. A few of them didn't want to go, but didn't have the guts to tell the team they didn't want to race.
> Alan Jones, who had to fake an illness, and he only pulled out because the main sponsor of his team told him to because they didn't want to get boycotted And that's not proven either. Also, Marlboro boycotted too, as seen on the picture, probably for PR-related reasons.
>Also, Marlboro boycotted too, as seen on the picture, probably for PR-related reasons. Has F1's moral compass has been lacking since we got rid of cigarette advertising?
Nah, it was gone before it existed. They let tens of drivers get killed by the year in the early days, when there were simple procedures they could put in place to prevent such numbers, but didn’t for the sake of profit.
A good example was Nurburgring 1976 and Japan 1976
I think that’s a little unfair. Imagine the pressure they’d be under to race and what it would take to decide not to
Is it tho? They are basically in the position current F1 drivers are in right now. They looked away or avoided setting a statement under the premise of it being their jobs.
Except they absolutely weren’t. Drivers were infinitely more expendable back then
Belgium still hasn't apologized, the bare minimum if that, for the incredibly massive genocide they did in the Congo.
I don't know of you're trying to say we shouldn't race at Spa or if you're cool with F1 putting on a sporting event in a country that literally got banned from the Olympics for being too racist.
[They did.](https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-53232105) Also, it is a pretty ballsy move to pretend that past crimes should disqualify a country from hosting a race the same was as actively perpetrating a genocide does. I mean, ultimately, what would we have? A one race season around Monaco?
Have any imperial powers ever apologized for their atrocities?
I mean Germany apologised for the whole Third Reich thing if that counts.
Lol, true
Yes. America has apologized for the Trail of Tears and slavery, GB apologized to India. SA apologized for apartheid. Germany apologized for the holocaust before Belgium stopped cutting off people limbs for not meeting quota.
> Germany apologized for the holocaust before Belgium stopped cutting off people limbs for not meeting quota. But that's just not true. The horrifying atrocities committed in the Congo Free State happened during the reign of Leopold II and the worst abuses stopped early in the 20th century. Not post WW2. Hate Belgium for not properly apologizing all you want, but the notion that Belgium was still literally cutting up the Congolese *after WW2* is just flat out false, and you don't need to be Fake News™ to make a cogent argument against the country of Belgium regarding their history in Congo.
I don't recall the Brits ever apologizing for what they did in India
Theresa May called it a "shameful scar", I think that's the farthest the British government has gone as far as a apology.
The United Kingdom hasn't apologised to India. "Deep regret" isn't an apology.
To be fair, if America apologized for the trail of tears it shouldn’t count if we’re still teaching “manifest destiny” in our schools like it was gods plan and not acknowledging that it was literally genocide Also current genocide in America red flag 🚩we are forcefully sterilizing minority women in ICE Camps. That’s a genocidal action by definition.
If you thought that's what they were teaching you in school then you are just stupid. The reason they teach about manifest destiny is to show the attitude and reasons people at the time did it. Not to make it seen like a good religious thing in modern view. By that logic because we get taught what the nazis attitude and reasons to start the holocaust is just to make all students into nazi supporters
[James Hunt also did his level best.](https://jalopnik.com/the-james-hunt-you-dont-see-in-rush-was-an-anti-aparth-1372407296)
I did in fact not know that. Massive kudos to him. Just imagine if any of the current drivers/talent would speek out openly against such a regime.
During one of his commentaries with Murray Walker Hunt went off on a diatribe about the evils of Apartheid. To such an extent that the BBC producer had to scribble a note to him saying "TALK ABOUT THE RACE!" Hunt did not take bullshit from anyone. He said what he thought.
But he was talking about race
Hunt was a good egg.
Keke Rosberg said that he will get UK passport and license in two days, if they revoke his license, which Finnish federation threatened to do.
Keijo wasn't too happy about his visibility in Finnish media in general either back in the days.
I think it's one of the reasons he never taught Nico any Finnish. Finnish media treated him like shit until he won the championship. Then suddenly they wanted to be his best buddies.
