Harbin [St. Sophia Cathedral], by Xiquinho Silva (CC BY 2.0)
source https://chinadigitaltimes.net/2022/12/photo-harbin-st-sophia-cathedral-by-xiquinho-silva/
Friday 30 December 2022
Photo: Harbin [St. Sophia Cathedral], by Xiquinho Silva
source https://chinadigitaltimes.net/2022/12/photo-harbin-st-sophia-cathedral-by-xiquinho-silva/
The Clash of the 2022 Year-End Retrospectives
Recent year-end retrospectives and New Year’s messages published by various Chinese media outlets—including People’s Daily, Xinhua, Southern Weekly, and NetEase News—have offered vastly different interpretations of 2022, the year that was. The stark contrast between these retrospectives has inspired criticism and hilarity among Chinese netizens, with some members of the public offering up alternative lists of the key events and catchwords of the past year.
The battle of the retrospectives kicked off on December 24, when the People’s Daily official Weibo account launched the hashtag #12SentencesRecollecting2022 (#12句话记住2022), accompanied by a list of twelve sentences selected by the People’s Daily editorial team to illustrate the motto, “The Journey We Shared in 2022.” The messages from each month were uniformly positive, reinforcing a form of “correct collective memory” of the year: “February: The Beijing Olympics and Paralympics—together for a shared future!” and “May: Create a youthful China with youthful me!” and “July: Wishing Hong Kong a brighter tomorrow!” Many readers noted that there was nary a mention of any of the suffering and setbacks that marked 2022: not Shanghai’s city-wide lockdown or the banned “Voices of April,” nor increasing repression and censorship in mainland China and Hong Kong, nor high youth unemployment rates and stagnant economic activity due to extended lockdowns. CDT editors have archived and translated some of the comments about the 12 sentences offered up by the People’s Daily:
来的饭饭：What kind of imaginary peaceful age are you playacting in?
五九______：It’s like we’re living in two different worlds.
静静的举铁：See the comments section for the real 2022.
Achmatowiczzzz：What I want to say takes far more than 12 sentences. And every word weeps blood. [Chinese]
Other visitors to the comments section took it upon themselves to help out by adding their own “personal incorrect memories” to the list:
Okra不ok：“We’re the last generation.”
你好请打钱lIllIllllI：“This world doesn’t want me!”
瓶装焰火：“Stolen glee.”
Fae·yaa：“Their ability to save themselves was weak.”
用户Gongshu：“His son is his Achilles heel.”
旋转滴晴天：We’ll never forget “malicious homecomings.”
骜鳌螯：“Tangshan’s ‘Operation Thunder’ has come to a successful conclusion.” [Chinese]
On December 28, the Southern Weekly published its customary New Year’s message, employing rousingly poetic language, and striking a more realistic balance of the positives and negatives. While acknowledging that 2022 had been a difficult year and that great challenges remain, it urged readers to have faith, tenacity, and the courage to rebuild and to continue to engage with the world and its eight billion people.
Even more striking was the “NetEase News 2022 Year in Review” video, which featured this text: “We accept reality too easily because reality is often so inauthentic. But we shouldn’t close the book on 2022, not like this—life is a garden with many divergent paths.” The video included clips about the chaotic pandemic lockdowns in Shanghai, Xi’an, and other cities; the woman kept chained up by her husband in Fengxian; the brutal assault of four women at a BBQ restaurant in Tangshan; the crash of China Eastern Airlines flight MU5735; the recent deadly fire in Urumqi, Xinjiang; and some stories of job losses and economic hardship. There was also a section about major public figures who died in 2022, such as former Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev, Queen Elizabeth II of England, former Chinese leader and CCP Chairman Jiang Zemin, and Ni Kuang, a well-known Hong Kong novelist and screenwriter. The NetEase video caught the attention of censors and was quickly taken offline, but it was widely shared and reposted by netizens who attempted to preserve it. CDT Chinese editors have archived the NetEase video, and compiled a selection of comments on and reactions to it:
@直物桃: I teared up watching “NetEase News Year in Review,” but in the so-called real world, [content like this] is always 404’d [deleted].
@duanaaaaa : So why is that if you speak the truth, you’ll be hunted and taken down across the whole internet?
@Watermelooow: It’s not even expressing an opinion, just listing factual news events.
