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A much-needed history lesson
By Jerome Keating
Sunday, Aug 08, 2010, Page 8
There was a time, not long ago, when Taiwanese were not
allowed to speak Taiwanese and could not say they were Taiwanese without being
ridiculed. There was a worse time, also not that long ago, when Taiwanese were
imprisoned and tortured if they wanted democracy. That is the period portrayed
in the movie Formosa Betrayed, which opened in theaters nationwide on Friday.
Can one imagine deprivation if one has only known plenty? Can one imagine
oppression if one has only known democracy? Can one imagine a one-party state
violating people’s rights unless one has experienced it? These questions inform
the narrative of Formosa Betrayed and are just some of the issues it raises for
Taiwan’s youth. It is a film that lays bare the harsh reality of Taiwan’s not
too distant past, a harsh, often unspoken reality, endured by the parents and
grandparents of today’s youth, a harsh reality that is hard to imagine. It is
easier to say that it did not exist.
As a foreign consultant and professor, I currently find myself in the awkward
and somewhat embarrassing position of having lived more years in Taiwan and
experienced more of its changes than any of my Taiwanese university students.
When I first came to Taiwan, martial law had just been lifted and Taiwanese were
still afraid to talk about, let alone criticize, the government. The Strawberry
Generation, born shortly after the Kaohsiung Incident, was just entering school
at that time. They probably have no memory of the dreaded Garrison Command
walking the streets; they may not even know what the Garrison Command was.
Today’s “1996 consensus” generation was just starting school when the first
popular presidential election was held. They probably have no memory of the
Chinese Nationalist Party’s (KMT) one-party state control and the lack of free
elections for important political positions. They have no experience of fat-cat
KMT legislators and National Assembly members. Elected way back in 1947, these
men enjoyed unquestioned iron rice bowl privileges that only ended in 1992 when
those that had not died of old age were forced to finally shuffle into
retirement, albeit with a generous retirement package.
As the youth of today search for a job, they must wonder at the privileges and
job security Taiwanese tax dollars gave such KMT members.
Formosa Betrayed depicts a fairly recent time in Taiwanese history. Set in 1983,
the film is, however, not a documentary. Rather, it is a composite of the
murders, torture and reality of things that happened before, during and after
the 1980s. There is an irony to it in how Taiwanese seeking democracy were
betrayed not only by the KMT, but even by the US, which too often turned a blind
eye to human rights violations in Taiwan. More irony can be found in the fact
that the same KMT that in the 1980s oppressed Taiwanese for spurious suspicions
that they might be “communist spies” now runs and fawns over those same
communists in their present dealings with China.
In the film, a young American FBI agent, Jake Kelly (played by James Van Der
Beek) is sent to Taiwan in pursuit of two Chinese gangsters who have just
murdered a Taiwanese professor in the US because of his outspoken and critical
views of Taiwan’s government. In that journey, a Taiwanese, Ming (played by Will
Tiao, 刁毓能) introduces Kelly to the side of Taiwan that most outsiders never see.
In turn, Kelly has to deal with his own personal epiphanies and disillusionment.
The film doesn’t have the action scenes of Mission Impossible movies or the
femmes fatales that are always a feature of James Bond films; it has only the
simple reality of a Taiwan that not long ago few wanted to admit to or face.
Did such things really happen? Talk to those who know Lin Yi-hsiung (林義雄), whose
mother and twin seven-year-old daughters were brutally stabbed to death in broad
daylight in the family home, despite the fact that he was under round-the-clock
surveillance by Taiwan’s secret police. Talk to those who know the family of the
murdered Chen Wen-chen (陳文成), an outspoken Carnegie Mellon associate professor.
Talk to those who know the family of Henry Liu (劉宜良), who wrote critically of
government officials and was subsequently murdered in the US. Talk to the
thousands upon thousands of families whose loved ones were unceremoniously
dumped on Green Island or killed during the 228 Incident, the White Terror
period, to the present.
Is it that long ago? The man who was head of the Government Information Office,
an agency that helped cover up and misdirect investigations of the above
high-profile murder cases, ran for president in 2000, vice president in 2004 and
mayor of Taipei in 2008. That is just two years ago and this same man now wants
to broker deals with the “communists” on the other side of the Taiwan Strait.
Similarly, many of those who had their doctoral degrees in the US sponsored and
paid for by the KMT government shown in the film still hold offices in today’s
government. They were often the campus spies spoken of in the film.
Will the film be successful? That is up to Taiwan’s youth and how much they
really want to know about their past. Cape No. 7 was not that artistically
strong, but it was successful because it dealt with the delightful nostalgic
side of being Taiwanese. Formosa Betrayed deals with a harsher side of being
Taiwanese that many of today’s youth may not want to face. The ball is in their
court.
Jerome Keating is a writer based in Taipei.
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