If you harass foreign-owned businesses in China, are you any better than the Tibetans who did the same to Han Chinese-owned business in Tibet?
Food for thought.
Thursday, May 1, 2008
To the people of China
Please stop all these anti-western, pro-nationalist demonstrations. You are only making things worse and are doing more damage to your country's image than pro-Tibetan protesters ever could. Understand that by demonstrating like this in our country, you are coming across as rude bullies and uninformed ones at that, and reinforcing racist stereotypes. Though some may lead you to believe otherwise, the "anti-Chinese" protests are not against you, or your country, but specifically the CCP. If you can't make the distinction, take a long, hard look at yourself.
If you harass foreign-owned businesses in China, are you any better than the Tibetans who did the same to Han Chinese-owned business in Tibet?
Food for thought.
If you harass foreign-owned businesses in China, are you any better than the Tibetans who did the same to Han Chinese-owned business in Tibet?
Food for thought.
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4 comments:
I agree that boycotting foreign goods and foreign companies investing in China is neither appropriate nor wise. And it does indeed portray a very bad image of China and Chinese people. However, there are a few things the author didn’t seem to understand
a) Only a small proportion of Chinese, most of whom over-zealous university students like those who initiated the Tian’anmen square protest in 1989, hold strong anti-West sentiment. This is in strong contrast with the situation in the west where a large proportion of the population hold very negative views about China and Chinese people (I lived in the UK for 8 years, words like “stupid chinks”, “go back to your repressive country”, “f****** Chinese” are not infrequently heard)
b) While anti-West/Japan protest occur occasionally in China - in the aftermath of events like NATO bombing of Chinese embassy in Belgrade, and the releasing of a highly controversial history textbook in Japan – it is the first time that Chinese people has organized and involved in such activity on foreign soil. In comparison, anti-China protest organized or supported by the Tibetan government-in-exile, the Tibetan Youth congress, the Falungong group, etc are frequently seen in the western world.
c) The Olympic Torch relay carries the national pride of many, if not all, Chinese people. When Chinese people come out in masses in cities where the flame passes through, the initial intention was to cheer for the flame, and to celebrate a day of happiness. We, at least most of us, respect the right of other people to express their opinion; but when they interrupt the procession of the relay, it becomes a matter of a different nature. Using a simple analogy: people generally feel O.K. with strikes (although they can be quite annoying sometimes as well), but vandalism of factory facility is never welcomed by anyone with a sense of conscience. In the Olympic Torch relay case, the pro-Tibet protests are like strikes to us Chinese, while the interruptions vandalism.
d) What really upset the Chinese people is the wide-spread acquiescence of, if not support for, the vandalistic actions taken by extreme protesters. One torch bearer showed “understanding” for the actions of grabbing and attempting to distinguish the torch; some media outlets and politicians went as far as explicitly calling or implicitly portraying the troubled torch relay as great manifestation of freedom and democracy. This is in stark contrast to the tone taken by the Chinese government, Chinese media, as well as influential Chinese scholars – many of who famous for not following the official rhetoric – with regard to the anti-West protests in China. As soon as the first round of protests broke out, the Chinese government and the state media urged people to exercise calm and wisdom, and not to express patriotism with violence. Outspoken scholars and journalists published articles on the internet, as well as in printed media, to analyse the policy failure in Tibet, to criticize the government’s rhetoric that demonizes the Dalai Lama, and to provide constructive suggestions for policy improvements in Tibet and better dialogue with the West.
e) Many people in the West think that criticizing the Chinese government is doing the Chinese people a favour. Such assumption is somewhat self-righteous. Chinese people welcome constructive criticism. My uncle, a pensioner who recently retired from his $100-per-month post at a state-owned company, was eager to get me to help him set up a link to a proxy server so that he could access news and comments from officially blocked websites. He is by no means alone. Despite the censorship, many people in China have their own ways to get around the government’s firewall and to access information that help them put together a full picture of what is going on in China, and in the world.
