U-lock

Source: China Digital Times (1/18/24)
Word of the Week: “U-LOCK” (U型锁, U-XÍNGSUǑ)
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This month, there have been a number of incidents—some major and some minor—that illustrate the “U-lock” mentality, a phrase that is sometimes used as shorthand to describe vitriolic xenophobic (particularly anti-Japanese) sentiment. “U-lock” refers to a U-shaped metal bicycle lock used to attack the Chinese owner of a Japanese-made car during the 2012 anti-Japanese protests in Xi’an. Ever since, Chinese internet users have used the term “U-lock” to refer to knee-jerk, xenophobic sentiment with the potential to incite real-world violence.

The “U-lock” mentality was on display in some of the rejoicing and Schadenfreude on Chinese social media after a destructive magnitude 7.6 earthquake struck western Japan on New Year’s Day of this year. Some nationalist commenters even claimed that the earthquake was “retribution” for past Japanese transgressions, from the conquest of Asia during WWII, up to and including last September’s initial release of treated nuclear wastewater from the damaged Fukushima nuclear power plant.

Just a week after the earthquake came the Nanning Metro “rising sun/folding fan” flap, set in motion by a nationalistic Douyin vlogger who complained that a colorful new advertisement on the Nanning metro system resembled the controversial former “rising sun” flag of the Imperial Japanese Army. Nanning Metro quickly backed down, deleting the offending imagery and promising to improve its oversight of future advertising, but a look at the entirety of the advertisement revealed that the image was not a Japanese rising sun at all, but a traditional Chinese folding fan. Some online observers chalked the incident up to nationalist trolls attempting to whip up anti-Japanese sentiment through deliberate misrepresentation or intentional misdirection (指鹿为马, zhǐlùwéimǎ, literally “pointing at a deer and calling it a horse.”) Others characterized it as an example of “porcelain bumping” (碰瓷, pèngcí)—in other words, creating a sham scenario to fool the unwary and advance one’s own agenda. (The term was coined, noted David Bandurski, “to describe a technique used by fraudsters who would wait with delicate porcelain vessels outside busy markets and demand payment when these shattered, ostensibly due to the carelessness of others.”) Continue reading

Rocky road for HK academics

Source: Hong Kong Free Press (1/20/24)
Opinion: Rocky road for those Hong Kong academics who are out of tune with the times
“It is difficult to feel optimistic about the future of Hong Kong universities generally if they are to be the playthings of political appointees who are unwilling or unable to respect the limits of their powers and rights,” writes Tim Hamlett.
By TIM HAMLETT

An amusing coincidence last week. A kind friend sent me an interesting op ed piece from the China Daily about recent events at Harvard University, where the president recently resigned under pressure from major donors.

Students at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. File photo: Kyle Lam/HKFP.

Students at the Chinese University of Hong Kong. File photo: Kyle Lam/HKFP.

The writer of this piece mentioned, in passing, how lucky we were that such a thing could not happen in Hong Kong, because our universities enjoyed autonomy and were immune to interference from the government.

I proceeded to breakfast and the morning paper, which announced that the Vice Chancellor of the Chinese University of Hong Kong had resigned a few days into what was supposed to be a three-year contract.

The resigning V.C., Rocky Tuan, made all the usual polite noises: honour to serve… time is ripe… grateful to all concerned for their support. The chairman of the university council also made the usual polite noises: university is grateful … outstanding leadership, etc, etc, etc.

And behind all this, as the local media reported with varying degrees of candour, was a four-year campaign by the pro-government camp to get rid of Prof Tuan, who had, in 2019, not found the safe course for university leaders in a time of crisis, which was to hide in the office and say nothing. Continue reading

KMT fights to survive

Source: Wall Street Journal (1/19/24)
Party Backing China in Taiwan Fights to Survive
By Chun Han Wong

Kuomintang candidate Hou Yu-ih speaks at a campaign rally. I- HWA CHENG/ AGENCE FRANCE- PRESSE/ GETTY IMAGES

TAIPEI—Beijing’s closest political partner in Taiwan is fighting to remain relevant in an island democracy where voters increasingly see a future that is detached from an authoritarian China.

