Reflections on Chen Guangcheng’s Escape

First off, apologies to everyone for the lack of updates as of late. In part, it’s because I’ve been trying to keep a lower profile since certain CCTV hosts threatened to sue me, but mostly I’ve just been extremely busy with the film and a number of personal things. That will remain true for a few weeks at least, but please stay tuned, as I’ve got some good stuff in the cannon for later.

Anyway, now that Chen’s been safely in the US for a while and the American right-wing seems to have abandoned its utterly idiotic quest to paint him as a pro-life Christian figure, it seems as good a time as any to reflect on Chen’s escape or, more to the point, the collective reaction to it, and what, exactly, went wrong.

The mistake that I think almost everyone made was assuming that Chen was emotionally and mentally stable enough to be handling the international media or making decisions about his own life and his family’s lives within days of his harrowing escape from nearly two years of torture and isolation. I was taking the latest word on what Chen had said a bit too seriously, without fully considering what he had been through and what effect that probably had on his mental and physical state. Nor was I giving adequate consideration to the fact that he probably wasn’t aware that his every word was being amplified and broadcast as gospel to the world. I wasn’t that harsh in my criticism of the US Embassy at the time, but my concerns about the its handling of the case proved to be unwarranted.

(I want to stress, also, that it’s not my intention to criticize the media for broadcasting Chen’s statements as news. This was, after all, a massive story, and what its central player was saying is undeniably news. If anything, perhaps those closest to Chen should have advised him not to speak with the media for a little while, or not published everything he said live on Twitter. But in their position, I suspect I would have done the exact same thing. Basically, it was a very difficult situation for everyone.)

That said, and with the caveat that I have no inside info whatsoever, it would certainly seem as though US officials may have made the same mistake. One gets the impression they may have been rushing to resolve the situation before the SED talks, which is totally understandable from a policy perspective. But from a psychological perspective, it would almost certainly have been better to give Chen more time. That may not have been possible — I don’t know — but Chen being left alone in the hospital after he left the embassy would seem to be a sign that the US perhaps hadn’t fully considered his mental state and how he might feel abandoned in a situation like that.

Emotions certainly played a role in my own reaction to the story, too. Obviously, Chen’s case is one I had been following for quite a while, and his unexpected escape and subsequent release from the embassy all took me completely by surprise. I think it was an emotional time for a lot of us who have been following the case closely, and in my own case at the very least, it probably led me to draw conclusions — or at least to suggest potential conclusions — too quickly before the situation had been given a chance to play out.

That said, I maintain that my cynicism about the Chinese government’s commitment to holding up its side of the bargain was entirely warranted. Although US diplomats entering the picture certainly changed the situation, the fact remains that there is virtually nothing in Chen’s past to indicate the government would have any interest in treating him fairly, redressing his grievances, or allowing him to leave the country. Trust must be earned, and although (despite some suggestions to the contrary) I do not believe China’s government to be entirely evil, it had done nothing to earn any sort of trust with regards to Chen’s case. Aside from bringing his family to Beijing — albeit as a bargaining chip of sorts to get him out of the embassy — there were no signs of good faith ((I do not consider the Foreign Ministry’s statements to be a sign of anything. Yes, it said Chen would be allowed to leave China, but it also said Melissa Chan broke “relevant laws” and that Al Jazeera’s English bureau in Beijing is operating normally, among numerous other lies…)), and more than a few indications of bad faith. Chen’s phone service was interfered with, journalists were barred from visiting him, and even US diplomats were kept out at times. Chaoyang Hospital — a fairly unpleasant place under the best of circumstances ((my wife had surgery there once; it was an awful experience.)) — turned into a bizarre sort of prison with helmeted security guards and plainclothes police roaming the halls.

