China Bans Game Recognizing Taiwan Independence 892
OhioJoe writes "MSNBC is reporting that China has banned a soccer game that depicts Taiwan as independent. Violators are threatened with $1200 fines. From the article: "The game, 'Soccer Manager 2005', contained content that harmed China's sovereignty and territorial integrity and violated Chinese law, the Xinhua news agency reported on Tuesday."
New Section Please (Score:2, Funny)
Thanks.
Re:New Section Please (Score:4, Insightful)
There are whole chunks of real estate that once was owned/ruled by a different government. So just because it once was, doesn't mean squat now. Or else we have to give back the Americas to England, France, Spain, Portugual, Russia... not to mention the Native American Indians, Most of Europe would revert to some one else as would just about every other square inch on this planet that a previous landlord wanted to collect the rent on again.
Re:New Section Please (Score:3, Insightful)
I can't say the results have been that great. It's pretty much at the center of the division between the arab world and the west.
The same wonderful type of real estate planning caused the conflict with possesion of Kashmir between India and Pakistan.
Ah nothing like the break up of the Engl
hmm (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:hmm (Score:5, Funny)
The makers should code in a new soccer team... (Score:5, Funny)
Huh? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Huh? (Score:3, Insightful)
The article answered that quite nicely. China's government is very sensitive about territorial issues.
Re:Huh? (Score:5, Insightful)
Are they really that incapable of being exposed to a different view of the world? It's not like a stupid video game representing Taiwan as its own country is going to make China break up or something. Taiwan really *is* an independent country, whether the People's Republic of China likes it or not. These are the realities people: stop sticking your heads in the sand.
I hate the stupid ultrasensitive crap that some governments (or even societies) get all upset about. Pretty much every country has some minor stupid thing they get all uptight about.
Argentina get all pissy about the Falkland Islands, which are hardly worth the trouble.
The United States seems to spit fire if anyone talks about it stifling democracy in other countries or waging war for reasons other than "freedom", or burning flags (which causes harm to so many people!).
India and Pakistan stop thinking rationally every time the subject of Kashmir comes up.
Turkey frothes at the mouth every time the Kurds are mentioned.
Some things just aren't as important as people seem to think they are. It's time to grow up, it's time to calm down.
Re:Huh? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Huh? (Score:5, Insightful)
As soon as Taiwan's President can say that without being attacked by the mainland, you'll be right.
Re:Huh? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Huh? (Score:4, Insightful)
Uh . . . in a word, "No."
It could perhaps be said that Taiwan is de facto independent, but not truly independent. Taiwan has never declared its independence from China; only 4 countries in the world recognize the Taiwanese government (officially . . . try to find the Taiwanese embassy in the US. It doesn't exist. There is an unofficial non-profit that represents Taiwan in the US, but it is not a recognized diplomatic mission). Taiwan has no seat in the UN.
However, Taiwan has its own currency, government, military, and trade relationships . . . and a defense treaty with the USA.
Taiwan is in limbo . . . somewhere between independence and subjagation . . . with between 200 and 300 missles pointed at it from the other side of the Taiwan strait.
Re:Huh? (Score:5, Insightful)
and on that note, a word of advice to any foreigners enjoying themselves in a pub in downtown London (with too much to drink):
It's a bad idea to suggest to a crowd of Brits that England should just get the hell out of Ireland. I mean, why not make it simple and just let each country have their own island, right?
All joking aside, nobody found it funny and I was pushed down several times and nearly beaten up until the doorman pulled me out of there.
As an American, I really didn't realize that what I said would illicit such a violent response.
The following day, I asked some of my friends (and their parents) why it was such a sensitive issue, but they just rolled their eyes at me with disgust. Finally, google was my friend and I finally learned how deep into British culture this religious clash actually goes. Scary.
Re:Huh? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Huh? (Score:4, Interesting)
While you're not entirely wrong, as an American you are really really not allowed to say this. Why? Cos Americans funded a lot of terrorism against the British mainland (NORAID) and we really haven't forgiven a lot of you for that. And in the current climate with America being all "ooh terrorists are threatening us, we must pin down the whole world", we're just not in the mood for that talk coming from you, ok? Particularly when all protestations to your government to cease funding the IRA was met with a deaf ear.