The Kuomintang, or Nationalist Party, once governed China and had dominated Taiwanese politics for decades. It is now on its longest losing streak in presidential elections since this self-ruled island started choosing its leader by popular vote, consigned to a third straight term in opposition.

Whether the century-old party can get back on its feet has ramifications for Taipei’s rocky relationship with Beijing, which claims Taiwan as its territory and considers the KMT a useful partner in efforts to assimilate the island. The prospect that Taiwanese voters might never elect a Beijingfriendly government again could tilt China toward harsher methods to seek unification, including military force.

KMT leaders have put on a brave face, saying they still have the clout to keep Taiwan’s ruling party in check during the next four years. But many members worry that, without decisive overhauls, one of Asia’s oldest political parties could fade into irrelevance, as more Taiwanese embrace a local identity separate from China and reject the KMT’s perceived coziness with Beijing. Continue reading

Taiwan’s democracy draws envy and tears for visiting Chinese

Source: NYT (1/19/24)
Taiwan’s Democracy Draws Envy and Tears for Visiting Chinese
阅读简体中文版 | 閱讀繁體中文版
People with personal ties to China, on a tour to see Taiwan’s election up close, learned of the island’s path to democracy — messy, violent and, ultimately, inspiring.
By Li Yuan, Reporting from Taipei and Tainan, Taiwan

In an illustration, three faces peer skyward as campaign balloons float and streamers fly in front of a rally.

Credit…Xinmei Liu

At the Taipei train station, a Chinese human rights activist named Cuicui watched with envy as six young Taiwanese politicians campaigned for the city’s legislative seats. A decade ago, they had been involved in parallel democratic protest movements — she in China, and the politicians on the opposite side of the Taiwan Strait.

“We came of age as activists around the same time. Now they’re running as legislators while my peers and I are in exile,” said Cuicui, who fled China for Southeast Asia last year over security concerns.

Cuicui was one in a group of eight women I followed last week in Taiwan before the Jan. 13 election. Their tour was called “Details of a Democracy” and was put together by Annie Jieping Zhang, a mainland-born journalist who worked in Hong Kong for two decades before moving to Taiwan during the pandemic. Her goal is to help mainland Chinese see Taiwan’s election firsthand.

The women went to election rallies and talked to politicians and voters, as well as homeless people and other disadvantaged groups. They attended a stand-up comedy show by a man from China, now living in Taiwan, whose humor addressed topics that are taboo in his home country.

It was an emotional trip filled with envy, admiration, tears and revelations. Continue reading

Ideology power bank

Source: China Digital Times (1/17/24)
Xi-Branded Power Bank/Speakers Provides Two Kinds of Positive Energy
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A top Party outlet has created a Xi Jinping Thought-themed combined Bluetooth speaker and power bank for distribution to cadres across the country. The contraption, clunkily titled the “‘Xi Jinping’s “The Governance of China” Volumes 1-4’ Ideology Power Bank,” was unveiled by Guangming Online, a subsidiary of the influential Guangming Daily, in March 2023, but has gained broader attention online this month. The “ideology power bank” is designed to allow on-the-go cadres to charge their phone while listening to any of 72 essays expounding on Xi Jinping Thought on Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era.

A photograph of the "ideology power bank" which is red and has yellow text.

The text reads: “Xi Jinping’s ‘The Governance of China’ Volumes 1-4. Ideology Power Bank: Charging Phones, Empowering Thought

The product is not available for purchase online. However, CDT Chinese editors have found that many local Party Congress representatives and government employees have received the “ideology power banks.” A press release touting their release quoted a “zoomer” member of China’s rubber stamp national consultative body, who claimed to carry it with her everywhere: “The ‘ideology power bank’ provides us youth with ever-available, ever-informative scenarios. It will be a big hit among youth.” She added that the essays provide a much-needed “north star” and “compass” for the study of ideology. Continue reading

China’s population shrinks again

Source: NYT (1/16/24)
China Told Women to Have Babies, but Its Population Shrank Again
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Faced with falling births, China’s efforts to stabilize a shrinking population and maintain economic growth are failing.
By Alexandra Stevenson and Reporting from Hong Kong

On a frozen river crowded with people, an adult wearing a heavy red coat pulls a child in a pink sled across the ice.

