Forget `mainland'

Call Taiwan, Taiwan? ... how about first calling the other side by its name, the real one.

Although I really wanted to go to the demonstration in favor of changing and recognizing the true name of this country, Taiwan, I did not. The reason is that because I do not carry a Republic of China passport and in the end I considered it a bit weird to assist. This is something that should be decided by the Taiwanese themselves.

But before any change is possible, the Taiwanese (and foreigners too) need to change their mind set. In some way we all have been brainwashed. I hate that in every newspaper, radio or TV news program, government organization and even among average people (including hardcore pro-independence ones) there is an excessive and irritating use of the word "mainland".

There is no such country as the "Mainland" -- except for those people who live on an island and recognize that they politically belong to a country whose main territory is on the mainland. That is what it means: main [principal] and land [territory].

Those who believe that Taiwan is not a part of China should refrain in using this term, both in English and Chinese. Mainland women are Chinese women, mainland people are Chinese and the mainland is the "People's Republic of China." This is the real name of that big country that so proudly and openly squeezes and denies any international recognition to this island called Taiwan.

If we continue using "mainland," we are just helping to extend the Chinese Nationalist Party's (KMT) pro-China brainwashing of the 1950s to 1990s. The Mainland Affairs Council should become The Council for the Relations with the People's Republic of China and so on.

If you do not agree with the idea that Taiwan is an island that is part of the PRC, then it is time to stand up and call the PRC by its own name. Then you can begin to realize who you are, what is your identity, where you belong to and so on.

The greatest dangers for Taiwanese identity, like this one, are disguised and look harmless in appearance, but run deep in the social body and with their omnipresence prevents the Taiwanese people from discovering their identity.

Francisco Carin Garcia

Taishan, Taipei County

Ensuring linguistic diversity

Two separate events on Monday afternoon reflect the linguistic changes in this country brought about by democratization. The first event was a press conference called by Council for Cultural Affairs Vice Chairman Wu Mi-cha to announce that the draft of a "national languages development law" had been completed and would be presented to the legislature. The proposed law is aimed at overturning the past dominance by a single, official "national language," ie, Mandarin.

The intent behind this legislation is to protect and preserve disadvantaged languages which are in danger of extinction after being marginalized by the forced usage of Mandarin for so many decades. Under the proposed law, all languages used in Taiwan would become national languages and be given equal status.

The bill would authorize the different levels of government -- central, county, etc -- to designate common languages in the areas under their jurisdiction. This would mean the country would have more than one common language. What is extraordinary about this bill is the separation of spoken languages from written ones. Under the bill, once the various governments designate common languages, the language users themselves would decide which language to use on official occasions.

About the same time that Wu was holding his press conference, Council for Hakka Affairs Chairwoman Yeh Chu-lan was visiting Examination Yuan President Yao Chia-wen. She wanted to discuss a recent qualification test for civil servants which featured questions on Hoklo, sparking criticism from Hakka-speakers. Yeh wanted to express the Hakka people's concerns and the hope that in the future, such examinations would reflect the interests of all ethnic groups, not just one.

The council's language bill is based on the concept of plurality, respect for all ethnic groups and concern for their interests. It is aimed at reversing past language policies dominated by Mandarin and enriching the country's linguistic assets.

Since the Democratic Progressive Party's Chen Shui-bian became president in 2000, the country has gradually liberated itself from the political framework established and dominated by the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT). Culturally, the long repressed local ethnic cultures are gradually being liberated from the framework of China's central plains culture.

The KMT's national language policy created a single common language, but the deliberate suppression of other languages caused those languages to wither. For example, even though Hoklo-speaking people are the biggest group in the country, not many people under the age of 30 in northern Taiwan can speak fluent Hoklo, even though it is still a common language in the south. Such language loss is even more serious among the Hakka and Aborigines.

The Council for Cultural Affairs is working to transcend the unification versus independence political dispute and allow all ethnic groups to liberate their linguistic energies. Under its proposed bill, administrative procedures will become more complex. For example, because test-takers will be able to decide which common language to use in government tests, multi-language test format and facilities will have to be available. Moreover, when a head of state delivers a speech in a language other than Mandarin, the speech will have to be translated into several languages.

The development of languages is fluid, especially in dynamic Taiwan, where the interaction between different languages may create a richer language environment. The proposed policy will create many problems -- as well as opportunities -- but it is vastly preferable to the previous KMT administra-tion's policy of linguistic favoritism.