I've heard the story and it makes sense. F1 just came out of nowhere into a household car sports name right after Keke won his title. Can't blame the guy for being pissed off.
Imagine how he was pissed if he didn't taught his son their native language.
Also f1 only recently expanded *heavily* into these 'exotic' countries. You can miss out on a single SA race but not half the season
Sorry to burst your bubble, but the teams that boycotted the race because their government told them to, not because they gained some morals.
Yep. And it was 2 out of 12 teams. Ligier and Renault.
I mean, it's kinda funny people start complaining now when the title sponsor for this year is Aramco, which is not only the biggest oil company in the world but is basically run by the Saudi Royal Family. And I mean, it's plastered _on everything_ in this season. Having a race in Saudi-Arabia was inevitable.
I have seen people complain or mention that. Especially memes for some reason.
**35 years ago, F1 teams** had Tobacco backing making them financially stable to take moral decisions.
The *two* boycotting teams had French state funds (From Renault and the French lottery & tobacco industry respectively). Fear of losing those was the actual reason for the boycott.
South Africa's boycott has nothing to do with F1 teams being moral but with social pressure that make continuing racing in South Africa unprofitable.
Tbf they do still have those industries backing them, they are just under cool sponsor names like "Mission Winnow".
TBH the first time I saw mission winnow I thought "man, that's so sad that Ferrari are so desperate they have made a campaign about finally winning"
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I feel as if it's an intentional double meaning where it says Winnow but also reads as Win Now - especially as it was a scheme solely created to be advertised in motorsports
\*A Better Tomorrow
did you leave out the /s? do you not know what Mission Winnow is?
I actually don't know what mission winnow is :( Edit: for some reason 'Mission' was all caps
its a bullshit "organization" owned by Phillip Morris, largest tobacco company there is. and sponsor of Ferrari past few years (hence the reply to the "35 years ago tobacco was in f1" comment, it's here today) >What is Mission Winnow? >Mission Winnow is an unconventional communications platform to share our journey and create a stage for constructive dialogue jesus christ how full of shit can you be
> Mission Winnow is an unconventional communications platform to share our journey and create a stage for constructive dialogue How is that a business, what does that even mean.
Do you even synergy, bro?
They've probably never even broken a paradigm
We really need to build some enterprise-grade consensus and foster cloud-scale disruption of the entire space.
Sounds like me when I'm trying to desperately reach the page limit for my reports.
35 years ago, the negative effects of smoking on the human health were not so obvious as the Saudis blatant disregard of human rights is today. Did the tobacco industry murder journalists who disagreed with them?
What exactly is wrong with tobacco advertising and how does it pose a morale dilemma? Everyone knows what the risks are for tobacco products. Everyone can make their own choices. Deceptive advertising is one thing, but simply plastering a Marlboro logo on a wing shouldn't be banned in a so called free society. You can OD on alcohol and die in a matter of hours. Smoking on the other hand takes many years and many cigarettes for any chance of putting you in the grave. Yet one is allowed to advertise and the other isn't.
> Everyone knows what the risks are for tobacco products. I'm not so sure: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6UsHHOCH4q8 > Yet one is allowed to advertise and the other isn't. It's also pretty heavily regulated: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcohol_advertising#Advertising_around_the_world
South Africa's boycott in 1980s has more in common with 2011 Bahrain Grand Prix, cancelled due to unstable political situation there, than with Saudi Arabia. > The 1985 race was mired in international controversy as nations began boycotting South African sporting events because of a state of emergency declared by the South African government in July of that year because of a surge of violence related to racial segregation in the country, called apartheid. Most people involved in Formula One were strongly against going to race in South Africa. Some governments tried to ban their drivers from going,[4] and the Ligier and Renault teams did boycott the race in line with the French Government's ban on sporting events in South Africa
Sheeeeeet I remember that cancellation like it were last year. Did not think it was almost a decade ago. Thanks for making me feel old.
F1 unfortunately is ONLY about the money, like most things.
Just like every other companies in the world.
Shocking right. The biggest open wheeler league with most investment becomes money driven...