The frozen Liangma River in Beijing. The number of babies born in China declined for the seventh straight year in 2023. Credit…Gilles Sabrié for The New York Times

China’s ruling Communist Party is facing a national emergency. To fix it, the party wants more women to have more babies.

It has offered them sweeteners, like cheaper housing, tax benefits and cash. It has also invoked patriotism, calling on them to be “good wives and mothers.”

The efforts aren’t working. Chinese women have been shunning marriage and babies at such a rapid pace that China’s population in 2023 shrank for the second straight year, accelerating the government’s sense of crisis over the country’s rapidly aging population and its economic future.

China said on Wednesday that 9.02 million babies were born in 2023, down from 9.56 million in 2022 and the seventh year in a row that the number has fallen. Taken together with the number of people who died during the year — 11.1 million — China has more older people than anywhere else in the world, an amount that is rising rapidly. China’s total population was 1,409,670,000 at the end of 2023, a decline of 2 million people, according to the National Bureau of Statistics.

The shrinking and aging population worries Beijing because it is draining China of the working-age people it needs to power the economy. The demographic crisis, which arrived sooner than nearly anyone expected, is already straining weak and underfunded health care and pension systems. Continue reading

DPP battles to prove its staying power

Source: NYT (1/12/24)
Taiwan Party, Reviled by China, Battles to Prove Its Staying Power
The Democratic Progressive Party has transformed Taiwan into a bastion against Chinese power. Now it is promising a mix of change and continuity.
By Chris Buckley and 

The Grand Hotel Taipei in Taipei, Taiwan in December. The Democratic Progressive Party was formed in the ballroom of the hotel in 1986. Credit…

Nearly four decades ago, a group of lawyers, intellectuals and activists assembled in a hotel ballroom in Taipei to found an illegal political party dedicated to ending authoritarian rule in Taiwan.

No longer a scrappy upstart, the Democratic Progressive Party, born in that ballroom, is now seeking an unprecedented third consecutive term. It needs to persuade voters that after eight years in power, the party can renew itself while also protecting Taiwan from mounting pressures imposed by Beijing, which claims the island as its territory.

Led by Vice President Lai Ching-te, the presidential candidate, the D.P.P. faces a stiff challenge in an election on Saturday from its chief rival, the Nationalist Party, which favors expanded ties with China. Polls have indicated that the Nationalists, led by Hou Yu-ih, a former policeman and the mayor of New Taipei City, may have a fighting chance of returning to power for the first time since 2016, an outcome that could reshape the region’s geopolitical landscape. Election results are expected by Saturday night.

For Su Chiao-hui, a lawmaker with the Democratic Progressive Party, the stakes of the vote are especially personal. Her father, Su Tseng-chang, helped found the party when Taiwan was under martial law and later served as a premier in both the party’s two phases in power, including under the current president, Tsai Ing-wen. Continue reading

Taiwan likes its democracy loud and proud

Source: NYT (1/11/24)
‘Frozen Garlic!’ Taiwan Likes Its Democracy Loud and Proud
At the island’s election rallies, warming up the crowd for candidates is crucial. “You have to light a fire in their hearts,” one host says.
By Chris Buckley and 

A large nighttime crowd stands facing a stage on which a man stands speaking, and three large screens show the same image.

Lai Ching-te, the presidential candidate for the Democratic Progressive Party, at a campaign event in New Taipei City.

Huang Chen-yu strode onto an outdoor stage in a southern Taiwanese county, whooping and hollering as she roused the crowd of 20,000 into a joyous frenzy — to welcome a succession of politicians in matching jackets.