@白子画: “NetEase News Year in Review” was fairly restrained, and it still got censored? It didn’t even mention Foxconn, or those bank depositors [in Henan]. [Chinese]
Finally, on December 30, China’s state news agency Xinhua weighed in with a list of the “Top 10 Domestic News Stories of 2022.” True to form, Xinhua presented a hagiographic list of events that the CCP might consider major accomplishments—the 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing, the 25th anniversary of Hong Kong’s return to the motherland, the resolute “smashing” of Taiwanese independence sentiment, Xi Jinping’s attendance at the G20 Summit, China’s space station construction, and the CCP’s 20th National Party Congress—but there was little mention of the events and challenges that affected the lives of ordinary Chinese people during 2022.
Year-end/new year message of three distinct styles, from three outlets: Xinhua, NFZM(Southern Weekly), and Netease News
What you've been told
v
What you wished for
v
What you actually experienced pic.twitter.com/ziEcUhyvyS— CD:DC:// (@lichtspektrum) December 30, 2022
source https://chinadigitaltimes.net/2022/12/the-clash-of-the-2022-year-end-retrospectives/
Thursday 29 December 2022
Saturday 24 December 2022
Voices of Protest: “If Not for the People, Where Would You Be?”
“Voices of Protest” is a special edition of CDT’s monthly “Voices of…” video series. This 15-minute video is a compilation of video footage, images, and audio from the large, spontaneous public protests that broke out in a number of Chinese cities in late November and early December of 2022, and the transnational protest momentum that continues even today.
On October 13, on the eve of the Chinese Communist Party’s 20th Party Congress, a man named Peng Lifa (also known as Peng Zaizhou online) held a solitary protest at Beijing’s Sitong Bridge in which he displayed banners calling for elections, political reform, an end to arbitrary COVID lockdowns, and for Xi Jinping to step down. News about the protest was heavily censored on the Chinese internet and on Chinese social media. Peng was later arrested and his whereabouts remain unknown, but his daring protest ignited undercurrents of dissatisfaction with both China’s COVID policy and Xi Jinping’s unchecked rule, leading supporters to publicize Peng’s demands by creating posters and placing handwritten protest slogans in public toilets and other public areas.
When a deadly fire broke out on November 24 in a residential complex in Urumqi, Xinjiang, the death toll was amplified by the fact that firefighters were prevented from reaching the building due to COVID barricades and stalled cars (that had been sitting, undriven, during over three months of lockdowns). For many Chinese citizens who had suffered under interminable lockdowns, the fire was the last straw: spontaneous public memorials to mourn the victims of the fire quickly turned to broader expressions of dissatisfaction with government policy. Heavy-handed police suppression of the memorial gatherings only served to fuel the protests. Many overseas Chinese and Chinese students studying abroad held demonstrations in support of the mainland protesters, and began to explore new ways to incorporate diversity and address the mistreatment of Uyghurs and other communities at the hands of the Chinese state.
Based on statistics compiled thus far, there have been public protests in at least 21 provinces in China, drawing large crowds of demonstrators in cities such as Urumqi, Shanghai, Beijing, Wuhan, Chengdu, Guangzhou, and Hangzhou. Students have held protests at more than 50 colleges and universities. Demonstrations of support by overseas Chinese residents and Chinese exchange students have taken place in London, Paris, Toronto, New York, Berkeley, and many other locations.
While the Chinese government attempts to elide the very real issues underlying the protests by deflecting blame onto “hostile foreign forces” and other straw men, the spirit of the protests lives on—not only in the slogans, artwork, poetry, videos, and songs, but also in the heightened awareness and forged connections that link a diverse group of protesters with the confidence to voice their demands, and the compassion to listen to the experiences of others.
“Voices of Protest” is a tribute to them all. The translated transcript of the video appears below:
November 24, 2022
After a deadly fire in a residential building in Urumqi, Xinjiang, spontaneous protests on a scale rarely seen in mainland China erupted in Shanghai, Beijing, Chengdu, Guangzhou, and other cities.
Students from the Nanjing Institute of Communication, Peking University, Tsinghua University, and other Chinese universities held on-campus protests. They were soon joined by a wave of demonstrations held in solidarity by overseas Chinese residents and overseas Chinese exchange students.
[Footage of a brief portion of Xi Jinping’s two-hour speech at the 20th Party Congress in Beijing on October 15, 2022]:
In responding to the sudden outbreak of Covid-19, we put the people and their lives above all else, […] and tenaciously pursued a dynamic zero-Covid policy. In launching an all-out people’s war to stop the spread of the virus […]
Title: “Voices of Protest”
Background music: protest song “If You Won’t Take the Lead”
If you won’t take the lead, please join the crowd
If you won’t join the crowd, please take our side
If you won’t take our side, please shout online
If you won’t shout online, please close your eyes,
Sit back and enjoy the rights we’ve earned for you
But don’t mock us, or turn a blind eye
Because the sunlight we fought for and won
belongs to everyone
October 13, 2022
After the protest on Beijing’s Sitong Bridge, Chinese students at home and abroad expressed their support.
