Sorry for being vocal on this sensitive issue, but I think it is important to speak out against the hegemony of a misled media. Anyway, I have track record of abusing this list, so there is nothing that I’m afraid of:
CNN has a quick vote on whether China’s anti-Japanese sentiments are justified.
http://www.cnn.com/2005/WORLD/asiapcf/04/15/china.japan/index.html
This past Sunday night I looked at the quick vote from the computer at home and noted the statistics as below and I kept a screenshot.
28% (6073413 votes) yes and 72% (15438349) no.
However, last week’s vote on whether Japan should be given a Security Council seat, 98% vote no. Probably many Chinese went to the site and vote and it’s unlikely that they didn’t this time. Therefore this 28% vs. 72% is odd enough, given the usually big number of votes. I’m aware of certain computer programs that can run automatic votes that can be used on both sides. So 28% vs. 72% is fine.
Today, Monday morning, I just voted another yes from my computer in the office. The result is still the same (I got another screenshot):
28% (6073413 votes) yes and 72% (15438349) no.
Not only the percentage is the same but also the number of the votes!!!!!!! If voting has ended, why can one still vote by clicking that vote button?! Even if the vote has a self-claim that it is not scientific, it is still a vote. How can CNN just post a number and a percentage that it wants and claims it is the result of voting?!!!! (And this is such an sloppy job done!) I could have dismissed the whole thing, whether it is 98% vs. 2% or 28% vs. 72%: neither of these is reflective of the facts esp. when such mechanism is subject to statistical flaw and technical manipulation. (OK, I admit I tried to vote several times.) But isn’t it deplorable and sad when many more Chinese come to this site and vote diligently, having learned about this vote from the widespread emails, only to find such a sham? People would think CNN is influential as news media and hoped to express their views and make a difference on the number, but CNN failed the expectation in such an ugly manner. I know the result of such vote has no actual bearing on what is going to happen between China and Japan whatsoever except that the public opinion might have some remote long-term effect (though the public here probably don’t care at all.) But how could CNN so blatantly violating professional ethics? (Or maybe I should have come to this conclusion earlier from Lou Dobbs’ xenophobia with his saggy face and depressed look.)
But the reason that I continue to write this long is that, I’ve noticed that CNN, along with a good part of the media such as the supposedly respectable New York Times and The Economist, are systematically telling lies or at least misleading with a one-sided view. To me, they are, knowingly or unknowingly, serving as an accomplice in continuing Japan RIGHT WING (note I’m not saying the whole Japan or all the Japanese) plain denial of its atrocities against the Chinese and others in Asia. Throwing eggs and smashing windows is violence and not right; killing, raping, mutilating, burning (and denying) is not violence and is right?! If Schroeder as prime minister of Germany pays yearly tribute to Hitler on the ground that Hitler, too, died for his own country, how acceptable is that?! Chinese government might be selective in allowing and forbidding different types of protests. However, if protests and congregation are the right forms of freedom of speech, why is it wrong for China to allow anti-Japanese protests to go on? (Yes, I think the non-report on the protests in Chinese media is wrong.) So it seems that media in the “Western world” only want Chinese government to allow protests against itself but not against another country. So what did the media say when the Lebanese were calling for Syrian troops to get out? Why is the media almost silent on protests of the same nature in Korea against Japan? Is it because that would be a case of democracy vs. democracy, democracy in the sense of multi-party election? In the case of China vs. Japan, it is a communist country (perceived as dictatorship) vs. a democracy, therefore the answer should be self-evident?the dictatorship must be in the wrong?! Or is it anti-intuition that a communist country should be growing this fast and gaining momentum therefore some bashing is deemed necessary?
Yet, the crimes Japan committed in the WWII was against HUMANITY but not the People’s Republic of China government, which didn’t exist by the end of WWII. How can one be so unethical to accuse the PRC government of simply using these protests in service of its political ends? Where is the sense of justice and proportion? Are they saying that China is politically motivated using its victim status whereas Japan is sweet and innocent, unfortunately insulted and injured whose only focus is world peace?