SARS susceptibility linked to genes

INBUILT RESISTANCE: A doctor said she has identified a certain gene, found in 10 percent of people in Taiwan, that makes them more likely to suffer from the SARS virus

CNA , TAIPEI

Susceptibility to SARS could be related to genetics, a hematologist at Mackay Memorial Hospital said yesterday.

Dr. Marie Lin, of Mackay's Transfusion Medicine Laboratory, said no theories expounded during the height of the SARS outbreaks could explain why some people did not contract the illness even though they had close contact with SARS patients, while others fell victim to the epidemic easily with only short and vaguely defined encounters with patients.

Doctors have had little idea of why some people only developed slight flu-like symptoms after being infected by SARS while others died, Lin said at a press conference to make public her findings about the relationship between SARS and human genes.

Lin said that after comparing hundreds of blood samples from SARS patients, she and her team found that people with the human leucocype antigen (HLA)-B46 gene are most likely to fall victim to SARS, while people with the HLA-B13 gene are relatively immune to the SARS virus.

Lin said that about 10 percent of Taiwan's population have the HLA-B46 gene. These people share the gene with "southern Asians," including people from China's southern coastal provinces of Guangdong and Fujian, Hong Kong, Singapore and part of Vietnam, where people have maintained close genetic connections over the past 400 years, she added.

She said many SARS patients were relatives or members of the same families, indicating that blood relations might have been one of the factors causing the transmission of the disease.

Meanwhile, she continued, none of Taiwan's Aboriginal people fell victim to SARS.

Aborigines were unaffected by SARS because this group of people have genetic make-ups totally different from those of the "southern Asians" and do not have the SARS-prone HLA-B46 gene, Lin said.

She said that although some Canadian nationals were hit by SARS, a great majority of them were of Chinese descent, originating from Hong Kong or southern China.

Explaining why many people in Beijing contracted SARS, Lin attributed this development to demographic changes in the capital city as a result of the Cultural Revolution, during which the entire Chinese population experienced forced immigration, and the fact that many residents of southern China have migrated to Beijing for business or education purposes in recent years.

Lin said the purpose of her laboratory's blood research is mainly to find an effective method of SARS prevention before the disease can make a reappearance this winter.

If necessary, medical care workers can contact the Mackay Transfusion Medicine Lab for test doses that can screen blood to find out who has the HLA-B46 gene so that they can take precautions to avoid being infected, she added.

Yu keeps his options open on language

NOTHING OFFICIAL: The premier said designating an official language would need an amendment to the Constitution and he will respect public opinion

By Ko Shu-ling

STAFF REPORTER

Premier Yu Shyi-kun said yesterday that the government might consider designating official languages in the Constitution, as 112 other countries have done.

"The Constitution and existing laws do not specify any particular language as the nation's official language, so constitutional amendments or legislation would be needed to legalize an official language," Cabinet Spokesman Lin Chia-lung quoted Yu as saying.

There is no doubt that Mandarin is the nation's most commonly used official language, judging from a functional and practical point of view, Yu was quoted as saying.

"Of course, we'll respect public opinion and the decision of the legislature, which has the final say on the matter," Yu said.

Yu also explained why the Cabinet decided in March to let the Council for Cultural Affairs take over the drafting of a language law from the Mandarin Promotion Council under the Ministry of Education.

"The United Nations has expressed its concern over the gradual disappearance of Taiwan's native tongues," Yu said.

As the disappearance of native languages would be a loss to mankind, Yu said, the Cabinet thought it was a good idea to let the Council for Cultural Affairs handle the drafting of the language law to help conserve and develop the nation's languages.

Yu made the remarks after the weekly closed-door Cabinet meeting yesterday morning at which Government Information Office head Huang Hui-chen briefed ministers on public opinion of the subject.

A draft of the national languages development law, approved by the Council for Cultural Affairs on Monday, caused a stir by stating that the nation has no official language and that local governments may decide what languages they want to use.

During the Cabinet meeting, Minister of Education Huang Jong-tsun said that designating an official language was a sensitive topic, because political ideologies are polarized.

"If amending the Constitution is the way to go in terms of designating the official language, I hope Mandarin is not the only language taken into consideration," Huang said.

Council for Hakka Affairs Chairwoman Yeh Chu-lan, who recently visited Examination Yuan President Yao Chia-wen to express her opposition to Hoklo language questions in the national examination for civil servants, said that each language should be treated equally.

"The government has to move very carefully in designating the nation's official language because all languages spoken by ethnic groups are a nation's important cultural heritage," she said.