[Photos of protest banners hung from Sitong Bridge. The banners read: “We want food, not COVID tests; reform, not Cultural Revolution. We want freedom, not lockdowns; elections, not rulers. We want dignity, not lies. To be citizens, not slaves,” and “Boycott classes. Boycott work. Depose the traitorous despot Xi Jinping.”]
[Photos of handwritten protest slogans reproduced on walls, doors, and in public toilets]
[Photo collage of protest posters and flyers from various universities around the world]
November 25, 2022
Residents in Urumqi, Xinjiang, took to the streets to demand an end to the lockdown.
Residents shouting: End the lockdown! End the lockdown!
November 26, 2022
A female student at the Nanjing Institute of Communication protested by standing silently and holding a blank sheet of paper. After a man came up and confiscated her paper, she continued standing in silence, empty-handed.
Observer: Why did you take her piece of paper?
Man: What power does a blank piece of paper have?
Observer: Exactly, so why did you confiscate it?
November 26, 2022
The woman’s fellow students at the Nanjing Institute of Communication held a demonstration in support of her “blank paper protest,” and shouted the slogans: “Long live the People! Rest in peace!”
November 26, 2022
Students from the Xi’an Academy of Fine Arts held a demonstration to protest the lockdown of their campus.
November 26, 2022
Student protesters at Sichuan International Studies University sang “The Internationale.”
Male student: What’s wrong with singing “The Internationale”? Is there a problem with that?
November 26, 2022
Peking University students sang “The Internationale” to protest lockdowns.
Protesters singing the Chinese lyrics to “The Internationale”: The blood in my chest has boiled over / We must fight for the truth!
November 26, 2022
Student protesters from Sun Yat-Sen University in Guangzhou sang “Boundless Oceans, Vast Skies” [a 1993 Cantonese song by the Hong Kong band Beyond].
Protesters singing: It’s easy to give up your dreams / And even if someday, it’s just you and me …
November 26-27, 2022
Between the evening of November 26 to the early morning hours of November 27, 2022, protests took place at Shanghai’s Wulumuqi Road M (Urumqi Middle Road), and were violently suppressed by the police.
A large group of protesters gathered near the Urumqi Middle Road street sign, shouting: We want democracy, not dictatorship! We want democracy, not dictatorship!
Seen from a slightly different angle, protesters gathered near the Urumqi Middle Road street sign shout: Give me liberty or give me death! Give me liberty or give me death!
A small group of young people in the midst of a larger crowd sing the English lyrics to “Do You Hear the People Sing?”: When the beating of your heart / Echoes the beating of the drums / There is a life about to start when tomorrow comes.
As several lines of police officers look on, a large group of protesters shout: CCP step down! Xi Jinping step down!
A line of police officers in reflective vests and surgical masks stands face to face with the crowd, as a man shouts: The People’s Police should “Serve the People” and devote their skills to the nation instead of standing here besieging your own people! Serve the People! Why are you standing against the people?
Near a white police van, police officers scuffle with members of the crowd, who shout slogans demanding the release of detained protesters.
Crowd: Let them go! Let them go!
Man scuffling with officer: Fuck! You’ve got no right to arrest me!
Crowd: Let them go! Let them go!
Later, a group of workers took down the Urumqi Middle Road street sign and carried it away.
Male bystander: Why did they take down the street sign?
November 27, 2022
In Shanghai, a man holding a bouquet of flowers went to Urumqi Middle Road to encourage everyone to “be brave,” after which he was forcibly arrested by the police.
Man [addressing the protesters and shaking his fist in the air]: We have to be brave! Am I committing a crime by bringing flowers? [He lowers his mask, and a policeman points at him to move aside.] Am I breaking the law? [The crowd cheers him on.] They won’t dare to arrest us.
November 27, 2022
In Beijing, after a female student protested by standing at the entrance to the Tsinghua University canteen and holding a blank sheet of A4 paper, Tsinghua students held an on-campus demonstration and shouted, “Democracy and rule of law! Freedom of expression!”
Black-clad man in face mask: Don’t film this.
Woman [off-screen; trying to film the female student with the A4 paper]: Why not? Why can’t I film it?
[The man raises his hand and approaches her in a threatening manner.]
Woman [backing away]: All right, all right!
A large crowd of Tsinghua University protesters shout: Democracy and rule of law! Freedom of expression!
