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Just as loaded as a
Chinese AK-47
By J. Michael Cole ±FÁıN
It¡¦s easy to lose track of the number of occasions in the media where one
encounters language that seeks to create a moral equivalence in the Taiwan
Strait. The conflict, as anyone who bothers to learn the facts will quickly
realize, is not symmetrical and does not involve two belligerents. Only one
side, China, threatens the other, Taiwan, through economic or political
absorption ¡X or, in the extreme, war.
Still, even in the supposedly apolitical realms of, say, education and culture,
one often comes upon language that not only politicizes the matter, but also
portrays Taiwan as the aggressor or unjust, irresponsible party.
Our exhibit today is an article by the government-owned Central News Agency (CNA)
published on Saturday ¡X and later carried in this newspaper (¡§Policy on China
students needs change: experts,¡¨ March 26, page 3) that discusses the prevailing
divisions among Taiwanese on how to treat Chinese students, who were last year
for the first time allowed to enroll full-time in local schools.
Following a series of uncontroversial and self-evident remarks about the need to
make the Taiwanese education system more global and competitive, the article
turns to Yu Zelin (§E¿AÀM), a Chinese student at the Chinese Culture University,
who voices a number of complaints about the system.
After bemoaning the fact that students like him were afraid to see a doctor when
they got sick or did not dare get sick, as they could end up paying expensive
medical bills because of their exclusion from the national health insurance
plan, Yu then complains that Chinese students¡¦ hard work at school is not
rewarded, as they are not allowed to receive scholarships from the Taiwanese
government.
The article then says that the environment of free speech in Taiwan can create
pressure on young people in their 20s thanks to ¡§ignorant¡¨ and ¡§xenophobic¡¨
comments on the Internet, such as ¡§swim back if you¡¦re upset,¡¨ directed at
Chinese students by some Taiwanese (remarks that pale in comparison with a
recent one I received in which the anonymous writer recommended I should ¡§gtfo
of Taiwan¡¨).
We should note that the complaint about free speech had no attribution. We do
not know whether this is still Yu talking, or the reporter or the CNA editor as
a ¡§father figure,¡¨ perhaps speaking on behalf of the government (and which one,
I could fairly ask). Free speech, furthermore, is portrayed negatively in the
article, as it allows for ¡§ignorance¡¨ and ¡§xenophobia¡¨ (as if societies where
free speech isn¡¦t exercised, such as in China, for example, did not have media
or youth that spew their own xenophobia).
Taiwanese who do not agree with state assets sponsoring students from a country
that threatens them and denies their existence are ¡§ignorant¡¨ and ¡§xenophobes,¡¨
or ostensibly ¡§pressured¡¨ to adopt language that reflects such views. And yet,
the article remains silent about the racist, xenophobic and authoritarian
policies of the Chinese government and about the Chinese students in Taiwan who,
on some occasions, have verbally assailed, or completely overtook, their
Taiwanese counterparts or lecturers such as Chinese activist Wang Dan (¤ý¤¦).
The article is not done with us yet. An academic, who we are told studies
cross-strait affairs, but who remains unnamed, tells us that Taipei¡¦s current
policy on Chinese students is ¡§uncivilized.¡¨
So now Taiwanese are not only ignorant and xenophobic, they¡¦re also
¡§uncivilized.¡¨ Whereas, of course, negating the separate existence of 23 million
people, threatening them with hundreds upon hundreds of ballistic missiles and
an increasingly formidable military, or engaging in a hostile takeover by force
of trade and investment, is perfectly civilized. This, of course, is not to
mention the Chinese Communist Party¡¦s civilized treatment of Tibetans, Uighurs,
Falun Gong practitioners, prisoners of conscience, rights activists, dissidents,
lawyers, environmentalists, investigative journalists ¡X all of whom, we can
assume, are as ¡§uncivilized¡¨ as those pesky Taiwanese.
Voicing opposition to policies that were imposed without proper consultation
with the legislature and the public is not, as the CNA article implies,
xenophobic, ignorant or uncivilized. It is a right exercised by citizens of a
democratic society in which free speech is not only permissible, but sine qua
non.
J. Michael Cole is deputy news editor at the Taipei Times.
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