But discussion of language was overshadowed yesterday by the ongoing rift between Lin and Taipei Mayor Ma Ying-jeou.

The quarrel began after Lin claimed that at last week's Cabinet meeting Ma had likened the Cabinet's plan to hold non-binding referendums to China's Cultural Revolution.

Ma requested an apology from Lin, saying he had been misquoted.

The mayor yesterday seemed to claim victory in the squabble.

"I believe [Lin] must have learned a lesson from this incident," Ma told reporters after the Cabinet meeting.

Lin retorted by saying he hoped Ma himself had been "enlightened" by the incident.

Soong: Taiwan's Chairman Mao

By Paul Lin

`There are some politicians in Taiwan who constantly long for the authoritarian era, unable to fit in a democratic system, or who think they are infallible, and that they, just like Mao, have become gods. That is cause for concern.'

Following the 500,000-strong demonstration in Hong Kong on July 1, the deputy director of Beijing's liaison office in Hong Kong, Zou Zhekai, came out to say, "During the Great Cultural Revolution, people were out in the streets demonstrating all day long, criticizing this and struggling against that. As a result, the economy was on the verge of collapsing and people's lives became indescribably hard." According to this explanation, Hong Kong could become the capital of turmoil.

Zou was condemned for this statement, and even people within the left wing felt it was inappropriate. Unexpectedly, similar statements have been used in Taiwan to describe things happening along Taiwan's road toward democratization as a "cultural revolution." The two occurrences are similar in that both denounce and reject the democracy movement.

Even if Taipei Mayor Ma Ying-jeou continues to repeat that he was quoting some Tai-wanese businessman, and that his words were taken out of context and distorted, two unavoidable facts remain regarding the use of such a quotation to describe the political situation in Taiwan.

First, Ma agrees with the businessman or he would not have quoted him. Second, the comparison is wrong even if the incident has no bearing on a referendum, because the chaos in Taiwan's political situation is the product of its democratic multiparty system. It has nothing to do with the Cultural Revolution.

Due to the calamity and great suffering the Cultural Revolution caused the Chinese people, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has always prohibited discussion and publication of related materials in an attempt at eradicating it from people's memories.

While the average Taiwanese businessman will not understand the true situation during the Cultural Revolution, it is impossible that Ma, once the vice chairman of the Mainland Affairs Council, wouldn't understand. That is why he would not admit to his mistake when it was pointed out.

So what was the Cultural Revolution really all about? As someone who experienced it firsthand, and who has spent many years studying it and thinking about the experience, I can offer a brief introduction.

The Cultural Revolution began in 1966. The reason was that tens of millions of people had died in famines created by the CCP's "Three Red Flags" -- the General Line of Socialism, the Great Leap Forward, and the People's Communes -- in the late 1950s.

Because of these disasters Mao Zedong had been forced to retreat to the back rows and hand the reins of power to Liu Shaoqi. Because he was unhappy about his position, Mao had his wife, Jiang Qing, and the military leader Lin Biao deify Mao with the help of propaganda. The army was first.

Mao then came out to start the Cultural Revolution's mass movement. He himself wrote the "Bombard the Headquarters" big-character poster and used the Red Guards to incite a rebellion. Across the country, he charged people with being "landlords, rich farmers, anti-revolutionaries, bad elements, rightists, rebels, spies or capitalist roaders" to fight and eradicate Liu and his people.

Because the Cultural Revolution implemented "the Four Big Rights" -- the rights to speak out freely, air views fully, hold great debates and write big-character posters -- it was said to implement "Great Democracy." This was, in fact, not the case at all.

Mao first denounced the original Political Bureau before setting up the Central Cultural Revolution Group from which he led the Cultural Revolution. Jiang and other members of that group then indicated to the Red Guards who belonged to the "bourgeoisie headquarters."

The Red Guards then used "beating, smashing, robbing, grabbing and looting" to topple and even torture these people to death. Some Red Guards who attacked people belonging to the "proletariat headquarters" were labelled "anti-revolutionary groups" or "active anti-revolutionary elements."

Mao and Jiang even promoted "great disorder under heaven -- the more, the better," inciting struggles among the masses. Liu eventually lost power in the chaos.

"Great Democracy" was thus a way for the dictator to mobilize the masses in the name of democracy. When the people that were to be removed had been removed, and even people who were not supposed to be removed were affected, there was more discontent.