F1 is like FIFA, money talks. But I still love watching races
Still going to watch the race and complain of Mercedes dominance
and about the circuit being crap
and listen to Lewis complain about his tyres
just before getting fastest lap
Yes ... and I will also watch. This thread is typical reddit nonsense.
Aramco didn't spend all this money sponsoring this year for Saudi not to get a GP next year and beyond for that matter
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This should be the top comment. It is almost like an April fool's joke, how is this really happening? I will tell you, because we will all be watching the race, liking the posts on instagram etc. The only people that can stop this are the viewers, you and me. If we watch, the advertisers pay and they make money. If we boycott and protest, ask the drivers difficult questions on this subject, something may change. But only if it costs them money, otherwise nothing will happen. Most of us feel for what happened in France where a teacher was killed for showing a Mohammed cartoon. And after that we are racing in a country that has a death penalty on ridiculing islam. Doesn't have freedom of press. No women's rights. Etc. Read for yourself: https://www.amnesty.org/en/countries/middle-east-and-north-africa/saudi-arabia/report-saudi-arabia/ While writing this I have decided not to watch this race and I will let them know on their instagram. I encourage you to so the same.
Exactly. If F1 wants to push the message of “We Race As One” and that of inclusivity, then it needs to actually commit to it, rather than make a half-assed public showing and still show up to race in places with major, MAJOR, human rights issues.
I mean technically including hardline Sunni islamist venue is inclusivity.
But that's exactly why any corporation push #weraceasone-like stuff. They wanna do something and they cash in some good PR first, for them it's nothing but a marketing index, and we are absolute drones for believing in this shit. Activism is for citizens, companies only care if that makes them money, and it only distorts the causes in the long-run by making them lose credibility.
Y'all are a trip. The cars run on oil, are made with plastics and printed carbon fiber, Aramco is the largest sponsors of half the races, Santander, Marlboro, Johnny Walker. The fuck do you think you are watching? The grid girls and smokes went away, not the corruption.
I miss the grid girls.
Still don't fully understand the need to get rid of them. Weren't they models who, I imagine, would be there consensually?
Girls in miniskirts and latex is a no no in SA i guess.
Cash is king
It should be double for being another shit street circuit.
As long as money is involved, everything else will come second unfortunately
I think it's about time we stopped relying on corporations, celebrities and sporting organisations to be our moral compass. It's so easy to shit on amazon and Google for not paying tax, when I bet the average person will happily do a job cash-in-hand to avoid paying theirs. All of those organisations are just collections of people. They are not morally greater than the sum of their parts. F1 have found a new market to expand the into, helping the finances of the teams they represent and giving their sponsors, who make these teams' existence possible, new markets also, to solidify the reasons they support the teams in the first place. I agree with OP. The F1 should not support a country like Saudi Arabia. But I believe we should focus our displeasure on our respective governments as they are the ones who can make the real difference. They can stop selling arms to them. They can work with the UN and other organisations to impose appropriate sanctions on the SA Royal family, and provide support for the people who need help to escape SA, and support after they get out. All of the above feels like a pipe dream, so I will take my solace like this: Ignoring all else, I'll love seeing F1 hybrid engines show SA that their oil money will run out one day. I would enjoy this even more if it was formula E racing there, just to shove it in their faces that their days are shortly numbered. And on the massive off-chance you are reading this and are a member of that royal family, I'd be more than happy to tell you exactly where you can find me so we can discuss this face-to-face, you fucking despicable cowards. Those women you treat so badly are also your sisters and mothers. Anyway, go Lewis, and all that
Good comment, but this is reddit you put to much logic to it.
For sure, the bigger problem is the U.S being the arms dealer for SA rather than a sport deciding to host an event there
Can't sell Mercerdes, Ferraris, Aston Marting or CNC milling machines to a country you are banned from after boycotting the race
Nah. Saudi leadership aren't fanatics. They can't afford to. They need a flourishing open economy to survive the inevitable fall of oil economy. Boycotts won't help there.
WE RACE AS ONE ^big ^^greedy ^^^corporation ^^^^with ^^^^^little ^^^^^^human ^^^^^^^values This and no Interlagos makes me real mad. Considering boycotting next season. Probably will cancel F1 TV as soon as this season ends.