Much of the criticism on China and the Chinese authority channeled through the western media, however, is not constructive. In recent years, the Chinese government has been criticized for a multitude of issues: exchange rate (despite the fact that China resisted the temptation to depreciate its currency during the 1997 Asia financial crisis), sweat factories (disregarding the fact that working conditions in China is no worse than any other major OEM countries, and that worker’s pay in China is higher than that in Thailand and way higher than that in Vietnam), human rights violations (at a highly disproportional scale considering the fact that human rights issues are endemic to developing countries in general due to lack of effective law-reinforcing mechanism and lack of awareness at grassroots level), and supporting suppressive regimes (while the standard approach is to isolate the country and cut off the aid, hoping that one day the starved masses will become angry enough and strong enough to overthrow the dictator and turn the country into a democratic wonderland with singing pigs flying across the sky). Rarely do politicians or journalists show any appreciation of the complex reality the Chinese authority faces and the improvements it has managed to achieved in the past 20 years. Even more rarely do they attempt to provide feasible suggestions that yield mutually beneficial outcome.
It is easy to say that criticism on China is targeted at the government rather than the people. Yet no matter whom the criticism is targeted at, it would have significant implications for the people of China. On the one hand, when it comes to public opinions on a particular country, image of the government and that of the people are, unfortunately, not usually well separated. On the other hand, lack of appreciation and disproportional criticism run the risk of driving the Chinese authority to disengage from the international community, creating a cold-war-like situation which is in the interest of no one whatsoever. There is no need to sing praise for the Chinese government. Yet given how much China, as well as the authority that governs it, has improved over the past 30 years, impartiality would require at least some positive words on China and the government to help install a more balanced view among the general public in the West.
The recent events in China, and around the world, are not simply a rash of nationalism. While nationalistic sentiment certainly played a role in some of the more aggressive events, in most cases, the peaceful protests are a demonstration of the deep-rooted frustration that Chinese people feel as the result of long-running and wide-spread misunderstanding about the reality in China, and the total disregard of the perspectives, as well as feelings, of the Chinese people.
What the author says here makes perfect sense, and in away reflects the public opinion. In short and simple English it means:
“Why don’t you Chinese just shut up? We hate you, and making loud noise would make us hate you even more.”
O.K., we get that. But the question still remains – what can we, or the government, possibly do to make you hate us less?
Yipei, firstly I would like to say thank you for expressing your views, which is something I encourage 100%. Much of what you say is very interesting, and I’m sure it will provide some perspective for many of our other readers. However, I do not agree personally with everything that you said, especially your understanding of the message behind my article.
“a) Only a small proportion of Chinese, most of whom over-zealous university students like those who initiated the Tian’anmen square protest in 1989, hold strong anti-West sentiment.”
There are always over-zealous students, in every country. What this has to do with the Tian’anmen square protest and subsequent massacre I do not understand.
For the record, my article was strictly talking to those holding “strong anti-west sentiments”, who have displayed them in recent months.
“This is in strong contrast with the situation in the west where a large proportion of the population hold very negative views about China and Chinese people (I lived in the UK for 8 years, words like “stupid chinks”, “go back to your repressive country”, “f****** Chinese” are not infrequently heard)”
As you implied yourself, racism does exist, and those that make the most noise get the most attention. I don’t think that “a large proportion” is true, as no one that I have personally spoken to expresses such views. You will find that these views are in the minority. This racism, just like the Chinese equivalent you mentioned, stems from ignorance, and there are a lot of ignorant people in the world (both in the west and east). With respect, as far as I have seen those with concerns regarding the repression in China are sympathetic towards the people, not hostile.
“b) In comparison, anti-China protest organized or supported by the Tibetan government-in-exile, the Tibetan Youth congress, the Falungong group, etc are frequently seen in the western world.”
Yes, indeed, but as we have absolute freedom to protest in such a way here, it is a common occurrence for any cause. Do not suggest that the kind of pro-China protests seen here in Australia would be allowed to occur on a similar scale in China. In defense of the protests, I don’t think that any of those above are actually anti-China, but more pro-human rights. There is a difference, unless you are implying that China is synonymous with human-rights violations.