Of course, Chen ultimately was allowed to leave (though I doubt he’ll be allowed to return). Under the circumstances, that was the right move for China and the government should be applauded for making it ((Then it should be condemned for failing to make it years earlier, failing to prosecute Chen’s captors, and failing to protect Chen’s family in Shandong from the illegal and ongoing campaign of revenge for his escape.)). The cleanup of Chen’s home village and the disappearance of the guards there is a sign that the government may even be planning to investigate Chen’s imprisonment as it promised to, though Chen Kegui’s lawyers not being allowed to represent him is an extremely troubling sign. However, that doesn’t change the fact that prior to Chen’s flight out of China, there was plenty of precedent for pessimism and the only reason for optimism was that now the US was more directly involved, sort of. That turned out to be enough, but I don’t think it was at all unreasonable of me to be skeptical.

China’s Latest PR Fail?

You may recall last year, it was announced that China was spending bundles of money to create an advertisement designed to appeal to US audiences and turn the tide of US public opinion. All of China’s shiniest celebrities were called in, and then it all disappeared from the news.

But with Hu Jintao’s visit to Washington has come news that the advertisement is out, and now it, or at least clips of it, are being played on the giant screens in Times Square! So what did the Chinese government decide was the best way to convince Americans to like China? Observe:

http://www.tudou.com/v/sCuFz9rSQgM/v.swf

OK, maybe we’re not getting the whole picture from that news report, and we also can’t hear whatever audio will go with the ad, but it appears to consist of (1) shots of Chinese celebrities standing around and (2) a big 中国 (which Americans can’t read) next to a very tiny “China”. Um, what?

Actually, on the face of it, I sort of like the principle I imagine they started with: China has some cool, and unique, people, and Americans don’t really know that because China is some faceless “othery” place to them. This is true. However, this approach to introducing Chinese people to the US is, well, dumb.

First of all, regardless of what the audio says, the people are doing absolutely nothing in any of these shots, which makes them unmemorable and pointless. They don’t serve to illustrate anything other than that Chinese people exist, which was something Americans already knew. Seriously, you got together sixty of China’s most beautiful, famous people, and then asked them to stand around for a while?

(If you’re curious who, exactly, is standing around, check out this list the Baidu Beat folks have put together from the footage we have so far.)

Secondly, I wonder about the use of celebrities at all, given that 95% of the people in the video aren’t people Americans know or will be impressed by at all. I don’t think anyone is going to see that video and think, “Wow, Tan Dun is Chinese!” Most people have no clue who Tan Dun is, and those who do know him already know that he’s Chinese. As the one woman they ask about it in the news report above says, “I know Yao Ming, and uh, some of the supermodels…”

It is also worth pointing out that they obviously didn’t attempt to rework the ad at all to make it fit on those Times Square screens, so in many of the shots half of the names are obscured, people are cut out, etc. Bush league.

Maybe the audio somehow turns it into a captivating, mind-blowing coup d’etat somehow. But I highly doubt it.

It’s telling that at the end of that news report, the only American they ask about the ad as a whole says the advertisement is “moving” because it shows “where people work” and “their fields of interest.” Captivating!

I look forward to seeing the full video as it will air (or perhaps is already airing?) on US TV. But based on this quick introduction, this whole thing seems like a colossal waste of time and money. Can’t say that surprises me at all.

UPDATE: We now have the full video. It is even worse than I imagined, and I will write more about it later today or tomorrow, but in the interim, here it is for your (lack of) enjoyment. (Here’s a China-friendly version)

UPDATE 2: The release of the full video obliges me to add a couple things to my original assessment. First, the audio adds absolutely nothing to the video in terms of context, so I was right about that. Second, the design of the video itself is fairly flawed. Granted, we’re watching compressed web videos, so the colors are off and the resolution is low, but even at 420p, the names of the Chinese people in the video above are unreadable, and even the larger white text is very difficult to read when it is against a white backdrop. Presumably, if I were watching this on a large HD TV, these issues would be resolved, but it seems odd to design an advertisement with text too small to read in a web video and (I suspect) also to small to read on a standard-def TV when sitting a reasonable distance away.