Think what your reaction would be if someone in a bar suggested that the middle east was none of your business and you deserved the Sept 11 attack for interfering in other people's business.
Re:Huh? (Score:3, Insightful)
I'm 23. I had nothing to do with funding Northern Ireland terrorists, and I wasn't in a position to do anything about it. So you're saying that if I were to express an unpopular opinion, it's all right if I'm physically attacked?
Essentially, you're saying that it's ok to physically beat someone up for expressing an unpopular opinion. From how it sounds, it seems like the parent was almost killed by a group of idiot Brits. That's just unacceptab
Re:Huh? (Score:3, Insightful)
No. I was only trying to explain why the reaction over here can be so extreme. Remember it was mostly London pubs in which those NORAID funded bombs went off. I should have pointed out that I don't hold such opinions myself.
From how it sounds, it seems like the parent was almost killed by a group of idiot Brits. That's just unacceptable. That's beyond unacceptable: it's reprehensible and inhuman.
Re:Huh? (Score:4, Insightful)
Yeah, that's what I read the first time. "... and therefore I think it's okay that you were beaten" is your own addition. Why don't you consider it to be an endorsement for his friends' mere eye rolling? Or why don't you consider it to be what it is: a statement about the emotion that underlies both reactions, shoving and eye-rolling.
I think this is a problem: people unable to differentiate between causes and justifications. Like discussing why insurgents are attacking us in Iraq, what their motivations are, without saying that the attacks are therefore good. Or saying that 9/11 was not some attack out of the blue in response to nothing, and yet still was an unjustifiable act of terrorism. This is the kind of nuance we need right now.
"There are rational reasons for this behavior" is not an endorsement of the behavior. Thinking otherwise is dangerous, because you're only recourse then is to consider any bad behaviors to be the result of insanity, with no cause that you can address. That's why the only thing we've come up with to address terrorism is: kill terrorists. That's all you've got, when there can be no underlying cause without justifying the effect.
Re:Huh? (Score:5, Funny)
Sometimes I think we need a powerful alien race to come over and set us straight. "Ok, Turkey and Iraq, you're splitting up. The Kurds have been more than patient, and will get their own country. No, you don't get any rights to their oil. China, shut up about Taiwan. You can't have it. And since you've been such a baby about it, you're losing Tibet as well. North Korea, your leader is a nut and is being committed to a mental institution. Time for you to find someone new. Make sure he isn't crazy this time or we'll be back. Zimbabwe, you need a new leader. India and Pakistan, this Kashmir thing is ridiculous. Here's the deal: everyone has to move out of it, to either India or Pakistan (their choice). Then, we're making it into a Park. No one can live there except rangers. Sri Lanka, you're splitting up. The Tamils get their own half of the island. And finally, United States, you're splitting up too. You're too powerful, and have been electing idiots lately. All the states west of New Mexico, including Alaska and Hawaii, and now a separate country. You east coast states will have to learn to get along without all of California's tax revenue, and without all the natural resources of the West. Plus, since Nevada is in the new country, they get to keep Area 51. You can keep the wrecked ship of ours that you found, but we want the bodies back."
Re:Huh? (Score:3, Funny)
Don't mention the war.
Re:Huh? (Score:4, Insightful)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Taiwan [wikipedia.org]
http://users2.ev1.net/~turton/history.html [ev1.net]
The Chinese Nationalists hardly "founded" the country of Taiwan... Invaded is more like it.
Re:Huh? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Huh? (Score:2)
What's retarded is that FIFA 2000 had Taiwan in it, too...I took them to the World Cup.
Re:Huh? (Score:2, Informative)
Because most of China's leaders keep legitimacy by maintaining that Taiwan is part of the China still. To lose Taiwan would almost certainly lead to a Communist over-throw in China.
Also, if Taiwan declares Independence the by-product would be war. Right now, China has an awful lot of weapons pointed at Taiwan and they have yearly drills on how to invade Taiwan.