Female protester speaking to the crowd: If we’re … so afraid of being arrested that we don’t speak out, then I think our People will be disappointed in us.
Female protester shouting to the crowd: From this day forward, I’ll no longer suck off the powers that be!
November 27, 2022
At Southwest Jiaotong University in Chengdu, Sichuan province, students gathered to mourn the victims of the fire in Urumqi, and demanded “Democracy, rule of law, and freedom of expression.”
A somber group of students shout: Democracy and rule of law! Freedom of expression!
November 27, 2022
In Beijing, students at Renmin University marched through campus, demanding an end to the lockdown.
Students shouting: End the lockdown! End the lockdown! End the lockdown!
November 27, 2022
In Wuhan, citizens marched through the streets, dismantling fences and barricades along the way. Local authorities dispatched police to suppress the protests.
Woman, observing the protesters below, from a high window: Are you seeing this? They’re tearing down barricades everywhere.
[Street-level images of a police van driving slowly through a crowd.]
November 27, 2022
In Chengdu, citizens protested by holding up blank sheets of paper and shouting slogans. Local authorities dispatched police to suppress the protests.
Crowd shouting: Give me liberty or give me death!
Woman facing off with a row of masked police officers: You can’t face me, can you? Do you dare look me in the eye? Do you dare? Do you? Do you have any idea how badly people have suffered during these lockdowns? Do you even know?
Man in the crowd: Why did you become cops in the first place?
Huge crowd shouting: Reopen the country! Stop mass COVID-testing!
[People start cursing and shouting as police try to break up the protest.]
November 27, 2022
In Chengdu, a female protester made a speech: “Without the support of the people, you’re nothing but a hammer!”
Woman giving a speech to the crowd: If not for the people, where would you be? Without the support of the people, you’re nothing! [The crowd cheers.] Nothing but a hammer!
November 27, 2022
In Guangzhou, citizens held a protest in Haizhu Square and sang “Glory Days,” a classic political anthem [dedicated to Nelson Mandela] by the Hong Kong band Beyond.
A large crowd, holding candles and singing: A lifetime of setbacks and struggles, but you had faith you could change the future—who else could have done that?
November 27, 2022
In Beijing, residents held a “blank paper protest” at Liangma Bridge, and passing cars honked their horns in support.
A large crowd, holding blank sheets of paper and chanting the slogan: We want freedom, not COVID tests!
November 27, 2022
Beijing residents demonstrated in support of Shanghai’s Urumqi Middle Road protesters.
Crowd: Stay strong, Shanghai! Release the Shanghai protesters!
November 27, 2022
Two protesters in Beijing scoff at unfounded accusations of “foreign forces” meddling in the protests.
Man [shouting angrily]: By “foreign forces,” are you referring to Marx and Engels?!
Man [more calmly]: Excuse me, but was that fire in Xinjiang set by “foreign forces?” Was that bus in Guizhou overturned by “foreign forces?”
Man two [grabbing the loudspeaker]: Were all of you summoned here by “foreign forces?”
Crowd roars: No!
Man two: We can’t even access the foreign internet! Where would these “foreign forces” have come from? How would they even get in touch with us?
Another man: We only have “domestic forces” who want to keep us from gathering!
November 27, 2022
In Kunming and Dali, Yunnan province, people pasted blank sheets of paper on their clothes and guitars, and marched through the streets singing protest songs.
[A young couple stroll through an alley singing, “Do You Hear the People Sing?”]
Marchers strumming guitars sing “The Internationale”: Arise, you prisoners of starvation! Arise, you wretched of the earth!
November 27, 2022
Residents of Taipei, Taiwan, held a demonstration in Liberty Square in support of the mainland Chinese student protesters.
Demonstrators: All Chinese people, everywhere—stay strong!
November 27, 2022
Outside the Chinese embassy in London, England, Chinese students and overseas Chinese demonstrated in support of the protesters.
Crowd [holding signs and shouting]: We want freedom! We want democracy! Long live human rights!
November 27, 2022
In Glasgow, Scotland, Chinese students held a memorial to mourn the victims of the Urumqi fire.
[Images of flowers, candles, and handwritten signs of support.]
November 27, 2022
In Paris, France, Chinese students and overseas Chinese demonstrated in support of the Chinese protests.
Crowd singing: Do You Hear the People Sing? / Singing the song of angry men / It is the music of a people who will not be slaves again!
November 28, 2022
A lone, black-clad protester in Wuzhen, Zhejiang province, walked down a street with her hands in chains and a piece of black tape over her mouth, holding a blank white piece of paper.
[Video footage of the silent protester walking down the street, with passersby observing.]