There is one angle from which we might consider this ad a win for China, see the comments of Christopher C. Heselton below for more details on that. It’s possible that’s all their goal was with the ad, and if so, they have probably succeeded. But it’s equally clear that this ad is utterly meaningless to foreigners. Hard to know for sure whether or not the government really cares.

Netizen Thoughts on the DPRK/South Korea Situation

You may be aware that yesterday, South Korean officials announced the results of the joint investigation conducted by inspectors from several countries into the sinking of a South Korean warship near waters that are contested by the DPRK (i.e., North Korea). 46 South Korean navy members died as a result of the sinking. To no one’s surprise, these investigations revealed that the torpedo ((In the process of writing this piece, I learned that the Chinese word for torpedo is 鱼雷, which might be very loosely rendered as something like “fish lightning”. Awesome.))that sunk the warship almost certainly came from a small North Korean submarine. The US has condemned the attack and promised there will be consequences for North Korea. China has been more reticent, although news stories in State-approved media have printed stories on the damning results of the report, as well as the DPRK’s fervent denial and accusations of fraud.

On his blog, Zhang Wen has summarized the main points of the story, and then kick-started a discussion. He writes:

“What’s surprising is that with a story this big, China’s three main internet news portals didn’t mention it [immediately yesterday morning,] (they did in the afternoon). Just now I saw this story of Sina, but when I clicked on the link I got the “This page does not exist” error message, and soon [the link on the front page] disappeared.

As far as I’m concerned, there’s no need to hide it; using this kind of measure in the internet age is really too little. And that’s leaving aside the fact that what happens next on the Korean peninsula will affect all of us the most, and with ironclad proof in front of us and 46 lives lost, how should China continue to stand with North Korea?”

Zhang often poses open questions like this on his blog to start discussion. So far, this has attracted thirty responses, some of which we’ve translated below:

“Discussion after just these few days of investigation is rash. It took a year of investigation before the “South China Tiger” became the “Zhou Tiger” ((Reference to a recent scandal involving a faked photograph of the rare South China Tiger)), now that’s what you call thorough.”

“Having a guard dog can be a good thing, as sometimes it can bark and warn you, or do things that are inconvenient [but advantageous] for the owner to do. But there’s no use keeping a dog that brings disaster and bites the hand that feeds it. You often see stories in the news of fierce dogs that eat their owners. So it’s good to let others beat your dog, otherwise he won’t know the feeling of pain. If you spoil a dog he’ll be disloyal, and if you try to keep him from the kitchen he’ll always find a way in… [i.e., if it’s clear that China is restraining North Korea it may come back to hurt China in the future, but if China allows other countries to do this, it keeps North Korea in line for them]”

“So they found a fragment of the torpedo casing with the serial number. North Koran probably didn’t expect that when they were denying this yesterday.”

“We must not associate ourselves with renegade countries [like North Korea]!”

“This never happened. Hehe.”

[In response to the above commenter:] “According to my father, as long as North Korea doesn’t admit to anything, this won’t go anywhere too serious.”

“Despicable, and it’s not just the DRPK that’s being despicable.”

“Fuck, if it was China’s warship that was attacked, I fear there would have to be some kind of response…”

“My guess is three words: same as before.”

“[Another news story today] said that China is supporting sanctions for Iran. I’m not surprised by this, because although they are sanctions, the sanctions that came out of over twenty rounds of Sino-US debate are very far from the original plan the Americans wanted in February. This process has killed two birds with one stone, in that it has served China’s interests and provided a big discount on the “sanctions”. Comparing this to North Korea, I would estimate that at the end of the day, the results will be similar to what happened with the Iran sanctions.”

What do you think? We may translate further comments as Zhang Wen’s blog accrues them. Also, today is your last chance to fill out our reader survey if you haven’t already.