So, the best thing for China and Taiwan is to maintain the status quo. Taiwa
Re:Huh? (Score:5, Insightful)
Excellent point.
Both of these regimes began as opposing sides in the Chinese civil war. From the point of view of the victors -- the government in Beijing -- Taiwan is a rebellious province occupied by the enemy in the waning days of that war. From the Taiwanese point of view, the Beijing government is illegitimate.
This just in.... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:This just in.... (Score:2)
Re:This just in.... (Score:2)
Apt error message ... (Score:2)
Yes, I can imagine that's what proprietors of Chinese franchises of EB Games [ebgames.com] will be saying when customers come inquiring for Soccer Manager 2005.
If you can't beat 'em in the real world... (Score:2, Funny)
Is nothing sacred? (Score:5, Funny)
And in related news... (Score:2, Insightful)
...UK doesn't ban a soccer game that shows England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland as separate entities...
Re:And in related news... (Score:2)
Hmmm... I could never see England banning a soccer game. Football maybe, but not soccer... And imaging the hooligans if England banned a football game?
Thanks for restoring my faith in the US govt (Score:2)
Thanks, China.
but great employees (Score:3, Insightful)
This is a surprise? (Score:5, Insightful)
blocks its citizens from portions of the internet at the national level, and brutally rolled over demonstrators in Tienaman (sp) square. What do you think they would go?
The worst part of the whole thing is that China is a capitalist's dream, cheap labor, who have no chance to redress grievances. No wonder we can't compete.
To those who say that economic capitalism leads to democracy, we'll just have to wait and see. I'm not holding my breath.
Re:This is a surprise? (Score:2)
Re:This is a surprise? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:This is a surprise? (Score:2)
Re:This is a surprise? (Score:3, Interesting)
This is a country with a modernizing government who has never recognized the breakaway rebellion in the Taiwanese province, who protects its citizens from superstition on the Intern
Re:This is a surprise? (Score:4, Interesting)
And China is far from sustainable: The pollution problems there are rampant and growing worse.
sigh (Score:5, Insightful)
Would you PLEASE, for the love of all that is good and holy, learn the freakin' difference between "communist" and "totalitarian".
A country can be communist AND totalitarian, but that doesn't make those two things interchangeable.
The worst part of the whole thing is that China is a capitalist's dream, cheap labor, who have no chance to redress grievances. No wonder we can't compete.
To those who say that economic capitalism leads to democracy, we'll just have to wait and see. I'm not holding my breath.
See, China is moving away from communism, but not from totalitarianism. You've noticed that capitalism doesn't magically bring about the end of totalitarian states: Please adjust your vocabulary accordingly.
Re:sigh (Score:3, Insightful)
Hold on. We have been fed this "communism" crap for around 60 years now, no need to get hostile over someone listening to the news and reading the newspaper for ones whole life filled with FUD and then expect informed opinions to be made.
Here in America, we have been taught that democracy == capitolism and that communism != democracy. Democracy == good, therefore communism !
Re:This is a surprise? (Score:3, Interesting)
> (sp) square
You know, I'm not very fond of China's Human Rights Record, but people need to stop citing this ad infinitum. The Chinese could just as well talk about how we killed our own citizens during the Kent State protests during the Vietnam war. The scale at Tiananmen square was clearly far larger; however, the protests were far larger as well (at their height, over a million people strong).
Furthermore, the Chinese did not "roll over" protesters
Re:This is a surprise? (Score:3, Funny)
The main song sung during the protests was "The Internationale"
I had to read that sentence 3 or 4 times before I stopped trying to interpret "main song sung" as a chinese name.
It's trivial, and somewhat silly, but it made that paragraph much harder to understand than it should have been : )
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Not the same (Score:3, Insightful)
I'd call that proportional overuse of force.
Comparing proportion is a bad metric. A few jackass yahoo National Guardsmen with itchy trigger fingers can kill 4 people in seconds without consent from their immediate superiors. Killing 3000 people takes planning and significant leadership coordination.
It's Just A Game (Score:2)
This isn't really suprising considering China's (belligerent) stance on anything and all things Taiwainese. Last weeks West Wing had a good example of these types of 'affronts' (although on a bigger scale) towards China regarding Taiwan.