Taiwan is in the final days of its presidential election contest, and the big campaign rallies, with M.C.s like Ms. Huang, are boisterous, flashy spectacles — as if a variety show and a disco crashed into a candidate’s town hall meeting.

At the high point of the rally, the Democratic Progressive Party’s presidential candidate, Lai Ching-te, was introduced to the crowd in Chiayi, a county in southern Taiwan. Ms. Huang roared in Taiwanese, “Frozen garlic!”

The phrase “dongsuan” sounds like “get elected” and, yes, also like “frozen garlic.” Ms. Huang and another M.C. led the crowd of supporters, now on their feet, in a rapid-fire, call-and-response chant: “Lai Ching-te! Frozen garlic! Lai Ching-te! Frozen garlic!” Then they sped up: “Lai Ching-te! Lai Ching-te! Lai Ching-te! Frozen garlic! Frozen garlic! Frozen garlic!”

For Ms. Huang, the event, days before Taiwan’s election on Saturday, was one of at least 15 rallies she would have led by the end of this campaign season. Continue reading

How Taiwanese identity has evolved

Source: NPR (1/8/24)
How Taiwanese identity has evolved on the island in recent generations
By , , , , Hugo Peng

What it means to be “Taiwanese” varies from one generation to the next, influenced by the island’s complicated history with China. NPR talks with members of one family across generations.

AILSA CHANG, HOST:

And I’m Ailsa Chang in Taipei, Taiwan, where I often visited as a kid because this is where my family is from, going back centuries. But, you know, all through my life, I never really thought of myself as Taiwanese, even though I grew up speaking Taiwanese. My parents always just said, you are Chinese, just like, well, someone such as Emily Feng is.

EMILY FENG, BYLINE: Hi, Ailsa.

CHANG: NPR’s Emily Feng covers China and Taiwan from her base here in Taipei.

FENG: But to be clear, my parents emigrated to the U.S. from China.

CHANG: That’s right. And yet, Emily, a lot of people would clump you and me together as Chinese.

FENG: Yes. And identity is a hugely sensitive issue for this island of 23 million people. Because even though more than 90% of people living in Taiwan can trace their roots to mainland China, the majority of them now identify in polls as Taiwanese only. And that’s a huge shift from just 30 years ago.

CHANG: Exactly. And part of the reason that we’re here is because there’s a really consequential presidential election this week. And for many voters, at the heart of this election is the question, what does it mean to be Taiwanese? Continue reading

Chine: les influenceurs de la colonisation

Excellent new film on the ongoing Chinese colonization of genocided areas:

https://www.arte.tv/fr/videos/113682-006-A/sources/
Chine: les influenceurs de la colonisation [English subtitles]
Arte / Sources, France 2023.
Disponible: 15 dec. 2023 to 29 Nov. 2026

Also available on Youtube:

This new 15 minute ARTE film is about Chinese colonizer-influencers in Xinjiang, hired by the State to promote colonization of ethnic- cleansed areas under the military-industrial Bingtuan complex (XPCC), the main tool of state settler colonialism in Xinjiang kicking in higher gears during this phase of the genocide.

It’s a lot like what Nazi Europe would have been like, had the Nazis won WWII. Or indeed, Israelis in a future fully cleansed Gaza, with an ocean view,” as one extremist settler leader recently memorably promoted it.

(I was just interviewed by the RFA to comment on the ARTE film. The interview may first come out in Uyghur, but I can send the link later. The main point: this is all part of a logical sequence of genocide – camps, mass destruction of separated families, forced labor or prison for split up parents and children’s Gulag for the kids. Down to how the belongings of the evicted and detained Uyghur owners of the land, now in the camps, or dead, shows up on Chinese ebay: https://bitterwinter.org/uyghur-family-fortunes-mysteriously-reappear-for-auction/)

Sincerely,

Magnus Fiskesjö, nf42@cornell.edu

Don’t expect kindness and humanity from dictators

Source: China Digital Times (11/6/23)
Translation: “Don’t Expect Kindness and Humanity from Totalitarian Dictators”
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A fanciful and colorful illustration of China's first emperor Qin Shi Huang, with regal robes, a jeweled headdress, and fiery purple eyes.

