Thinking about China lately

Tibet:

Inappropriate terminology – “unrest” is such a castrated word. Riots took place.

No one knows what China will be like in 20 years. We know what it is like now, i.e. oppressive, chaotic, predictably nationalistic. No one should be shocked by how the Lhasa riots were reported. The hilarious part is that the government kicked out all the journalists, brought in a pack of trusted ones + all the thugs to make sure they didn’t see too much, and they still saw monks protesting.

Western media really wants a clear victim in the 3.14 incident. The fact that Tibetans violently attacked Han Chinese problematizes their false dichotomy. We should accept that violence is an acceptable form of protest even in Tibet, but this is hard for us because our 21st-century orthodoxy is that all freedom fighters are terrorists. In reality, they could just be angry poor people who hate Chinese.

China’s convenient if improbable scapegoat – Dalai Lama (not a full independence advocate anyway).

The Dalai Lama as a Tibetan political leader, by the way, confuses us because of the race-based attacks during the riots. We want to believe in his endless love, but we have a bizarre, overly emotive understanding of him and his thought. The Dalai Lama himself speaks English poorly but is insensibly tasked with explaining inscrutable Buddhist precepts to the West. His monastic lifestyle makes him oddly sheltered, even while trying to lead a country in exile and be a sacred religious leader. His job is one of the hardest in the world, and he has failed at it many times.

Trusting CNN to cover an issue in a competitor country is risky. It is not as risky as trusting Xinhua. We should hold ourselves to higher standards but not expect the mouthpiece of the regime to be something it isn’t.

Beijing Olympics:

The Olympics in China is, to the Chinese government, about convincing the world of Chinese greatness. Above all else. This is very petty, but the Olympics are so mired in hubris anyway that it’s odd to expect anything else from China of all countries. In the event of an Olympic boycott, the only people I would feel sorry for are the athletes, who might miss their only chance for greatness.

Popular political discourse in China is not far past this. Expecting China to suddenly act like a “liberal democratic order” is silly. From a media perspective, there is only one correct perspective: the party line.

Back to the Slate article above- 1936 Olympics in Berlin was supposed to “welcome Germany back into the family of nations” at the same time as subjugation of ethnic minorities was underway, huh? Great parallel there. So, was having the 1936 Olympics in Germany ultimately a good idea?

Big picture – Chinese government as a regime is oppressive. Tibet riots have been building for years. There will be more “unrest.” The possibility of something disastrous happening in the Olympics is, sadly, high.

Chinese government today is by no means the worst regime of all time, but again, it is bad. Hosting the Olympics is a gift that should be contingent on among other things a commitment to human rights, not as propaganda on the greatness of the status quo. We should boycott for moral reasons. Our moral authority is shattered, but we have to start somewhere because it’s important to regain.

Of course, I don’t think many countries, if any, actually will boycott. I’m sure hijinks of some form will occur during the Olympics however, and when it happens foreign governments will be unable to help their citizens.

Participating in the Olympics shouldn’t be about endorsing or not endorsing the host country’s policies. In this case, we should boycott because if all goes well it only spurs on the Chinese jingo machine (while doing nothing to improve lives) and if everything goes to hell, people are going to get hurt. What are we really going to gain from having the Olympics in Beijing?