“c) The Olympic Torch relay carries the national pride of many, if not all, Chinese people. When Chinese people come out in masses in cities where the flame passes through, the initial intention was to cheer for the flame, and to celebrate a day of happiness. We, at least most of us, respect the right of other people to express their opinion; but when they interrupt the procession of the relay, it becomes a matter of a different nature. Using a simple analogy: people generally feel O.K. with strikes (although they can be quite annoying sometimes as well), but vandalism of factory facility is never welcomed by anyone with a sense of conscience. In the Olympic Torch relay case, the pro-Tibet protests are like strikes to us Chinese, while the interruptions vandalism.”
What was seen at the protest in Canberra does not demonstrate any respect for the pro-Tibetan protestors at all. I argue that the only reason that there were so many Chinese “supporters” present was because of the pro-Tibetan protests, not simply “to cheer for the flame”. A large percentage of them seemed to completely ignore the flame in favour of antagonising protestors. However, I definitely agree with you on the point of disruption of the flame, as can be seen in my earlier post "to boycott or not to boycott".
“d) What really upset the Chinese people is the wide-spread acquiescence of, if not support for, the vandalistic actions taken by extreme protesters. One torch bearer showed “understanding” for the actions of grabbing and attempting to distinguish the torch; some media outlets and politicians went as far as explicitly calling or implicitly portraying the troubled torch relay as great manifestation of freedom and democracy.”
The “troubled relay” is a “manifestation of freedom and democracy”, simply due to the protests taking place at all. The “vandalism” is not, and as I have said before, many view it as totally counter-productive. It is UNDERSTANDABLE though, due to the extreme emotions involved, just as the Chinese backlash is understandable. I don’t support either, and I know most people agree with me.
“This is in stark contrast to the tone taken by the Chinese government, Chinese media, as well as influential Chinese scholars – many of who famous for not following the official rhetoric – with regard to the anti-West protests in China. As soon as the first round of protests broke out, the Chinese government and the state media urged people to exercise calm and wisdom, and not to express patriotism with violence.”
As did the Australian government, and the Dalai Lama himself. I’m not implying that the Chinese administration are in support of the violence, though why facilitate the get together of 10,000 extremely patriotic Chinese at a high tension event where there was known to be an opposing group? Surely it was obvious that this would result in violence. Concerning the anti-western protests within China, would such protests be allowed to exist were they anti-Chinese/anti-CCP? It is this double-standard that is the problem with the protests.
“Outspoken scholars and journalists published articles on the internet, as well as in printed media, to analyse the policy failure in Tibet, to criticize the government’s rhetoric that demonizes the Dalai Lama, and to provide constructive suggestions for policy improvements in Tibet and better dialogue with the West.”
Could you please reference the critical “printed media”? I, and I’m sure my readers, would be very interested to see it, as it would debunk a popular pre-conception about censorship in China.
“e) Many people in the West think that criticizing the Chinese government is doing the Chinese people a favour. Such assumption is somewhat self-righteous. Chinese people welcome constructive criticism. My uncle, a pensioner who recently retired from his $100-per-month post at a state-owned company, was eager to get me to help him set up a link to a proxy server so that he could access news and comments from officially blocked websites. He is by no means alone. Despite the censorship, many people in China have their own ways to get around the government’s firewall and to access information that help them put together a full picture of what is going on in China, and in the world.”
Yes, it is often self-righteous, but we criticise our own government just as strongly. Doesn’t the fact that the firewall exists, and that people wish to circumvent them, prove such criticisms are well founded? If we (the foreign critics) thought the Chinese people were able to freely criticise in the same fashion, we wouldn’t feel such a need to stand up for their rights by proxy. Peacefully demonstrating for what we believe in is our culture, and our right. Is it yours?
“Much of the criticism on China and the Chinese authority channeled through the western media, however, is not constructive.”
Agreed.
“In recent years, the Chinese government has been criticized for a multitude of issues: exchange rate, sweat factories, human rights violations, and supporting suppressive regimes.”