A fiery-eyed Qin Shi Huang, China’s first emperor (259-210 B.C.E.), who was famed for his book-burning and brutality.

A brief, fiery essay excoriating totalitarianism has been censored on WeChat, and appears to have precipitated the closure of a Jiangxi-based current- and legal-affairs blog. First posted on the public WeChat account 法制江西 (Fǎzhì Jiāngxī, “Jiangxi Legal”), the ten-paragraph essay—interspersed with photographs of contemporary strongmen and vivid illustrations of the brutal emperors of old—extolled the virtues of liberal democracy and argued for the “inevitable demise” of authoritarian systems. Some aspects of the essay echo, intentionally or not, the vision for a “Beautiful China” of rights lawyer Xu Zhiyong, who was sentenced in May to 14 years in prison for subversion. Soon after the essay disappeared from WeChat, the “Jiangxi Legal” public account announced, without any explanation, that it had been suspended and would cease posting updates. The account’s public profile described it as “a general news column, under the auspices of a legal-affairs Party media outlet, offering in-depth analysis and commentary on trending topics in the news,” and described the content as “a global perspective, a Chinese point of view, explaining current events and discussing all manner of things.”

On Chinese social media, there is routine censorship of content praising so-called “western values” such as democracy, rule of law, human rights, freedom of the press, and freedom of speech. In recent years, there has also been an uptick in the censorship of content and works referring to failed or despotic emperors and other figures from antiquity, particularly if that content is viewed as being obliquely critical of Xi Jinping’s rule. In October, a reprint of the historical biography “The Chongzhen Emperor: Diligent Ruler of a Failed Dynasty” was pulled from bookstore shelves and online booksellers due to a cover redesign and promotional quotes that seemed to implicitly criticize Xi Jinping. (One blurb on the book’s wrapping read: “The diligent ruler of a failed dynasty, Chongzhen’s repeated mistakes were the result of his own ineptitude. His ‘diligent’ efforts hastened the nation’s destruction.”) The name “Chongzhen” and related topics were later search-blocked on Weibo, with searches only showing results from verified users. Continue reading

Balloons float over Taiwan before an election

Source: NYT (1/4/24)
Balloons Float Over Taiwan Before an Election. Experts See a Sign from China
Some analysts see the objects as a calculatedly ambiguous reminder to voters that Beijing is watching.
By Chris Buckley and Amy Chang Chien, Reporting from Tainan, Taiwan

Two soldiers in white uniforms fold up a Taiwanese flag in a plaza.

Folding a flag of Taiwan in the island’s capital, Taipei. The balloons from China do not appear to pose an immediate military menace. Credit…Chiang Ying-Ying/Associated Press

A surge in sightings of balloons from China flying over Taiwan has drawn the attention of the island’s military and struck some experts as a calculatedly ambiguous warning to voters weeks before its presidential election.

Taiwan’s Ministry of National Defense has reported occasional sightings of balloons floating from China since last month, and a surge in recent days, according to the ministry’s daily tally of Chinese military activities near the island. Official Taiwanese accounts about balloons were previously very sporadic.

The recent balloons have mostly stayed off Taiwan’s coast. On Monday, however, one flew across the island, according to the ministry’s descriptions of their paths. Of four spotted on Tuesday, three flew over Taiwan, and two passed through to the island’s east side, facing the Pacific Ocean. Another flew over the island on Wednesday.

The Taiwanese reports also noted some of the balloons’ proximity to the island’s military bases. Of the four reported on Tuesday, three were first detected 120 to 184 miles from the Ching Chuan Kang Air Base in the city of Taichung. Taiwan’s defense ministry declined to specify how close to the base they may have flown. Continue reading

China Project closing?