Only in the US... (Score:2, Insightful)
Sigh. Only in America would someone reference a fictional TV show as a source of information on something like this.
Sorry (Score:4, Insightful)
Sorry, wrong. Practically every country in the world gets everything they know about the US from fictional TV programs. They see an episode of Cops or The Bachelor and then they think we are a brutal police state where everybody gets married on TV shows.
Anyways, back to topic, there's not much you can really make up about Chinese brutality and censorship because chances are they've done most all of it. Alas, the US just makes a better target for these totalitarian and ignorance jokes than China, regardless of reality.
China also jailing journalists. NYT (Score:4, Insightful)
China's Donkey Droppings
By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF
For the last century, the title of "most important place in the world" has belonged to the United States, but that role seems likely to shift in this century to China.
So what are China's new leaders, Hu Jintao and Wen Jiabao, really like? Are they visionaries who are presiding over the greatest explosion of wealth the world has ever known? Or are they ruthless thugs who persecute Christians, Falun Gong adherents, labor leaders and journalists in a desperate attempt to maintain their dictatorship?
There's some evidence for both propositions, and they are probably both true to some degree.
When Mr. Hu and Mr. Wen rose to the helm of the Communist Party two years ago, many Chinese hoped they would bring a new openness to a nation that is dynamic economically but stagnant intellectually. Instead, China has become more repressive.
The repression has now engulfed a member of The New York Times's family. Zhao Yan, a researcher for the Beijing bureau of The Times, has been detained by the authorities since September and is not allowed to communicate with his family or lawyers.
Mr. Zhao is accused of leaking state secrets, a very serious charge that could lead to a decade in prison. China's government may believe that he was behind the September scoop by The Times's Beijing bureau chief, Joseph Kahn, that China's former leader, Jiang Zemin, was about to retire from his last formal position.
While The Times's policy is, wisely, never to comment on the sources of articles, my own private digging indicates that Mr. Zhao was not the source for that scoop. He is innocent of everything except being a fine journalist who, before joining The Times, wrote important articles in the Chinese press about corruption.
(In fairness, sending journalists to prison for doing their job is not an exclusively Chinese phenomenon. Several American journalists - Jim Taricani of NBC, Judith Miller of this newspaper and Matthew Cooper of Time - may be sent to U.S. prisons in the next month or two for refusing to reveal their sources.)
Mr. Zhao's case is depressingly similar to that of another Chinese journalist, Jiang Weiping. He is serving a six-year sentence for "revealing state secrets," even though his real crime was exposing corruption.
"China has changed so much economically, but not politically," Jiang Weiping's wife, Li Yanling, told me. "It's a puzzle to me."
The authorities ordered Ms. Li to keep quiet about her husband's arrest, and detained her when she didn't. The couple's daughter, now 15, was traumatized at losing first her father and then her mother to the Chinese prison system. When Ms. Li was finally released, the daughter called her constantly from school to make sure that she had not been arrested again.
Mr. Zhao's arrest is just the latest in a broad crackdown in China. The Committee to Protect Journalists reports that 42 journalists are now in prison in China, more than in any other country.
"There was a period of openness, a period of hope, when the new leaders first came to power," said Jiao Guobiao, a journalism professor at Beijing University. "But now they've consolidated power, and everything has closed up again."
Mr. Jiao should know. He wrote an essay this year denouncing censorship, and it was immediately censored. Now the government has banned Mr. Jiao from teaching.
I've felt this cooling as well. I was planning to visit China this month, but the government has declined to give me a visa. It's the first time I've been refused, and the State Security Ministry may have worried that I would write a column about its unjust imprisonment of Mr. Zhao.
I love China, and I share its officials' distaste for those who harm it. That's why I'm angry that hard-liners in Beijing are presenting China to the world as repressive, fragile, ty
Re:China also jailing journalists. NYT (Score:2)
>
> Otherwise, all that dazzle is just a mirage. The Chinese leaders might recall an old peasant expression, "Lu fen dan'r, biaomian'r guang." It means, "On the outside, even donkey droppings gleam."