Human-rights violations are wrong wherever they occur, for whatever reason; those in developed nations will support what they think is right. “Lack of effective law reinforcing mechanisms”? What does it mean when it is the law and administration that is in violation? China is the current focus, as it is becoming less isolationist and moving into the international community on several fronts. It is logical that scrutiny would be increased in such a situation.
Regarding China’s support of suppressive regimes, noone expects a “democratic wonderland”, but simply the most basic enforcement of human rights. Food, water, shelter and the right to live without fear of persecution. If I tie my brother up like a dog and force him to be my slave or perish, how should people stop me? By facilitating my abuse?
“Rarely do politicians or journalists show any appreciation of the complex reality the Chinese authority faces and the improvements it has managed to achieved in the past 20 years. Even more rarely do they attempt to provide feasible suggestions that yield mutually beneficial outcome.”
Sure, improvements have been made, noone is denying that. “Feasible suggestions” concerning what exactly? If you are talking about the “Tibet issue”, how is simple dialogue with the spiritual and cultural leader of the people in question not feasible? This suggestion has been met with absolute refusal and misinformation more often than I care to remember.
“It is easy to say that criticism on China is targeted at the government rather than the people. Yet no matter whom the criticism is targeted at, it would have significant implications for the people of China. On the one hand, when it comes to public opinions on a particular country, image of the government and that of the people are, unfortunately, not usually well separated. On the other hand, lack of appreciation and disproportional criticism run the risk of driving the Chinese authority to disengage from the international community, creating a cold-war-like situation which is in the interest of no one whatsoever. There is no need to sing praise for the Chinese government. Yet given how much China, as well as the authority that governs it, has improved over the past 30 years, impartiality would require at least some positive words on China and the government to help install a more balanced view among the general public in the West.”
Yep, for sure. It is in the nature of media outlets to report disproportionately on negative issues though, as can be seen in most countries. This reflects the view that positive improvement is normal, and should be expected. I agree that some lump in the Chinese people with criticisms concerning the administration, but often they are very careful to make the distinction. I do not understand why the Chinese people cannot disassociate themselves from their government when it comes to criticism. If criticisms are made of my countries governmental policies, even though I helped to vote them into leadership I still would not take the criticisms personally.
However, I agree very much that there is a disproportionate view of China itself among the western public, probably as there are similar views concerning the west in China. This is due to the infotainment media we have, where news programs tend to focus on what brings the ratings i.e. controversy. There are outlets here that have a more balanced focus, and many of us know to look there for a more truthful representation, but the vast public simply take in what they witness without thinking.
I would like to address the more positive elements of China in light of the overwhelmingly negative press it has been on the receiving end of lately, and shall do so in time.
“The recent events in China, and around the world, are not simply a rash of nationalism. While nationalistic sentiment certainly played a role in some of the more aggressive events, in most cases, the peaceful protests are a demonstration of the deep-rooted frustration that Chinese people feel as the result of long-running and wide-spread misunderstanding about the reality in China, and the total disregard of the perspectives, as well as feelings, of the Chinese people.”
I’m sorry but I don’t agree that the protests and criticisms are all due to misunderstandings. The origins of these criticisms are Chinese people themselves, and actual witnesses to events, or else we would not know about them at all.
It seems that many of the pro-Chinese activists were also quite misinformed. The most common things that were heard being screamed through megaphones at people were “have you ever been to China? Have you ever been to Tibet?” When people answered “Yes, I lived there for many years”, or similar, the hyped up megaphone holders quickly ran out of rebukes, and simply turned to scream the same question at others. Every serious debate I have heard involving Chinese representatives and their opponents left me feeling that the Chinese was the less informed. It is unfortunate, but true.
“What the author says here makes perfect sense, and in away reflects the public opinion. In short and simple English it means:
“Why don’t you Chinese just shut up? We hate you, and making loud noise would make us hate you even more.”
O.K., we get that. But the question still remains – what can we, or the government, possibly do to make you hate us less?”