Happy new year MCLC.

I am wondering if anything more has come to light regarding the closure of the web journal “The China Project” which succeeded “SUP China.”

The China Project web journal was closed down in December for no clear reason, but there was some mention of withdrawal of funds. Were the financial support withdrawn to kill the journal? For what purpose?

We know that one of the key sponsors/financiers, Anla Cheng, who was closely involved and listed as founding the SUPChina journal in 2015, is also involved in both the socalled Committee of 100 Chinese in America, and in the China Institute in New York, neither of which has ever said anything, or permitted any kind of activity that touches on, let alone criticising the monstrous atrocities now under way in Xinjiang (East Turkestan).

At one point, she suggested to the South China Morning Post that the mass atrocities is only a problem of different “perceptions” (!), not reality (see here), and refused to clarify.

Given this context, it is very difficult to avoid speculating that the CP closure had something to do with a desire to silence the good work of the China Project journal, in regularly featuring several knowledgeable writers on the Chinese atrocities in Xinjiang (East Turkestan).

Magnus Fiskesjö,  <magnus.fiskesjo@cornell.edu>, or: <nf42@cornell.edu>

Unfit for Chinese eyes, part two

Source: China Digital Times (1/2/24)
The Top ███ Chinese ██████s of 2023 (Part Two: Comedy to Tragedy)
By 

In part two of our retrospective on the most sensitive topics of 2023, as selected by our Chinese team, we focus on dissent and disasters. In part one we covered long-standing taboos on discussions about Xi Jiping and the Tiananmen Massacre, as well as the increasingly explosive problem of youth discontent. The following six themes are not the “most censored” words of 2023 but rather some of the more important censored themes. Each section will lead with censored terms and then follow with a brief explanation of their provenance and context. For more on many of these themes, see CDT’s newly launched ebook, “China Digital Times Lexicon: 20th Anniversary Edition.”

Dissident Leanings

Censored termsChizi, Wang Yuechi, Slap, Lew Mon-hung

Comedy proved a notable avenue for dissent in 2023. Chinese comedians performing abroad broke new ground with politically minded stand up routines. Many of them have paid a price for their humor. Wang Yuechi, known by his stage name Chizi, had all his Chinese social media accounts deleted after performing a North American stand-up tour during which he touched on human rights, Xinjiang, and the changes to China’s constitution that have allowed Xi to indefinitely extend his tenure as state president. One stand up comedian in China was issued a lifetime ban for an innocuous joke about the People’s Liberation Army and his dogs. Revitalized corps of “culture cops” stirred further anxieties that the space for humor is now even more tightly closed. Continue reading

Xinjiang’s Ominous ‘Looking Back Project’

Source: Bruce-humes.com (12/30/23)
回头看工程 — Xinjiang’s Ominous “Looking Back Project”
By Bruce Humes

Uyghur poet’s memoir recalls the Xinjiang administration’s retrospective hunt for unPC content in textbooks once commissioned, edited and published by the state:

Following the Urumchi incident in 2009, the regional government had initiated the Looking Back Project. The Propaganda Department organized special groups to go over Uyghur-language books, newspapers, journals, films, television shows, and recordings from the 1980s to the present. These groups were tasked with identifying any materials that contained ethnic separatist themes or religious extremist content.

. . .  Several years later, as one result of these investigations, half a dozen Uyghur intellectuals and officials were arrested for editing Uyghur literature textbooks for grades one through eleven. The textbooks had been used in schools for over a decade before the “problem” with them was discovered in 2016.  

Word spread that similar “problems” had been found in nearly all Uyghur historical novels, and that they would soon be banned. The government had even banned a popular historical novel by Seypidin Ezizi, the highest-ranking Uyghur official in the history of the Chinese Communist Party. If the work of such a trusted party veteran could be banned, there was little question what the future held for other Uyghur writers.

(Excerpted from Waiting to be Arrested at Night by Tahir Hamut Izgil, translated by Joshua  Freeman)