So, um, you really can polish a turd?
This is actually quite common (Score:5, Interesting)
They'll probably just release an updated version of the game without Taiwan and move along.
Re:This is actually quite common (Score:2)
And what rock were you living under that you didn't see anything about the Kashmir until the 90's? The dispute over the Kashmir between Pakistan and India has been ongoing since 1947, two years before the US helped Kuomintang refugees set themselves up as an independent state.
In other news... (Score:3, Funny)
War on China (Score:5, Insightful)
Please remind why America is not at war with China? My knowledge on this subject is limited, but my checklist (based on the precedent set by the "justifications" for the war on Iraq) suggests that they should be:
(X) Totalitarian government
(X) Autocracy government
(X) Possesses Weapons of Mass Destruction
(X) No human rights
(X) Unstable, Irresponsible leadership
(X) Inhumane treatment of its people
(X) Government oppression and censorship
If these are the valid reasons, could someone please explain why America is not at war with China?
Re:War on China (Score:2)
Re:War on China (Score:2)
Re:War on China (Score:3, Insightful)
Because they:
(X) Possess Nuclear Weapons
(X) Possess Largest Army on the Earth
Come on, even Dubya isn't that stupid!
Re:War on China (Score:2)
Re:War on China (Score:2)
Re:War on China (Score:3, Interesting)
Pick one:
On the other hand, Japan would likely be one of the first countries to sign up as a US ally!
Re:War on China (Score:2)
(_) Odds favourable of having fewer foreign civilians unjustly die in a war versus deaths under the status quo.
(_) Economic opportunity cost of fighting for someone else's freedoms (Will the economic cost of fighting the war be disproportionate to the economic gains as well as the amount of freedom/justice acquired by the foreign citizens vs status quo)
(_) Human/freedom opportunity cost of fighting for someone else's freedoms (Will the number of our deaths be disproportionat
Answers (Score:5, Insightful)
(X) Possesses 200 Million Man Army
(X) Possesses Cheap/Slave Labor
Re:War on China (Score:3, Interesting)
Why do Germany and France want to drop all economic sanctions with this country?
We can't go it alone with China. We'd need Russia and Europe in on this, and they'd never help. They're all getting fat rich off that dictatorship.
Re:War on China (Score:3, Funny)
Because you forget the unspoken checklist:
( ) Has gigantic oil reserves.
( ) Its leader has been used as a villain in movies for years.
( ) Has a weakened national defense, making it easy prey.
( ) Has been inspected and proven free of actual weapons of mass destructions.
( ) Its generals are easy to bribe, will surrender without too much trouble.
( ) Can be used as a strategic military foothold in the region.
Re:War on China (Score:5, Informative)
My ex-girlfriend was Chinese. There were some interesting things that came out of that:
Re:War on China (Score:2)
I avoided expressing my own opinion, since I thought that would get me modded troll[1], I was more interested in other slashdotters views on the topic in general.
[1] = As it turns out it got modded troll anyway.
Re:War on China (Score:2)
Maybe the simplest reason for not going to war with China is that without Chinese goods we wouldnt have anything to fight with. "
Are you talking about war or a video game??
If china can do it (Score:3, Funny)
Re:If china can do it (Score:2)
Funny (Score:3, Insightful)
Oh, the irony. (Score:3, Funny)
not surprising at all (Score:2, Insightful)
Now, if one can not produce material like that for export, how can one dare to sell this on the Chinese domestic market?
From the Article (Score:2, Funny)
Regardless of the state of Taiwan's independence, it looks like that the game is indeed geographically incorrect. Hong Kong and Macau are both officially part of China. This would be similar to a game depicting Texas as its own co
Re:From the Article (Score:3, Informative)
Tibet is also officially part of China -- and so is Taiwan in the official opinion of many countries.
This is why Windows went from 'country' to 'region' in all it's i8n settings.
Remember this (Score:2, Interesting)
We the People have more power than many of the more hysterical among us admit. The Chinese people have far less than most of us who grew up in th
Thugs have no sense of humor. (Score:2)
I don't think this tells us anything about China's government that we didn't already know.