I actually take offense at this, as I in no way suggested hatred of anyone, let alone China which I personally have quite an interest in and wish to travel/work in someday. A lot of this “why do you hate China” business sounds like paranoia to me, I have witnessed very little hated of China, and would discourage it if I did.
What I meant was that a lot of people do not hold the concept of China in very high regard at the moment, and there is very little to make them think otherwise. For whatever the reason, pro-nationalist demonstrations abroad of the kind seen around the relay, and anti-western protests domestically in China are not constructive in the least. Honestly they seem like a bit of chest-beating while ignoring the issues at the source of the tension.
I hope I have not offended you, and I hope you continue to provide your opinion, as you write well, and are making good arguments. More I say! I enjoyed reading your comment, with the exception of the dramatisations and putting words such as “hate” in my mouth.
Good on you for taking the time, few people do.
Jetsam, thank you very much for the reply. And please allow me to apologise for my bad choice of words.
Much of what you say is very sensible, and it was my mistake to misread the message behind your article. You raised a lot of interesting points/questions in your reply, and here are some of my response, which I hope you, and the readers of your blog, would find interesting
1) Tian'anmen square is an issue that keeps coming up when people talk about China's human rights violations. Personally, I think the event is much more complicated than just a demonstration of the evilness of the Chinese government. Killing defenseless people is never justifiable, yet despite all the sympathy they deserve, the students at the time were far from faultless. Lacking clear objective or specified agenda, the student movement quickly reduced into an ever escalating social chaos exacerbated by student leaders’ vying for authority and perpetuated by material and moral support from pro-democracy forces outside the country. The irony that I’m trying to bring out by mentioning the Tian’anmen square event is that the students who are instigating anti-West protests in China are not so different in nature from those who turned the 1989 student into a chaotic farce. Yet the treatment they received from the West differs quite considerably.
2) While many people who criticize the Chinese government are not hostile to the Chinese people, my concern is that the portraying of China as a country with no human rights runs the risk of intensifying racism. When I first watched the Jack Cafferty episode on CNN, I was not very bothered by the less-than-friendly comment itself. What really shocked me what the fact that none of the other three commentators, who frequently engage in hot debate with Mr. Cafferty, seemed to have a problem with the comment. This gives me the impression that either Mr. Cafferty’s inaccurate observation reflects the common view among western public, or it is considered acceptable in the western society to make unfair judgment on China
3) I don’t think I was wrong to say that most Chinese respect the right of other people to express their opinions. Respect of their right, however, does not necessarily entail appreciation of their opinion and action. For the Chinese people, the Beijing Olympics is “their show”. To have someone “stealing the show” is bad enough. To have someone “stealing the show” and then completely “get away with it” is emotionally hard to accept. Worse still, most of those show stealers are just fad-followers who do not really understand the history, reality, and complexity of the Tibet issue. Despite their lack of knowledge, they were quite happy to spread lies and reinforce misperceptions. I met more than one group of people during the London leg of the torch relay displaying a picture of Chinese soldiers holding Tibetan Buddhist cloaks, claiming that the Chinese government staged the recent turmoil in Lhasa. When I confronted them by asking “Do you know that this picture was taken back in 2001 when the army officers were cast as extras in the Michelle Yeoh movie The Touch” the answer I got was a succinct “Yes. We know.” The irony is, the message written beneath the picture was The Chinese government lies.
4) I agree that human rights related criticisms on China originate largely from “Chinese people themselves, and actual witnesses to events”. These people, however, are not necessarily the most objective people in the world, and may not be the best representative of the Chinese people. Political refugees (some with more genuine cases than others) tend to have extreme (and static) views about the situation in China. And to make their story more exciting, they tend to add their own flavour and create the impression that every case of human rights abuse is out of the central government’s deliberate evil calculation.