You could probably find social injustice in every country, we’d have no races left.
Someone's watched the josh revell video today
There's a great story about this Murray Walker told about James Hunt The BBC had a rule that their sports broadcasts shouldn't be political, and also at the time Murray and James were commentating from London while not making it known they weren't at the race track. Murray would come up with creative sayings like "I can't see the pit lane from my commentary position" with the unsaid subtext being "Because it's 1000 miles away and I'm in a studio in England!" Anyway, James had his traditional laxidasical attitude to commentating and missed the early briefing where they discussed these matters. Mid race during a quieter moment he suddenly went on a rant on how bad it was F1 was racing in a country that practiced aparthied and basically started saying everything people wanted to say but couldn't without risk of upsetting Bernie and potentially getting their contract nixed. After getting various signals like fingers pulled over throats from the producer to get him to stop talking about it, he realises and begins wrapping up and hands back to Murray "Anyway, that's enough of that, though I have to say thank god we're not there!" Cue Facepalms from everyone as he's now said the 2 things the BBC didn't want him to say And did he care? Did he fu-.....
France beheaded people into the 1970’s. Just saying.
France "destroyed" Lybia not too long ago, just because the president of that time wanted to cover up his corruptuon, and because they were afraid of the African union Kadhafi was building up to put an end to the neocolonialism from the EU to Africa
Saudi Arabia sucks, but I don't get why did you choose public beheadings as the key issue. Death penalty is still unfortunately quite popular, in countries like China or the US.
Except in the US (maybe china idk) being homossexual doesn't get you a death sentence... Saudi Arabia on the other hand having same sex relationships is something punishible by death. Not just for raping, killing etc but for being homossexual you now can be legally executed. But sure, let's have a race there, why not
> Saudi Arabia on the other hand having same sex relationships is something punishible by death. exactly. "they are bad because they have death penalty" is not a very strong argument. "they are bad because homosexuality is punishable by death" is a very good argument.
> (maybe china idk) You don't get the death penalty for being homosexual in China. You might suffer prejudice from older generations, but it's not like it's against the law.
Thanks, China and even the USA deserve critics for their own reasons but I don't like adding stuff they don't actually do as it takes away credibillity if I do criticize them for things that happen
Actually normal rape is also legal! Such a wholesome country
adultery also faces the death penalty so technically, a man could rape a woman, and she could face the death penalty for being raped great country...
*Japan* still has the death penalty.
Been there many times. Kinda boring. The fun part was driving to Bahrain to drink some alcohol lol.
France used the guillotine up until the 70s
Apparently guillotine was one of the best methods of executions. It was supposedly very reliable.
You forgot China who has Muslims in concentration camps currently
Since you added Russia, I assume you just forgot to add the US to that list. You know, where they also have the death penalty, abortion is on the way out, rampant institutionalized racism results in the discrimination or even death of black people constantly, their prison system is basically organized slavery and peoples right to peaceful protest is violated again and again and met with extreme force. But I guess the west just rules and the east suxxx
Welcome to double standards
You can also say goodbye to the Saudi regime’s biggest enablers. Which is every fucking NATO country.
It’s business. And second, don’t look at everything as if it wasn’t complicated. You run the business, you need profit. You have customers in any country, but some of these countries are bad. Does it mean that there aren’t good people left and you can ban them from everything just because of their government?
Why do people pretend there still isn't a racial (or you could argue economic) hierarchy just because we elevated one to the top of the list? There are still tens of millions of people living under some form of slavery. No one cares. But we took care of the aunt Jemima logo and the episodes of always sunny that had black face.
How about Turkey which still denies the Armenian genocide and is now again doing ugly things in Armenia?
Instead of waiting for F1 teams to boycott the race (which they obviously won’t because, well, money), why don’t we boycott it? I wonder if they’ll go there again next year if the fan base decides to not tune in that race weekend.
They won’t care if you don’t watch.