Different approach (Score:5, Insightful)
There is a lot of ignorance here about the difference between the Chinese and Western ways of defining, and thus changing, reality.
If a Western government banned a game or a particular statement, it would be a move against that particular game or statement. When the Chinese government does it, it's one tiny part of the general full-time business of defining the version of reality they want to be percieved (and which is percieved) as the canonical Chinese one.
China is a large country, containing large areas which were not China until quite recently and still have major anti-Chinese native populations, and large areas whose interests conflict with each other and with Beijing's interests. The Chinese machine -- 'leadership' is the wrong word because it is a culture-wide effort -- has therefore always worked hard to promote a unified pro-Chinese vision in which the answer to the questions 'Should we not be part of China? Can China do bad?' is an automatic, instinctive 'no', so automatic that the question cannot really be asked at all.
If you want to get a feel for this, try reading XinHua in parallel with your other news sources. At first you will note differences here and there but over time you will come to see two different, parallel world histories going on; the XinHua one and the 'real' one.
But the true effect is only achieved when the whole dialectic of discussion at all levels, not just of government-controlled news sources, assumes the artificial reality, and this effect has been achieved brilliantly -- although lately they have been resorting to extreme nationalism to keep it up. The abuse of foreign soccer teams, the constant rehearsing of Japanese, British and French crimes in schools, the scholarly books on how Tibet and Goguryeo (google it, I don't know the right romanization though) and this and that bit of India have been stolen away by evil foreign interests but have been returned to China by the force of truth and sincerity -- it's all part of one absolutely brilliant concerted effort of which the banning of this game is a tiny, tiny, tiny, part.
I think the creation of not merely a new Chinese history but a whole Chinese reality, basically in 5 short decades, is probably the greatest cultural achievement of the previous century.
Or not.
"Recognizing"? (Score:2)
a few years back, a coworker of mine, doing a database project containing short and long form country names, called the Taiwanese cons
freakin' video games (Score:2)
IBM (Score:3, Funny)
Hm... (Score:2)
firefox crash (Score:2)
Free Software too.. (Score:4, Informative)
Herbert Xu, a Debian Developer and maintainer of the Debian Linux Kernel package, resigned from Debian in May 2004 due to a dispute over the use of a Taiwanese flag.
Resignation on debian-boot with references to context [debian.org]
start of thread on debian-devel [debian.org]
-molo
Game has flaws too (Score:4, Interesting)
However, this game has a number of errors. I quote from the article:Get real. Macau and Hong Kong are not independent countries, and Tibet hasn't been one for fifty years. The only country there that has some international standing is Taiwan, and that's by virtue of the United States assistance. This game is another case of designers that didn't bother to check their facts, or were intentionally trying to piss of the People's Republic of China. If China wouldn't ban it based on Taiwan, your damned right they'd ban it based on Tibet, and probably just laugh at the notion of an independent Macau. I am certainly not endorsing the actions of China, and regard the invasion of Tibet as a travesty, but sometimes people have to respect political realities.
Re:So many peanuts, so little gallery. (Score:5, Interesting)
I would think that if they had any power to do so, slashdot would *definately* be one of the sites they would block. Way too many opinions that conflict with the official CN views.
Single handidly working to get /. banned in China (Score:5, Funny)
That should pretty much put an end to slashdot's Chinese readership. If a revolution starts in China tomorow, I get credit for starting it!
Re:Single handidly working to get /. banned in Chi (Score:3, Insightful)
At least half of that statement could describe most governments of the world. Which half is left to the reader to decide.
Re:So many peanuts, so little gallery. (Score:3, Informative)
I've been unable to pull up the English version for the past two weeks whereever I've tried. It either redirects to the Chinese version or just fails.
Re:So many peanuts, so little gallery. (Score:4, Insightful)
Which hostility is that?
The Taiwanese aren't hostile towards China, though they are threatened by it.
Many of the city folk came over from the mainland with Chang Kai Shek in the late '40s, and don't like the government on the other side of the straights. Many of the earlier immigrants resented the newcomers, particularly since they behaved like bandit warlords in their first few years on Taiwan. There's a new generation running the show now, and most of those old strains are gone.