Certain things are indeed put in place deliberately by the central government: The censorship, the great firewall, the ban on Falungong, to name a few. Many cases of human rights abuse, however, are the result of local level corruption, which is endemic to developing countries in general. I mentioned the “lack of law-enforcing mechanism” as a cause of human rights abuses, which you didn’t understand why. Well, in many cases, human rights abuses occur because there isn’t an effective channel through which legal appeals could be brought against corrupt local officials. This issue is being addressed in recent years by more effectively separating administrative and prosecutive power at local level. A recent policy report published by the central party school even raised the need to establishment a justice system that is fully independent from party influence. It is true that thing is China work differently, and many things that should be in place are not yet in place. Yet China is moving forward, at a very fast pace. You said in your comment that no one is saying that China is not making improvements. This is in fact untrue. Jack Cafferty said that “they are basically the same bunch of goons and thugs for the past 50 years”. This is an extreme example, but I’m sure there are many people in the West who share similar views.
5) Criticism on China does not limit to human rights. As I said in my previous comments, Western government is blaming China for almost everything without provide constructive suggestions as what China could possibly do without causing major harm to its economy and social stability.
6) Chinese people can disassociate themselves from their government. The trouble is, when unfair, disproportional criticism start to have consequences on ordinary people’s life, then it becomes a matter that ordinary people should rightly feel concerned.
7) You said in your comment that “Every serious debate I have heard involving Chinese representatives and their opponents left me feeling that the Chinese was the less informed”. I think there is the need to bring some prospective here. For a Chinese to deliver a convincing argument, he or she needs to be both knowledgeable about the subjective in question and articulate in a non-native language. Whereas for a Westerner to achieve the same goal, satisfying one of the conditions would be sufficient. That said, I do think that many Chinese need to be more active in seeking information from variable sources to enrich their knowledge, and to form a better balanced view
8) Finally, you mentioned in your comment that you’d be interested to see some articles that are written by liberal scholars and are published on printed media in China. Here’s an recent example:
http://www.caijing.com.cn/todayspecx/cjkx/2008-04-30/58921.shtml
Caijing is a popular business magazine in China. It is frequently referred to as China’s Economist.
In this article, the author, Huangfu Ping, warned that Chinese people need to be wary about the rising nationalism, and not to encourage the development of xenophobia. He also criticized the insensitive speeches made by some communist party leaders. You will, however, need to be able read Chinese. (I think language, and cultural differences in general, are a major barrier to building mutual understanding between China and the west. People in the west are unable to appreciate the extend to which the flourishing online community has liberalized the society as a whole despite the official censorship)
Also, earlier in the year, the central party school published a report named Storming the Fortress (a brief description of the report can be found on Financial Times), which laid out the agenda for future political reformed. Some very bodacious recommendations were made in this report (Chinese politics work in a very intricate – or strange - way. Reports and documents released by the Central Party School (or sometimes articles written by “formerly influential figures”) say more about the government’s true policy initiatives than the official rhetoric)
刘, thanks for replying. You clearly are very informed and articulate, and I have thoroughly enjoyed reading your comments.
I actually agree with 100% of what you just wrote, and think that if more people had your balanced viewpoint this issue would not be as explosive as it has become. A lot of misunderstanding is occuring on both sides of the debate.
I implore my readers to read carefully Yipei's comments, and comment if you feel you have something to add. It is very easy to jump on the bandwagon for a cause, without examining the intricacies.
As for CNN, I don't watch it, and don't plan to. Their style of reporting does not interest me in the least, and what I have seen I find extremely distasteful. The media should be attempting to promote understanding instead of creating unnecessary division.
Readers, choose your current affairs and commentary programs wisely. Preferably do the research yourself and talk with people holding varied views.
Learning Mandarin is certainly on my "to do" list. Learning a language can greatly promote cultural understanding.
I agree that China is growing and developing in many areas, mostly for the better. The best we can do is to hold out the hand of friendship rather than the whip of judgement. There are some very closed-minded people on both sides of every argument. Let's balance them out, and make sure it becomes a discussion rather than an argument, where both sides attempt to empathise and understand the other to come to a mutually agreeable solution. Let's break down this "us and them" dynamic which constantly seems to develop.
Peace.
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