In the Nanjing Massacre and throughout the war from 1937 to 1945, civilians including children were killed or buried alive in masses. Japanese veterans reported that 15-20 women were assigned to each soldier to be raped and then killed (often with breasts cut, vagina stabbed, and womb taken out by shining bayonets in a masochist pleasure) since dead people could not talk. I heard from the Korean comfort woman that did a presentation at Yale that when the sex slaves got seriously ill from sexual abuse, they were left to rot and die in the same room where the dead bodies of Japanese soldiers were placed. If the women had not died at the time of the burial, they were buried half-alive. I realize that there was some peer pressure among the Japanese soldiers and not doing this would be seen as a sign of weakness and disloyalty to the Emperor. And these soldiers, would-be average sons and husbands in peace times, were transformed by the morbidity of the war. But can someone tell me how to forgive and forget when the government of the perpetrators merely refers this as an incident and at the shrine where the war criminals are worshipped it is stated that Japan was innocently forced into the War under the tacit agreement with U.S. etc.? How can one trust the Japanese government when it approves history-whitewashing textbooks on the base of freedom of speech while “NHK TV network, after getting a high-level warning, preemptively cut short a program on comfort women that laid blame on the emperor”? How can anyone be convinced that Japan’s current bid for Security Council seat is solely for peace when claiming on some occasions to this day that Japan’s occupation of China and other countries was for the prosperity and peace of East Asia, even if peace is indeed the only thing on its mind now?!
China in its contemporary history has been invaded and colonized by many countries, but why don’t Chinese protest against everyone? It still comes down to the attitude of being honest about the history. Chinese people are not violent by nature and nobody LOVES to be angry. China’s anti-Japanese Right Wing SENTIMENTS are totally justified. Some of my friends participated in the protests in Shanghai the past weekend though the government asked them to stay calm at home and let the problems be solved by diplomatic means. The atmosphere of unity and patriotism of the protest, according to them, was very moving especially when Shanghainese are stereotypically viewed as indifferent to politics. Bottle-throwing and window-smashing did occur, but in terms of proportion, it was in the minority. Not all protesters were approving of this violence. There were protesters who stayed behind to clean up the mess after the crowd. Again, Chinese people may be controlled by the government, but are not non-thinking (and violent) puppets that can be so easily manipulated in such great number. To dismiss all this genuine feeling as the result of a political game is comparable to saying that the American patriotism is the very result of Bush cashing on 9-11 and diverting attention from the economic recession and huge deficits during his presidency. I don’t like Bush but I don’t think he is that bad. And who can be so sure to claim that one is totally free from government (and religious) propaganda?
I am aware that there are things that the Chinese textbooks were ambiguous about, such as its war with India and Viet Nam, which is not right, either. But it did say the Great Leap, the Famine and Cultural Revolution under the Communist rule were huge mistakes and disastrous---contrary to some reporters’ assertion without even touching the textbooks ---I did grow up with these textbooks. And again, two wrongs don’t make a right. Such media should be ashamed, very ashamed to see their failure to make objective judgment and apply consistent standards. Simply poor journalism.
I agree that China does not have a whole lot of press freedom. There are a lot of things not told to the public. That’s wrong. And here, the press distorts and misleads the public, which is already ignorant and self-centered enough in certain sense. I don’t know which is worse. Or is it a fact known to all and I haven’t been smart enough to see this till now? When Rumsfeld commented China was a country ''we hope and pray enters the civilized world in an orderly way", I was wondering where/what exactly is this civilized world for China, a country of one of the longest histories, to enter.
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However, on a second thought, Japan’s bid for a seat in the Security Council may not be such a big deal. U.S. can go to Iraq war without UN authorization. Sudan can continue its ethnic cleansing disregarding UN warnings. Kofi Annan has a son in the Iraq Oil for Food program scandal. And then U.S. suddenly got quiet insisting on his resignation. Only idiots would believe his son didn’t get the position and network without his dad’s influence in the first place. UN official sexual harassment. UN peace-keeping force rape. What’s the use and “moral status” of UN anyway?! I was occasionally questioning myself whether declining the UNDP Leadership program offer was wise for a while. But now I think I made the right choice for not going to a morally-degraded and organizationally collapsing bureaucracy. Any country that wants a seat of SC should be granted such wish. It is not of much use anyway except projecting an image of allegedly higher status and greater importance in the so-called system of international relations. ?Alright, for this paragraph, I’m getting overly sarcastic, not there yet.
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