The Taiwanese seem to be slowly realising that culture and nationality are separable; thus the independence movement. Someday, maybe, they'll have that same epiphany about culture and nationality and race. The Mainlander government still doesn't distinguish between culture, race and nationality. More to the point, they need an external enemy on which to focus their populace's hatred and discontent. Separatists in Taiwan serve that purpose wonderfully.
A friend of mine who teaches in a military college in Taiwan says that the tensions between the two countries will die out with the passing of the current old guard, in about 20 years. I guess that assumes that they don't go to war in the mean time.
As for the other side of the straights, I'm sure that the people believe whatever they hear on their radio and TV. If their government believes that they need to channel some public dis-satisfaction into a harmless-to-the-government direction, the people of the Mainland will hate the Taiwanese for a few weeks. The rest of the time, if they think about Taiwan at all, they're probably scheming how to get across the straights and blend in.
Re:So many peanuts, so little gallery. (Score:5, Informative)
Westerners really don't understand the Chinese mentality. Chinese thinking is cyclical and long-term. As the famous line in Three Kingdoms goes,
"Domains under heaven, after a long period of union, tends to divide; after a long period of division, tends to unite." Division and reunification are important elements of how Chinese believe the world works. Many Chinese don't see the current situation in terms of the present, they take the long-term view which for Chinese is that the Han Chinese on Taiwan will eventully be reunited with China because that's how it has always worked in the past. It is true that many times splinter kingdoms of Han Chinese have broken off and were reunited by military force. Anyway, the point is the Chinese on the mainland think that reunification is inevitable. It might not happen soon but it will happen. This puts a cramp on negotiations as you can imagine. The most important thing to remember is that Chinese often see present events as filtered through thousands of years of Chinese imperial history.
The second thing is that to Chinese division is seen as bad and unification is good. (I suspect this comes from the misery of multiple civil wars). Hence there are strong elements of "using force for their (the Taiwanese) own good". There is a strong belief amognst mainland Chinese that the reunification of Taiwan with China will actually *benefit* the Taiwanese because the horrible division will be healed and the Han Chinese can act together as one unit to take on the world stronger than ever, together. They will cite China's growing economic and military power as signs of how the Taiwanese will benefit with joining with China. There is a belief that most Taiwanese support reunification and it is interference of a few mischief makers and US interference that is stopping the masses in Taiwan from joing with China. They take me aside and tell me that patriots in Taiwan are stealing technology secrets and passing them to China as a sign of their loyalty. A similar but different attitude can be seen in regards to places like Tibet. It is believed that before the Chinese takeover, the people of Tibet where barbaric savages living horrible miserable little lives where they are starving and oppressed. Now the Chinese government is taking over, the wonders of Chinese civilisation is being brought to them and they are now becoming educated civilised people who are capable of living in the modern world and are much happier than they were before.
Now before you laugh at this, please compare the Chinese attitude to the US attitude to Iraq.
As for Tiannamen. Many Chinese believe that the government was right in doing what they did. The students were threatening to bring down the government and hence in the interests of stability the government had to act to ensure that the country remained intact. The students were no more than a filthy band of rebels who were trying to take power as has happened many times in Chinese history. It's sad that the Chinese government had to use force but really the students' brought it on themselves.
There is really very little support for Communism BTW. Most of the support is based on (1) Nationalism (2) Paranoia towards the west derived from Western colonialism in the 19th century (3) Traditional Chinese political values and Confucian principles and (4) Desire for a stable government for peace and prosperity. I sense very little desire for democracy and freedom. As I have been asked, "What will democracy do for us?"
I am an student from China (Score:5, Interesting)
It is kind emotional unacceptable to claim Taiwan an independent country. My grandfather resisted Japanese invasion when he was young. Several of his brothers died during that war. My roommate's grandfather was born in Taiwan, fought with Japanese in Taiwan during the 1930's and 1940's. At last, we got Taiwan back after we beat the Japanese in WWII. And now some of the Taiwan politicians claim they are Japanese and claim Taiwan an independent country. It's outrageous.