November 28, 2022
Students at the Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) held up blank papers in support of the protest.
[Video footage of a large group of students holding up blank A4 papers to their faces.]
November 28, 2022
Citizens in Hong Kong’s Central District held up blank white papers to mourn the victims of the fire in Urumqi. Hong Kong police arrived at the scene to record the participants’ information.
[Video footage of a police officer raising a small video camera overhead to film the faces of several silent protesters.]
November 28, 2022
In Hangzhou, a resident with a bouquet of chrysanthemums was surrounded by police, who confiscated his bouquet. Citizens protesting in front of a shopping mall were arrested by the police.
[Video footage of a man surrounded by police. A white-suited officer in PPE snatches the man’s bouquet of flowers, and an argument ensues.]
[Footage of police and protesters scuffling and arguing in front of a shopping mall]
Woman [crying]: The police are beating people!
November 28, 2022
Protesters shouted slogans outside the Chinese consulate in Toronto, Canada.
Crowd shouting: Chinese people, stay strong! Chinese people, revolt! Give me liberty or give me death! CCP, step down!
November 28, 2022
In Sydney, Australia, Chinese students and overseas Chinese demonstrated in support of the Urumqi Middle Road protesters.
Crowd shouting: Xi Jinping, step down! CCP, step down!
November 29, 2022
In the U.S., protesters gathered outside the Chinese Consulate General in New York to demonstrate in support of China’s protesters.
Protesters displaying posters and shouting: Allow public mourning! End the “zero-COVID” policy! Release our fellow activists! Ensure the people’s rights! We stand with our Chinese compatriots!
November 29, 2022
Chinese students at Columbia University held a protest and shouted the slogan, “CCP, step down!”
A large crowd of protesters, waving posters and banners, and shouting: CCP, step down!
November 29, 2022
A Chinese student from Columbia University gave a speech to a crowd of demonstrators: “We are the orphans of Tiananmen Square.”
Student giving a speech to the crowd:
We are the orphans of Tiananmen Square
We are the seedlings that sprout after the brushfire
We are those sunk at the bottom of the Yangtze River
We are those buried under that passenger train
We are the “ulterior motives” aboard that bus in Guizhou
We are the “destroyers of social stability” during that fire in Urumqi
We are the “low-end population” wandering through an age of prosperity
We are the “foreign forces” shouting in a darkened room
November 29, 2022
Student protesters at the University of California, Berkeley: “We are all foreign forces!”
Student one: No one organized this.
Student two: There are no “foreign forces!”
Student one: There are no “foreign forces,” none of us are.
Student three: All of us!
Several students, chiming in: Yes, all of us are [“foreign forces”]!
November 29, 2022
Chinese students at Harvard University held up blank sheets of paper during a protest, and shouted: “No more censorship!”
Student protesters: No more censorship! No more propaganda!
November 29, 2022
Chinese students at Cambridge University held a protest and shouted the slogan: “Xi Jinping, step down!”
Student protesters: Xi Jinping, step down! CCP, step down! Xi Jinping, step down! CCP, step down!
November 30, 2022
Chinese students and overseas Chinese gathered in Seoul, South Korea to support Chinese protesters.
Demonstrators shouting: We stand with our compatriots!
November 30, 2022
Chinese students and overseas Chinese in Tokyo, Japan, demonstrated in support of Chinese protesters.
A man [wearing a white plastic mask to obscure his features] speaking to the crowd: This gathering here—what’s it called? Freedom. All these different people expressing different opinions—what’s that called? Freedom.
December 4, 2022
Students at Wuhan University protested unreasonable COVID control measures, and demanded an open and public decision-making process and more information transparency.
Protesters shouting: A public process! Information transparency! A public process! Information transparency!
December 5, 2022
Students at Nanjing Tech University held a protest in opposition to a campus lockdown.
Student: Your authority derives from us students. It isn’t inherent to you! [crowd cheers]
December 6, 2022
At a student protest at Zhejiang University, a student from Xinjiang gave a speech.
Student from Xinjiang: I’m from Xinjiang. I just got here after more than 100 days of lockdown. In a temporary field hospital in Xinjiang, I wasn’t able to take a shower for 14 days. Do you call that “human dignity?” [crowd applauds]
December 10, 2022
Student protesters at Chongqing Medical University demanded that administrators give fair consideration to the students’ reasonable demands.
Students shouting: No more arbitrary lockdowns! Hear our reasonable demands!
December 10, 2022 – International Human Rights Day
Chinese students and overseas Chinese held protests in London, Amsterdam, Toronto, and other cities.