Mao then organized "Workers' Mao Zedong Propaganda Units" to replace the Red Guards. Red Guard leaders, regardless of which faction they belonged to, were taken prisoner. Because Lin had too many enemies within the army, and because he had too high ambitions, Mao purged him too. Forced to flee, Lin died in an airplane crash during his escape. The facts surrounding the crash remain unclear to this day.

After Lin's death, Mao and Jiang turned to then premier Zhou Enlai. Zhou conscientiously carried out his duties and had a better standing among the people. Together with the enormous political and economic destruction caused by the Cultural Revolution, this led to the Tiananmen Incident following Zhou's death in 1976, when masses of demonstrators gathered in the Tiananmen Square in an anti-Mao demonstration. The demonstration turned out to be the biggest mass demonstration since the CCP had gained power.

Mao died not long after the excitement. Army leaders then used Hua Guofeng, whom Mao on his death bed had made his anointed successor, to initiate a coup and arrest Jiang and the other members of the Gang of Four, after which the Cultural Revolution ended.

Some conclusions can be drawn from these events.

First, the Cultural Revolution was a power struggle permeated with conspiracy and deceit within the top leadership of a dictatorship. It had nothing to do with democracy.

Second, it was led by a legendary leader and that is why the whole people could be blindly mobilized and why they fought each other.

Third, Mao's "Quotations" could only determine the thinking of hundreds of millions of people because there was a lack of free information and because no dissenting opinion was allowed.

The CCP admits that it was "unprecedented."

Taiwan is a diversified democratic society. No single leader holds sufficient power to be able to manipulate the masses into acting blindly according to his or her personal wishes. Seeds of personality cults must of course be eliminated.

Not long ago, a few slogans in a booklet for members of the "Friends of James Soong Society" were revealed; they "must study Soong's thought and identify with Soong's ideals," and "swear to protect Soong to the death," and so on. These slogans are similar to slogans from the Cultural Revolution; to "swear to protect Chairman Mao to the death" and to "read Chairman Mao's books, listen to Chairman Mao's words, act according to Chairman Mao's instructions, and be a good student of Chairman Mao's."

But as soon as these slogans were revealed, PFP Chairman James Soong had to clarify that they had nothing to do with him, and that is exactly the advantage of democracy.

Nevertheless, there are some politicians in Taiwan who constantly long for the authoritarian era, unable to fit in a democratic system, or who think they are infallible, and that they, just like Mao, have become gods. That is cause for concern.

Paul Lin is a political commentator based in New York.

Chen says history education should enhance democracy

By Jewel Huang

STAFF REPORTER

President Chen Shui-bian said yesterday that history education plays an important role in solidifying the nation's will since Taiwan's democracy has entered a critical stage.

Chen made the remark in speech at a symposium held by Academia Historica in the National Central Library and comes as debate on the new guidelines for high school history textbooks heats up.

In his speech, Chen said Academia Historica has made a great contribution under curator Chang Yen-hsien's leadership in restoring the historical documents and books that recount Taiwan's democratic development, which bring Taiwan's history closer to its people.

"Although people in Taiwan have gone through Japan's colonization and the Chinese Nationalist Party's (KMT) autocracy for the past century, we still created a democratic miracle because of our thirst for democracy," Chen said. "But we still need to work on integrating different historical perspectives and experiences with tolerance and practicing the value of democracy in our daily life."

Chen criticized opposition parties for boycotting the establishment of a national human rights commission.

"But I do not believe they [opposition parties] can keep resisting the democratic trend," Chen said.

Although the three-day event is entitled Symposium of History of the Republic of China, it focuses on the development of Taiwan's democracy in the 20th century, the history of Taiwan's democratic movement since 1895, the KMT's reign and the process of the nation's constitutional government.

More than 70 academics specializing in history, sociology and political science attended the symposium and 31 dissertations will be announced and reviewed.

Retired National Taiwan University law professor Lee Hung-hsi examined from a historical perspective Lee Teng-hui's notion that the Republic of China does not exist.

Lee Hung-hsi said the Republic of China was overthrown by the People's Republic of China in 1949, while the KMT continued its sovereignty by occupying Taiwan without effective international backing.

Chen Chun-kai, an associate professor of history at Fu Jen University, said in his dissertation that Taiwan's pursuing democracy is a winding road.

"At this point, Taiwan still faces a critical challenge because of the opposition parties' unreasonable boycott, which [is why] I call today's democracy in Taiwan a `nominal democracy,'" Chen Chun-kai said.

"Only by looking into Taiwan's history can we clarify today's situation and make out the road for the future," he said.