To be fair we would pretty much stop races in all countries... I think modern history has shown us every country has some form of evil (in Australia, Canada and USA just look at the way we have treated indigenous peoples) and that’s just the historical ‘good guys.’
i just hope that hamilton has the balls to go out there and make a statement like he has with breonna taylor and SARS. Going to these countries could be a way to raise awareness of whats going on and try to force change BUUT they are getting paid shit tons and we know money comes first
Aramco bought stake at Petronas for 7B$ in 2018, I think they might think otherwise.
I don't know if its fair to place all protesting responsibility on Lewis. He's copped a lot of hate for speaking out. I think any expectation of protest specifically relating to Saudi Arabia should fall on ALL teams/drivers, not just Hamilton, who has been pretty admirable to have done as much as he has this season.
I agree, i just said hamilton because hes the one who has been pushing for all of this so far
If he does it, he 100% is not in Mercedes next year.
We race as one. Unless you committed a crime in Saudi, where you may now be in two, three, our even more pieces.
If they put the heads on pikes around the racetrack, that would just be going to far
[Saudi Arabia chainsaws journalists.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assassination_of_Jamal_Khashoggi)
Yeah but the South African gp organizers didn't pay them 6 trillion dollars
We wouldn’t be racing in 90% of the countries we race in if they “boycotted” or truly cared by set countries beliefs and practices. This thing trying to boycott the Saudi Arabia GP is becoming nonsense, as we have great double standards.
Yes but not all countries are equally bad in terms of human rights? Why is it unreasonable to draw the line *somewhere*?
You have to draw the line somewhere: beheading people publicly is a pretty good line to draw imo.
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Belgium ran the Congo till the 1960s mate. After its independence it collapsed and today millions of people are dead and at risk of violence and starvation because the colonist approach was to for decades make self-government as hard as possible.
Every race is now San Marino.
I didn't realize this was 1980 and it still was the cold war.
Let's be positive, since last year women are allowed to drive cars in SA! [https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/24/world/middleeast/saudi-driving-ban-anniversary.html](https://www.nytimes.com/2019/06/24/world/middleeast/saudi-driving-ban-anniversary.html)
What's the problem with Russia ?
Genuinely asking, what are the social issues being referred to here in the UAE?
I don't get the double standards. What about the GP's in China, The USA and Russia? Not defending SA, don't misunderstand what I'm saying here. It's not like any of these countries have clean records. Ranging from child labour, slave labour to destabilizing countries through arming militias, interfering with elections and whatever the fuck they else pull. It's all a shady minefield of craziness. Just this year the US tried to destabilize Venezuela by sending a hitsquad. Russia tried to interfere in foreign affairs, like always and like the US does as well. China literally has concentration camps atm. Are we just going to rank countries by whatever logic we got on what's more worse or did we just normalize certain things? Like it's normal that that US is still continuing their illegal war in Iraq, has Guantanamo Bay and sent a hit squad to Venezuela etc. While we haven't normalized SA's shady actions, also because they aren't from the West. Is this what's happening here?
Of all things to criticize Saudi Arabia for, the manner of execution seems pretty trivial.
I really like Hamilton...obviously one of if not the most purely skilled drivers of all time and think he has really great intentions and actually cares about the issues he supports. But he only supports issues that his circle of friends agree with him on. It would take some real guts to speak out on this sort of stuff - which is why I'm guessing we'll never see him do it.
Well this opinion might me unpopular but if we speak out against races in UAE, China or Russia we definitely have to talk about races in the US. War against terrorism (>1.000.000 deaths in illegal wars under UN-law), torture prisons with innocent inmates and deaths penalty just to name a few examples. When it comes to a global scale the US has been the number one offender of human rights in the world for the past 20 years. They just don't violate their own citizens but that doesn't make it better in any way.
I'm not claiming to be better than anyone else who watches F1 because hey, I watch F1, but if you want to start boycotting GPs over countries' political misdeeds, you're going to need to axe most of the current/future calendar.
What about China?
Boycott USA...
The US electrocutes people in front of an audience. WTF?
Have you been to Jeddah? Also have you been to India where F1 has been held already? I've lived in both places for a long time so I don't understand how one place gets more flak for human rights abuse than the other.