Woman speaking through a loudspeaker:
Can you truly remain indifferent?
Can you truly stand to look the other way?
You and me, you and he, you and us—
We’re all crammed onto the same bus bound for hell
And the direction of that bus, the steering wheel, has never been in our hands.
December 7, 2022
China’s State Council issued the “Ten New Guidelines.”
No longer was there any mention of “tenaciously pursuing a dynamic zero-Covid policy.”
[Still images of A4 protests and of protesters being suppressed by the police.]
New measures included:
- Various forms of temporary closures and controls must not be employed.
- Proof of negative nucleic acid tests and health codes will no longer be checked for cross-regional migrants.
- Asymptomatic infected persons and mild cases who are able to isolate at home are normally to be quarantined at home.
Protests have continued in Chongqing, Sichuan, Jiangxi, Jiangsu, Fujian, and other areas.
Overseas students and other Chinese individuals living abroad continue to explore various ways to express solidarity with the protesters in mainland China.
May China soon be free.
This video is dedicated to all of the protesters.
Credits:
The background music for this video is the song, “If You Won’t Take the Lead.”
The copyright of all works in this video compilation belong to the original creators.
China Digital Times only archives original works in order to fight against China’s online censorship. [Chinese]
source https://chinadigitaltimes.net/2022/12/voices-of-protest-if-not-for-the-people-where-would-you-be/
Friday 23 December 2022
Amid Arrests, A4 Protesters Show Resolve, Seek Solidarity Abroad
In the month since China erupted in a series of nationwide public protests, incited by a deadly fire in Urumqi and fueled by anger towards harsh “zero-COVID” policies, those involved in the protest movement have taken stock of their progress and setbacks. The CCP has silently retaliated against many who took part in the demonstrations, but the rare opportunity for collective action has already inspired new forms of political consciousness that transcend domestic and international borders.
Within China, the government has leveraged its sophisticated surveillance apparatus to identify and detain many individuals who participated in the protests. AFP reported that one protester in Guangzhou was detained for at least nine days, with one lawyer stating that at least six other protesters in two cities had been held for a week or longer. “Now that it has been proven that excessive pandemic prevention was a mistake, and since the country has abandoned its ‘zero-COVID’ policy, these young people should be allowed to return to their homes,” a Guangzhou-based lawyer told NGOCN. “Everyone should know that these young people who were arrested are the most cherished part of our country.” Eva Rammeloo from TIME shared the stories of several protesters who were maltreated in detention:
It is not known exactly how many people were arrested. But protesters who were released tell TIME stories of their ordeal. “They pushed me against a police car, pulled me down on the street, and hurt my head,” says Chun, 27, who was rounded up with dozens of other protesters during and following the demonstration. He adds that they were strapped to chairs with their wrists and ankles tied, and that cigarette butts and bottles were thrown at them. In a Nov. 29 statement, the government said it would “resolutely crack down” on “activities by hostile forces.”
Chun says that officers demanded they strip naked and police taunted them with humiliating remarks. “When someone mentioned basic human rights, the police took it as a joke,” adds Jin, 21, who was also arrested following the vigil. Both say that most who were detained alongside them were held for over 24 hours in rooms that were too small to lay down in. The lights were also left on all night, making it impossible to sleep, Chun and Jin say.
[…] Sitting in her family’s living room in early December, Xia resolutely shakes her head when asked if she would go and protest on the street if they happen again. “Much too dangerous,” she says. [Source]
The Economist described the government’s crackdown on those sharing information about the protests online, and their resolve to persist:
Chinese authorities are using more intrusive methods that span the digital and physical worlds. Police have searched handsets for banned apps or protest-related images and contacted protesters identified via mobile-phone location data. Teacher Li [who played a pivotal role by sharing videos of the protests on Twitter] says police have visited his parents in China several times, presenting them with a list of his tweets as “criminal evidence” and threatening to block them from sending him money. “The psychological pressure is great,” he says. “But this account isn’t just about our family. It’s about the well-being of countless Chinese people. So I won’t stop.” [Source]
Now that the government has abandoned its longstanding “zero-COVID” policies, protesters and citizens alike are eager to hold officials accountable. “[B]eneath the relief is a collective and profound trauma that will not be easy to heal. Gripped with grief, anxiety and depression, people want a national reckoning of what went wrong,” wrote New York Times columnist Li Yuan. “Everybody I talked to believes that the government should apologize, but no one expects it will.” Despite widespread comparisons to the 1989 anti-government protests in Tiananmen Square and elsewhere, the current movement faces a regime under Xi Jinping whose leadership personnel are less openly divided than those thirty years ago, leaving fewer political opportunities for protesters to exploit. However, as Orville Schell wrote in Foreign Affairs, the A4 revolution (so named because many protesters displayed blank sheets of A4 paper rather than written protest signs) has shattered the illusion of government control:
To hear voices calling for Xi and the CCP to step down suggests that an elusive but important psychological line may have been crossed. But Xi is not a leader who accepts lèse majesté easily, and he will most certainly take umbrage and seek retribution.
