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Viewpoints Chinese hooligans, Japanese rapists, American bigots
Viewpoints Chinese hooligans, Japanese rapists, American bigots | Chinese hooligans, Japanese rapists, American bigots |
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I am outraged every time I read another op-ed from some know-it-all
American commentator that the recent anti-Japanese hate riots in
China were "scripted" merely to suit the Chinese government's
political agenda. That the Japanese are scapegoats of the Chinese
people who will jump on any excuse to go wild on the streets. That
war crimes and history books are "so many fig leaves". American
bigotry knows no bounds.
Yes, we know that China vs Japan today and in the future has a lot more at stake than simply patching up raw scars from the past, as Taiwan and the United Nations Security Council will attest. But reducing all Chinese demonstrators to puppet agitators and trigger-happy Japan-bashing hooligans is condescending, patronising, contemptuous and flagrantly ignorant. One wonders aloud if Mr. Washington Post has ever set foot on continental China himself. I only lived in Beijing for two years and in Hong Kong for two more, but even during that time in the capital - years before the riots - I witnessed first-hand, on several accounts, normally light-hearted people tensing up, calm and rational individuals transformed into raging bulls at the most casual mention of Japan in an admirative tone. Be it the traditional humiliation of the offended, the rage of resentment for a neighbouring first-world nation, the jealousy of economic success and cultural influence, there is no denying the emotional repercussions of the massacre, the torture, the sexual enslavement and the Rape of Nanking. Female survivors live to tell the many tales, half-Japanese children of rape are alive and ostracised, and among those who stormed the streets in Shanghai were also the grandchildren of those victims who were silenced by unspeakably violent deaths. To paraphrase the view from Taiwan-biased Washington DC: "Those pathetic Chinese are so oppressed by the Communist state, they just can't resist the treat of being allowed to bash windows and scream bloody murder." To paraphrase a minority view from Hong Kong: "Those poor, stupid mainlanders are so repressed by Beijing they'll seize the opportunity to protest against anything, unlike we Hongkongers who have the freedom to mimic Americans." Yet some 4,000 Hong Kong people gathered one Sunday afternoon in Victoria Park - the same park where a public candlelight vigil continues to be held every June 4 since 1989 - before marching peacefully to demand a concrete apology from Japan and to protest against its permanent seat on the UN Security Council. Many more letters to the editors of the local press express clear solidarity with their northern compatriots. America's own elected President Without A Passport (see The World According to Bush, rigorously more convincing than Fahrenheit 9/11) is the ugliest of the ignorant, and he puts all pot-melted Americans to shame. Believing that the riots were provoked by the government not only insults the protestors, it denies the real human pain that millions of Chinese people, plus several hundred thousand women, not only in China, but also in Korea, the Philippines, Indonesia and other Southeast Asian countries, suffered directly from the Japanese Imperial Army only 60 years ago. Not to mention the real fear that Japan will rekindle its imperial ambitions given the military opportunity, since, although its leaders may have recited oral apologies, the country has never to this day demonstrated any concrete signs of remorse or self-reflection. Deep-rooted Chinese hatred of Japan(ese), whether justified or not, is very much alive and real. The bigoted conspiracy theory of US propaganda says the poor things just don't know any better. Please don't believe it. CF
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