CBC caves under Olympic pressure to stop handing out free Canadian flags

You’ve got to be kidding me:

CBC staffers have handed out thousands of small Canadian flags to passersby outside their Vancouver studio – a friendly gesture, the public broadcaster said, to the patriotic crowds milling in the Olympic city.

But Vancouver Olympic organizers weren’t amused and asked the CBC to cease with the flags. The breach? The small flags had CBC’s distinctive corporate logo on the back.

The CBC building in Vancouver is near Canada Hockey Place where men’s and women’s Olympic hockey games are under way. Many of the crowds walking by are headed to the hockey arena, where it’s strictly verboten to brandish a corporate logo. The VANOC thinking was to halt those CBC logos from getting inside Canada Hockey Place.

I’m not quite sure which is more sad: That Olympic organizers think they can shut down a group wanting to hand out free Canadian flags from its own property… or that the agreed to let them.

More here.