[…T]he events that have been playing out reveal that just underneath the crust of order maintained by the CCP, there is a molten core of alienation. Totalitarian control mechanisms may have prevented people from openly expressing their outrage, but they have not prevented anger from quietly pooling up beneath the seemingly orderly surface. And historically, when such pressure has become too great, this molten core has erupted in surprising ways. [Source]
Protesters outside of China continue to keep the movement alive, despite the dangers of speaking out publicly. Last week, a U.S. federal court arrested and charged a Chinese student accused of harassing a Chinese activist who posted a pro-democracy flier on their college campus. “I will chop your bastard hand off […] I already called the tipoff line in the country, the public security agency will go greet your family,” the accused harasser wrote in a WeChat group. But as an anonymous special correspondent reported in Foreign Policy, Chinese students in the diaspora remain motivated to sustain the movement:
“It feels wrong not to show up,” Zhu, a public health student from Shanghai, told Foreign Policy later. “I have the privilege to live a comfortable life here in the U.S., while people back home are dying from zero-COVID policies.”
[…] While protesters abroad still face significant risks that forbid them to speak more openly, the recent protests have offered a sense of hope for many.
“If we build a stronger diaspora community,” Ava said, “we can try to support the domestic resistance better.” [Source]
Protests outside of China occurred in over 20 cities around the world. In ChinaFile, Yangyang Chen described the Chinese diaspora’s political awakening and visions of a different homeland:
Removed from the immediate demands of COVID restrictions and out of the iron grip of the home government, the mostly spontaneous remarks at overseas Chinese rallies have been a search for language: to contend with the legacies of empire that haunt the borderlands, to wrestle one’s national identity from the monopolizing powers of the state, to seize cultural symbols not yet claimed by the ruling party, and to uncover political expression for visions of a different China. At the vigil I attended, a few recited verses by contemporary Chinese poets. One quoted Mencius on the people’s right to topple tyranny. Another, in a passionate vilification of Xi’s one-man reign, spoke in a mixture of Mandarin and English. The lack of polish or preparedness was not a mark of weakness but a sign of potential. For many Chinese youths, this past week has been a moment of political awakening. A taboo is broken. A muffled tongue ventures its first cry. Vocabulary and fluency will take time. [Source]
One new development among Chinese diaspora mobilizations has been a gradual public reckoning with the Uyghur struggle. In the early days of the protests, Uyghur activists criticized the limited recognition of the Uyghurs in Han Chinese-led protests against the CCP’s political repression. As time went on, some activist groups endeavored to center marginalized groups in their demonstrations and organized panel discussions exploring the potential for greater solidarity between Han Chinese and Uyghurs. While there is still a long way to go, Rachel Cheung, writing for VICE World News, described the promising initial steps that overseas Chinese students are taking to support Uyghurs and other groups repressed by the CCP:
“Having relatively more freedom and resources, we are able to know what happened to Uyghur people,” one of the Chinese students [from the group Not Your Little Pink] that raised the proposal [to end Xinjiang internment camps] told VICE World News, speaking anonymously to avoid retaliation. The student stressed the need for overseas Chinese nationals to address China’s repression of Uyghurs, given the privilege and freedom they have, but also noted that it is not an easy task.
“They’re going through the process of unlearning everything they were taught when they were back in China,” they said. “Especially for folks that just arrived, they show a lot more resistance and hesitation in engaging in ‘sensitive issues’ about China, because what they were taught were so different.”
As a result of these efforts, [U.S.-based Chinese human rights activist Zhu Xun] said many protesters, who are starting to become politically aware, are also confronting the issue for the first time. “Many are just beginners taking baby steps,” Zhu said.
[…] “Ultimately, social movements can’t create qualitative changes. It requires community organizing, mutual engagement and dialogue over a long period,” Zhu said. “This is just the beginning.” [Source]
The quote: “Meaningful solidarity is walking shoulder to shoulder, is not to come together only in points of shared view of oppression. Being in conversation with each other regardless… Make decisions with those reference points of who you are in relation to those solidarities.”