We Chinese are peace people. We don't have too much ambitious. We enjoy our food and tea. But we don't like Japanese grab our land, or some "want to be Japanese".
I am not a communist, I don't like communism, we Chinese people don't talk about it much anymore, though US government classify China as a communism country. But I love my country, my nation, just as you guys love yours. I won't allow my country broken. We won't, just like US won't allow the southern separate from the Union, and Canada won't allow Quebec claim independence.
There is always culture difference between portions of a country, but this doesn't mean the country should be broke into parts.
As the presidency of Taiwan, Jacky Chan said my words, "the biggest joke in the world." [google.com]
Re:I am an student from China (Score:3, Interesting)
Come on . . . that was taken out of context and you know it. The presidency of Taiwan was not what Jackie Chan was referring to. He was referring to the presidential election process during the last election. After the results were announced the losing major opposition party appealed to the Taiwanese Constitutional court to nullify the election because of alleged impropriety. I was in Taiwan during this time.
This is n
Re:I am an student from China (Score:3, Insightful)
On Taiwan, the best would be to let the taiwanese decide. But China would't allow it, since it actually stands to loose.
Re:I am an student from China (Score:4, Interesting)
There are quite a few things I would like to address here. First off, my family has been in Taiwan for more generations than we can count. My grandmother lived under the Japanese rule when she was younger and she has told us many stories from that time. In fact, as many older Taiwanese people are now coming out to say, the Japanese treated us fairly and equally in almost everything. They were willing to provide education to the mass, allowed us to run our own business and even help the economy as long as they were respected as the government. They were not oppressive but rather taught the Taiwanese to embrace our own identity as well as theirs. The only thing they prevented us from was the government. As far as I can tell, you know nothing about the way the Japanese people treated the Taiwanese. Additionally, no one is claiming to be "Japanese" in Taiwan. We are not "Chinese." We are not "Japanese." We are Taiwanese.
Secondly, the Chinese government had long lost control of Taiwan, even before WWII. The native Taiwanese can not even recall the last time China had any established governing power in Taiwan. We remember the Dutch; we remember the Spaniards; we remember the Japanese. But as far as the native Taiwanese are concerned, we did not have any long standing ties to mainland China before Chiang Kai-Shek and his party came over. Even then, we only embraced them because they looked like us and spoke our language. They were "our" people. The newcomers claimed that the Japanese were evil when in reality, they were worse than the previous government. They depreciated OUR currencies against their own and sent our population into poverty, simply so they could be rich with what little they came over with. They killed our educated people. They suppressed the voices that questioned them. They changed everything to their advantage. They took our land, took our money, confiscated our wealth and intimidated us by force. And now we realize that half the people that came over weren't even educated or skilled in anything. It is only recently that people are speaking up. Before this past decade, we lived in fear of being taken and killed in the middle of the night. Because of this, we are acknowledging that the Japanese were better than the so-called fellow "Chinese."
Don't you dare equate this situation to that of the US Civil War or Quebec separating from Canada. If anything, this resembles the American Revolution. (I am very knowledgeable of American history.) The Taiwanese are nothing like the mainland Chinese in culture or thoughts. And don't you dare claim that we are the "same" people. If that is the case, then Singapore should also be part of China.... In fact, didn't all of eastern Asia come from China? That means the Japanese, Koreans, Thais, Vietnamese, etc. are all "Chinese" too.
As for Jackie Chan's statement... why doesn't he take a look at the American election and call it a joke? At least the Taiwanese president won by majority. In fact, has Jackie Chan listened to the voices of the his fellow people in Hong Kong who are protesting against the Chinese government and in support of Taiwanese independence?
Re:olympics '08 (Score:2)
I think they ran over all of the dissenters with tanks.
Re:This is the China (Score:3, Informative)
Re:"Self hating whites?" (Score:3, Informative)
Back in the 1780's, the slave and "free" states were roughly evenly divided. But by the 1850's, the slave states were significantly outnumbered by the states that had banned slavery. The southern states were demanding a limite