— Ting (@tingguowrites) December 21, 2022
thanks for making this happen!
thought I'd share two of my fav quotes on hope and fear:
Lu Xun: "Despair is as hollow and deceptive as hope"
Hannah Arendt: “… the beginning of something so unexpectedly and unpredictably new that neither hope nor fear could have anticipated it” https://t.co/eXKRqlo1Up— Chenchen Zhang 🤦🏻♀️ (@chenchenzh) December 21, 2022
source https://chinadigitaltimes.net/2022/12/amid-arrests-a4-protesters-show-resolve-seek-solidarity-abroad/
Thursday 22 December 2022
Tuesday 20 December 2022
Netizen Voices: “What Do You Think of the Government’s Lifting of COVID Controls?”
The recent abrupt end to China’s “zero-COVID” policy has left many citizens feeling confused and dismayed, unsure how to best protect themselves and their families. There have been reports of Omicron outbreaks in many Chinese cities, long waits at hospitals and clinics, shortages of fever-reducing medicines and home test kits at pharmacies, and backlogs at some mortuaries and crematoriums. The situation has prompted a great deal of online discussion, as netizens trade stories and advice about dealing with COVID symptoms, finding medicine and test kits, or taking care of sick family members. There has also been some debate about whether the central and local governments have done a good job in carrying out the policy switch.
In this now-deleted post to the Quora-like Zhihu.com, Zhihu user @张峰 (Zhang Feng) offers some thoughts in response to the question “What do you think of the government’s lifting of COVID controls?”
Zhang Feng begins by expressing his support for lifting the controls, and notes that China can learn from the experience of other countries, and cities such as Hong Kong, that have moved away from their initial “zero-COVID” policies. He also expresses his disappointment that certain essential preparatory measures seem to have been neglected—for example, increasing the number of ICU beds, diverting minor cases away from hospitals and toward local clinics, ensuring an adequate supply of medications and test kits at pharmacies, and establishing rotas for doctors and medical personnel to avoid understaffing, among others. In the end, he likens the government’s haphazard approach to re-opening to an irresponsible, peevish, destructive child who lashes out when challenged.
The post and all response comments have been scrubbed from Zhihu, but they have been archived on the CDT Chinese site. A partial translation appears below.
So, what’s the current situation in Beijing? The streets are deserted. Why are they deserted? Because no one dares to go outside for fear of being infected. And why are they so afraid of being infected? Because all the pharmacies are sold out of basic medicines, even fever-reducing meds and antigen test kits—is that normal? Folks everywhere are grousing about pharmacies, hospitals, unscrupulous businessmen, and greedy blood-sucking capitalists … I’m not sure whether to describe these folks as kindhearted or dimwitted.
Observing all this, I wonder if everyone else feels the same way that I do. Shouldn’t they have thought of these things [beforehand], shouldn’t they have done something about them? The end result is just …. baffling. It’s like we’re dealing with a rebellious junior-high-school student who has no sense of responsibility, suffers from an extreme level of paranoia, and is completely immersed in the fantasy that he’s the world’s most powerful superhero. He’s so prickly and insecure that when you suggest that he cut down on playing video games and focus on his studies, he smashes the TV set to bits (while you frantically raise your phone in the air so that he doesn’t stomp it underfoot), then he rips out every page from the extracurricular reading, lights a bonfire, and with blue veins practically bursting from his forehead, shouts, “There, are you happy now? Huh? Are you happy now?” [Chinese]
A selection of Zhihu user comments in response to the post are translated below:
tangscu：I agree. They’re fighting a battle they’re completely unprepared for.
loyalty：It’s like they relaxed controls out of sheer spite.
忧郁的臀哈哈：All other countries do is copy us, so why should we bother copying them?
[…] 老鹰抓小鸡：They were so busy locking things down, it’s like they never thought there’d come a day when things would open back up.
团大人：A clever sixth-grade student gets the highest test score in the whole school. He spends three years doing sixth-grade-level work and getting top marks, while all the other students take the entrance exam and move up to junior high school. The clever student finally decides to take the junior high school entrance exam, but discovers that he can only answer sixth-grade-level questions, because he never bothered to prepare for the junior-high-school level questions.
[…] 蜜桃：The way you described it in that last paragraph is so right. That’s exactly how it is.
90后空巢老人：A fitting summary. This whole operation can be summed up in one word: “baffling.”
[…] Jiangx：I don’t think that opening up prompted the outbreak; it was the outbreak that prompted the opening-up.
[…] 骄傲的胖哥：Caught between a rock and a hard place. [Chinese]
source https://chinadigitaltimes.net/2022/12/netizen-voices-what-do-you-think-of-the-governments-lifting-of-covid-controls/
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)